A NEW MIDDLE ENGLISH CAROL.

Since the publication of Greene's revised standard edition of the Middle English carol corpus(1) a handful of new ones have come to light.(2) There is, however, among the medieval materials in the collection of Professor T. Takamiya in Tokyo, another unrecorded carol. It appears on the blank, but water-stained, verso of the final leaf (sig. [EE viii]) of an incunable Latin Bible, printed at Speier by Peter Drach in 1489 (Goff B-587),(3) in a well-formed hand of the late fifteenth century.(4) The text is printed below. In transcribing it editorial intervention has been kept to a minimum; neither punctuation nor capitalization has been added; the few contractions that appear have been expanded and italicized. Stanza numbers have been added for ease of reference.

 
   Chorus.(5) Nowell Nowell Nowell Nowell(6) by the grettyng 
   of gabriell 
   Nowell Nowell Nowell Nowell pat borne is owr emanuell 
 
   [1](7) 
 
   All this world may knowe full well 
   Comyn is owre lyffe owre hope owre heyll 
   the deuylles yoke both sharpe and sore(8) 
   ys brokyn and raynson payd ther fore 
 
   Chorus 
 
   [2] 
 
   That Isay prophett songe be forne 
   The madyns chyld sothly is borne 
   As the angell in his message sayd 
   The holygost hath fulfyllyd a mayd…