Main Menu | List of entries | finished

ABSOLON2 is the parish clerk who loves Alison in The Miller's Tale. He is the village dandy. His shoes have a design like that of the windows of St. Paul's church; his kirtle is light blue; his stockings are red; and his hair is abundant, MillT 3312-3338. P.E. Beichner points out that Hugo of St. Victor (Wisdom IX.15) equates abundant hair with excess. [Alison1: Gerveys: John2: Nicholas1]

The name never occurs initially. It appears twenty-two times in medial positions, KnT 3339, 3353, 3387, 3389, 3394, 3398, 3657, 3671, 3714, 3723, 3730, 3733, 3741, 3744, 3749, 3764, 3767, 3772, 3783, 3793, 3852, 3856; ten times in final rhyming position, KnT 3313, 3348, 3366, 3371, 3657, 3688, 3711, 3719, 3766, 3804.


P.E. Beichner, "Absolon's Hair." MS 12 (1950): 223; A. MacDonald, "Absolon and St. Neot." Neophilologus 48 (1964): 235-237.
From CHAUCER NAME DICTIONARY
Copyright © 1988, 1996 Jacqueline de Weever
Published by Garland Publishing, Inc., New York and London.

Main Menu | List of entries | finished