The Devonshire Manuscript, Farewell all my wellfare

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The Devonshire Manuscript facsimile 9v (Image: DMSEG, CC BY-SA 3.0) |
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The Devonshire Manuscript facsimile 10r (Image: DMSEG, CC BY-SA 3.0) |
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f. [9v]

1    3# Ffarewell all my wellfare
2    my shwe ys trode awry
3    and thys now may I karke & care
4    to syng lullay by by
5    Alas what shall I do there do to
6    there ys no shyffte to helpe me now

7    Who made hytt suche a fence
8    to love for love agayn
9 {p'}{{th}+t+}    god wott that my pretence
10    was but to ease hys payn
11    ffor I had ruthe to se hys wo
12    alas more fole why dyd I so

13    Ffor he frome me ys gone
14    & makes{es} there at a game
15    & hathe leffte me Alone
16    to suffer sorow & shame
17    alas he ys vnkynd dowtles
18    to leve me thus all comfortles

f. [10r]

19    Hytt ys A grevows smarte
20    to suffer paynes{es} & sorowe
21    but most grevyd my hart
22    he leyde hys feythe to borow
23    & falshode hathe hys feythe & trowthe
24    & he forsworne by many a nothe an oath

25    All ye lovers perde
26    hathe cawse to blame hys dede
27    Whyche shall example be
28    to lett yow off yowre spede
29    let neuer{u'} woman A gayn
30    trust to suche wordes{es} as men can fayn

31    Ffor I vnto my coste
32    am warnyng to yow all
33    that{{th}+t+} they whom you trust most
34    sonest dysceyve yow shall
35    But complaynt cannot redresse
36    of my gret greff the gret excesse

fynys s

Commentary

Attributed to Sir Thomas Wyatt,1] this poem was entered by [H2. This poem was written from a woman’s perspective.[2] Rebholz notes that the speaker may be lamenting an unfaithful lover; in particular, line 4 -- that is, "To sing lullay by by" -- denotes her dilemma by alluding to the lullabies she sings to her illegitimate child.[3]

H2 paid particular attention to the presentation of this poem: it begins on the verso of f.9 and continues on the recto of f.10 (facing pages). The stanzas are evenly spaced for the maximum visual effect of balance. "Farewell all my wellfare" is one of seventeen entries in which Margaret Douglas marks: “and thys.” Paul Remley suggests that these annotations relate to another in-text annotation of hers, “lerne but to syng it” (81r), and may indicate a group of texts to be learned for entertaining.[4]

Works Cited

• ↑ R.A. Rebholz, ed., Sir Thomas Wyatt: The Complete Poems (London: Penguin, 1978), 311.
• ↑ We should, however, exercise caution in ascribing a female author to the poem. For a discussion of female voices, see Julia Boffey, "Women Authors and Women's Literacy in Fourteenth- and Fifteenth-Century England," in Women and Literature in Britain, 1150-1500, ed. Carole M. Meale (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 169. and Elizabeth D. Harvey, Ventriloquized Voices: Feminist Theory and English Renaissance Texts (London: Routledge, 1992), 15-24.
• ↑ Rebholz, 536.
• ↑ Paul Remley, "Mary Shelton and Her Tudor Literary Milieu," in Rethinking the Henrician Era: Essays on Early Tudor Texts and Contexts, ed. Peter C. Herman (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994), 40-77.

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