The authenticity of the prologue is questionable. It is found in one manuscript only; other manuscripts give other prologues, more plainly not Chaucer's than this; and some manuscripts have merely a colophon to the effect that "Here endeth the Franklin's Tale and beginneth the Physician's Tale without a prologue." The Tale itself is the well-known story of Virginia, with several departures from the text of Livy. Chaucer probably followed the "Romance of the Rose" and Gower's "Confessio Amantis," in both of which the story is found.英文原著 · 《The Canterbury Tales》
The Prologue here given was transferred by Tyrwhitt from the place, preceding the Squire's Tale, which it had formerly occupied; the Shipman's Tale having no Prologue in the best manuscripts.英文原著 · 《The Canterbury Tales》
Under the yarde: under the rod; in pupillage; a phrase properly used of children, but employed by the Clerk in the prologue to his tale. See note 1 to the Prologue to the Clerk's Tale.英文原著 · 《The Canterbury Tales》
the pyramids and returned home. ______
1. See the prologue to the Salic Law. Leibnitz says, in his treatise of the origin of the Franks, that this law was made before the reign of Clovis: but it could not be before the Franks had quitted Germany, for at that time they did not understand the Latin tongue. See Gregory of Tours. See the prologue to the Law of the Bavarians, and that to the Salic Law. Lex Angliorum Werinorum, hoc est Thuringorum. They did not know how to write.英文原著 · 《The Spirit of Laws》
They were made by Euric, and amended by Leovigildus. See Isidorus's chronicle. Chaindasuinthus and Recessuinthus reformed them. Egigas ordered the code now extant to be made, and commissioned bishops for that purpose; nevertheless the laws of Chaindasuinthus and Recessuinthus were preserved, as appears by the sixth council of Toledo. See the prologue to the Law of the Bavarians. We find only a few in Childebert's decree. See the prologue to the Code of the Burgundians, and the code itself, especially tit. 12, �� 5, and tit.英文原著 · 《The Spirit of Laws》
As he says himself, in his prologue. Nothing so vague as the title and prologue. At first they are the customs of Paris, Orleans, and the court of Barony; then they are the customs of all the lay courts of the kingdom, and of the provostships of France; at length, they are the customs of the whole kingdom, Anjou, and the court of Barony. Institutions, ii. 15,
287. See Du Tillet on the court of peers. See also Laroche, Flavin, Budeus and Paulus ?milius, i. Other causes were decided by the ordinary tribunals.英文原著 · 《The Spirit of Laws》