William of Shoreham was a MIDDLE ENGLISH lyric
poet of the early 14th century who authored
seven extant poems, all of which have survived in
a single manuscript (British Museum Additional
MS. 17,376). A colophon (or scribal notation) to
the manuscript mentions Simon, the archbishop
of Canterbury—a fact that dates the manuscript
to the beginning of the reign of King EDWARD III
(1327–77) and suggests that William was active at
that time. Little is known of William’s life, other
than his association with the village of Shoreham,
near Sevenoaks in Kent (perhaps he was born
there). He was made vicar of Chart Sutton in
Kent in 1313, and because that position was connected
with Leeds Priory, it has been suggested
that William was an Augustinian canon at that
priory.
William’s seven poems are all religious and didactic,
and deal with some of the favorite topics of
medieval preachers. Four of them are concerned
with Christian doctrine and theology, and include
lyrics on the seven sacraments of the Catholic
Church, on the Ten Commandments, and on the
Seven Deadly Sins. A longer poem, the final poem
in the manuscript, is a more substantial treatment
of topics like the nature of the Trinity, the fall of
Satan, and the Fall of Man, and apparently would
have dealt with the Redemption as well, but is incomplete,
as the manuscript breaks off after the
temptation. One ofWilliam’s other lyrics concerns
the five joys of the Virgin, and another is a hymn to
Mary apparently translated from a Latin text by
Robert GROSSETESTE. The latter is perhaps
William’s best-known poem, appearing in anthologies
of medieval English lyrics. It is made up
mainly of conventional allegorical symbols of
Mary. Its first stanza gives a good illustration of
William’s lyric style:
Marye, maide, milde and fre [noble],
Chamber of the Trinite,
One while lest [listen] to me,
Ase ich thee grete with songe.
Thagh my fet [vessel] unclene be,
My mes [meal] thou onderfonge [receive].
(Davies 1964, 103, ll. 1–6)
Generally writing in six- or seven-line stanzas,
William’s versification is often somewhat rough.
But the sometimes difficult theological concepts he
discusses are communicated clearly and simply,
and his poetry’s melancholy focus on the transience
of earthly life is typical of medieval lyric religious
verse.
It was once believed that William was also the
author of a prose translation of the Psalms that
appears in the same manuscript as his lyrics and is
written in the same hand. But because the lyrics
are in William’s native Kentish dialect, while the
Psalm translation is in a Midland dialect, it seems
unlikely that William wrote the English Psalms.
Bibliography
Davies, R. T., ed. Medieval English Lyrics: A Critical
Anthology. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University
Press, 1964.
Konrath, M., ed. The Poems of William of Shoreham.
London: Published for the Early English Text Society
by K. Paul, Trench, Trübner and Co., Limited,
1902.