A late MIDDLE ENGLISH verse ROMANCE of 1,130
lines in octosyllabic (eight-syllable) couplets, The
Squire of Low Degree was written in the East Midlands
late in the 15th century. There is no extant
manuscript of the entire poem, which is preserved
in a 1560 printed text and fragments of a 1520
printed edition by the famous early printer
Wynkyn de Worde. The 1520 text bears the title
“Undo Your Door,” a phrase drawn from one of the
poem’s episodes.
The romance tells the story of a poor young
squire’s love for the daughter of the king of Hungary.
The princess agrees to accept the squire’s suit,
but insists that before she can marry him he must
distinguish himself as a knight. A slanderous steward
sees the squire and princess together, and reports
the tryst to the king. When the king still
trusts the squire, the steward sets a trap to ambush
the squire on his way to see the princess. The
squire manages to kill the steward in the ambush,
but is taken prisoner. The princess, believing her
lover dead, is beside herself with grief. Her father
attempts to console her by reminding her of all
there is to enjoy in the world, describing courtly
feasts, music, and sports. But it is to no avail; the
princess is inconsolable.At last the king relents and
sets the squire free from his imprisonment, but the
young man still must leave the court to prove himself
a knight worthy of the princess. He rides out
on his quest, and has his share of knightly adventure.
When he returns after seven years, the
princess is about to take vows as an anchoress. But
he claims his beloved, her father gives them his
blessing, and the two are wed.
The Squire of Low Degree is a late romance that
seems to be made up of a number of motifs from
earlier romances. Its theme of an inborn nobility
even in someone of a lower social status, and its
vivid descriptions of courtly life and manners,
make this poem one of the more accessible of English
verse romances.
Bibliography
Hudson, Harriet E. “Construction of Class, Family,
and Gender in Some Middle English Popular Romances,”
in Class and Gender in Early English Literature:
Intersections, edited by Britton J.Harwood
and Gillian R. Overing. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1994, 76–94.
Sands, Donald B., ed.Middle English Verse Romances.
New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966.
Seaman, Myra J. “The Waning of Middle English
Chivalric Romance in ‘The Squyr of Lowe
Degre,’ ” Fifteenth-Century Studies 29 (2004):
174–199.
Spearing, A. C. “Secrecy, Listening, and Telling in The
Squyr of Lowe Degre,” Journal ofMedieval and Renaissance
Studies 20 (1990): 273–292.
Wright, Glenn.“‘Other Wyse Then Must We Do’: Parody
and Popular Narrative in the Squyr of Lowe
Degre,” Comitatus: A Journal of Medieval and Renaissance
Studies 27 (1996): 14–41.