 | |  |
Indirect Evidence
Before we come to Thornton's own scribal characteristics, it is worth looking at the evidence the corrections give us for the characteristics of his copy-text for this poem.[28] We can infer from the errors and their corrections that the hand of the previous scribe was a similar cursive script, at least by the evidence of o/e confusion (these graphemes are less likely to be mistaken in book hand). Besides the universal scribal problems of minims (m, n, u, i), c/t, and f/long s, the exemplar also had similar pairs h/b, r/y, e/o, e/sigma s, and identical y/þ. Moreover, the copy-text seems to have used similar suspensions and to have made similar suspension-errors—in particular, to have been similarly careless about nasal suspensions. On the other hand, Thornton's preference for w-spellings of the au/ou digraphs seems not to have been shared with his predecessor, a fact which may increase the likelihood of u/n error. The previous scribe also appears to have been more willing to use þ medially without a following suspension; the spellings heþen (e) (3687, 3704) and seþen (1977) are probably his. Dialectal characteristics suggest that other corrected forms taken from the exemplar include beryenge (2377; I.A.2 above), wenge corrected from wyenge (4002), and—a special case—both the error swyche and its correction syche (76; I.B.2 above).[29] Finally, although the conclusion is not based on Thornton's self-corrections, there is some evidence that the previous scribe's hand was uneven, as in the uncorrected error Cyruswitrye for cyrqwitrye (2616), in which the q had apparently crept far enough above the line to be misread as the -us suspension.
Thus, when speaking of the scribal tendencies in Thornton's copy of Morte Arthure, one should keep in mind that many of them were shared with his immediate predecessor (as well as late medieval scribes more generally). Nevertheless, one may legitimately infer from the foregoing analysis certain habitual procedures on the part of Robert Thornton.
The broadest conclusion one may draw is that Thornton transcribed, not word by word, but line by line. This conclusion is based primarily on the patterns of error shown in the "statistical summary," especially the greater tendency for the omission of words in the first half-line and the greater tendency for the wrong word to be copied in the second half-line, especially the last stave. What these patterns appear to show is a scribe hurrying through the first half-line in his writing in an attempt to complete the line while his
While transcribing the line, Thornton frequently performed his corrections in the process of writing, by superimposing a preferred letter or by crossing out and adding the correct (or an omitted) form immediately; many of these corrections may have been made without rechecking to copy. Twenty-five or so of the corrections, however, were performed after the transcription of the line was completed, for they were inserted at the end of the line with the deleted error or a caret-mark or both indicating the appropriate place. Among these, of course, are the two corrections by the second hand mentioned earlier.
We can see the scribe, in summary, reading a line in his exemplar and committing it to short-term memory, transcribing it with immediate corrections, occasionally checking the exemplar in the process, and then briefly rechecking it before going on to the next line. That brief look back, of course, while it helped him to correct error, may also have helped to introduce new error in the form of contamination from neighboring lines. One cannot claim that the scribe's attention to correctness in transcription was always at a high pitch, or that he always rechecked the exemplar before going on, in any case. There are too many errors remaining in the text, and Thornton undoubtedly committed his share of these.
| | |