¹ Unless otherwise specified references to, and quotations from, Chaucer are to Robinson, Fred Norris, The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer (1st ed. Boston 1933; 2nd revised edition in advanced preparation). MS Corpus Christi College Cambridge 61 (C) is the basis of both the English text and the Latin Argument. Stanzaic divisions are according to Skeat, Walter William, The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer II: Boethius and Troilus (Oxford 1894), essentially based on C, including the Latin, and Root, Robert Kilburn, The Book of Troilus and Criseyde (3rd printing, Princeton 1945, with a few corrections [1st printing 1926]), also essentially based on C, including the Latin Argument. Google Scholar

² Described in Robinson 1023-24; Root lii-lxi.Google Scholar

³ Robinson, 1030; Root 388 n. (cf. 554 n. 1498).Google Scholar

⁴ Text according to TC in Robinson 1030 n. 1498; Skeat II 404, with variants from TC manuscripts; Root 388-9, with similar variants. Shannon, Edgar Finley, Chaucer and the Roman Poets (Cambridge, Mass. 1929) 154, writes briefly and somewhat oddly of this as though the Latin were Chaucer's; at any rate he assumed that the English was based altogether on this Latin Argument — which is not the case, as will appear below.Google Scholar

⁵ I am most grateful to my colleague Professor Eric Alfred Havelock for controlling the translation of this as well as of the following Arguments and thus for saving me several mistakes in comprehension of the Latin.Google Scholar

⁶ Robinson, 559–60; Root 387-8.Google Scholar

⁷ As suggested above, the following Latin text is what one may call Chaucer's with proper names often quite quaintly distorted. What may be viewed as the standard edition is that of Queck, Gustav, Publius Papinius Statius II: Thebais (Leipzig 1854) 3–4 (not included in Klotz, , ed. cit. infra); more recently Max Manitius transcribed the lines from a Dresden MS of Statius (Kgl. Bibl. Dc 156): Rheinisches Museum N.F. 57 (1902) 397f. The text was also printed in the Valpy edition ‘in usum Delphini’ (London 1824) 592 and by Jean Augustin Amar and Nicolas Éloi Lemaire, , Thebais Publii Papini Statii (Paris 1825) 2. For comparison with Chaucer I give here the text according to Queck: Google Scholar

To complete the account of Arguments to the Thebaid, I also give here (with accompanying English translation) an Argument ‘ex vetustissimo codice Toletano’ not used by Chaucer (original Delphin edition [that of Claudius Beraldus: Paris 1685] I [2]: Bipontine edition [1785] 150 [neither of these editions carries the other 12-line argument]; Valpy 592; Amar-Lemaire 2; Queck 3): Google Scholar

[In the first book the understanding between the brothers (Eteocles and Polynices) is broken off. The second book rejects both alliance and alternate rule. The third inflames the Dorian camp against Thebes. In the fourth Mars in warfare carries off Greeks on all sides. The fifth tells of the grief and sorrows of Hypsipyle. The sixth conducts the games at the funeral of Archemorus (= Opheltes), the seventh (presents) besieged Thebes and the soothsayer's tomb. In the eighth Tydeus perishes from Menalippus’ javelin. The ninth gives Hippomedon and the Arcadian (= Parthenopaeus) to the earth by a weapon. The tenth pierced Capaneus with a lightening bolt. The eleventh joins the brothers in a common funeral. The last shows Theseus conquering Ogygian Thebes.] Google Scholar

⁸ Apparently distorted from Lemni ‘of Lemnos’ (Manitius’ Dresden MS actually showed lenni); note the reading Lemniadum Furiae in Root 388-9.Google Scholar

⁹ This extra verse appears in Arg. ad IX, below, whence it has been taken and incorporated in the TC text of Arg. Google Scholar

¹⁰ George Lane Hamilton in Modern Language Notes 33 (1908) 127 col. 2, and Wise, Boyd Ashby, The Influence of Statius upon Chaucer (Johns Hopkins dissertation [1905]; Baltimore 1911) 34-5.Google Scholar

¹¹ So Root 554 n. 1498.Google Scholar

¹² Ibid. Google Scholar

¹³ Robinson, 949 n. 1485.Google Scholar

¹⁴ The arguments of Bks. II-V, VII-XII were edited with variants by Klotz, Alfred, ‘Die Argumente zur Thebais des Statius,’ Archiv für lateinische Lexicographie und Grammatik 15 (1908) 261–74 (on approximate date see p. 269), thence (with the addition of the argument of Bk. VI) in his P. Papini Stati Thebais (Leipzig 1908) 476-82; note p. 475: ‘Libri primi argumentum deest.’ The argument of Bk. VI does not appear in the older MS tradition, being found only in the ‘recentiorum librorum turba’ (so Klotz, , ed. cit. lxxii); on its stylistic differences from the other ten arguments,s ee Klotz, , Archiv 15.261.Google Scholar

¹⁵ For the reader's convenience I have here and below given line-references to the portions of the Thebaid which appear to lie behind the epitomized Arguments. I have also supplied in parentheses identifications of certain names and appellatives which may not be clear to non-Hellenists; for this I have made much use of the very full and excellent ‘Index Nominum’ in Klotz’ edition of the Thebaid. Google Scholar

¹⁶ Understand divos cernuntque as if divosque cernunt with proceeding comma to set the phrase off from explorant (Havelock).Google Scholar

¹⁷ Read relevataque membra with Queck vs. Klotz’ unscanable membraque levata (Havelock).Google Scholar