1 mayde Cristes. The phrase is synonymous with “puella Deo dicate” in the Latin incipit. What it indicates of the woman’s status is uncertain except that she is a virgin. If she was a real person, she may have been a nun — a Minoress or Poor Clare (Hill, “The ‘Luue-Ron,’” p. 321), a lay recluse (Millett, “Women in No Man’s Land,” pp. 97–98), or merely a pious laywoman under the friar’s instruction. Bloomfield remarks that the maid “may also be no one at all but a poetic construct” (“Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” p. 55). The gendered context of the poem — pious instruction from a religious man to a woman — has a long tradition, and such works often focus on virginity (Newman, From Virile Woman, pp. 19–45).↩back to note source

luve ron. “a private message between lovers, or a love poem with a private meaning.” Ron (“rune”) combines a range of senses: “song,” “message,” “secret,” and “riddle”; see MED, roun(e) (n.(2)), sense 1, ron (n.(1)), and rounen (v.), senses 1 and 2. Compare the phrase luve runes (translating Latin amatoria carmina) in Einenkel, ed., The Life of Saint Katherine, p. 7. Thomas’s plan to “wurche” a love rune suggests the intricacy of verbal composition in interlocked rhyme and sense, and it hints at a secret message to discover. A later alliterative poem, Summer Sunday, also names its own form as runic (Robbins, ed., Historical Poems, p. 100). For Bloomfield, love ron suggests a hidden “wisdom” within a framed structure, something to be unlocked like the treasure of virginity itself (“Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” pp. 59–60). Levy reads the poem as a veiled message in likeness to the Annunciation (“The Annunciation,” p. 125–27).↩back to note source

2 For-hwan. “From which.” See MED, for-whan (pronominal adv. and conj.), sense 2c, and compare The Passion of Jesus Christ, lines 49, 242.↩back to note source

onother soth lefmon. The word onother is startling after the poet has stated the maid’s dedication to Christ. One wonders if the phrase mayde Cristes has a generic, neutral meaning: “virgin made in the image of Christ.” That the virgin should so much as express a desire not directed to God reveals her virginal status to be endangered (Bloch, Medieval Misogyny, pp. 97–101).↩back to note source

3 best wyte cuthe. The phrase is ambiguous because wyte can bear two different meanings: MED, witien (v.(1)), “guard, keep, preserve,” or witen (v.(1)), “know, advise.” Either may be meant here: “best able to protect” or “best able to advise.” The word wyte could also be wite (n.(1)): “best advisor known to a noblewoman.” In the courtly language of Love Rune, the word cuthe suggests a friendly “being known” with the potential for amorous intimacy. The phrase wyte cuthe thus opens several potential meanings: Thomas’s advising role, the possessive or protective role of a husband (or God), the need to guard something the woman has (virginity), and the potential of someone “knowing” her sexually. On the adjectival past participle cuthe, see MED, couth (adj. and n.), “acquainted or known”; connen (v.), senses 3–5, “to have ability; to know”; and kithen (v.), senses 1–2, “to make known.” Compare also lines 52 (beo the cuth, about Christ’s desire) and 100 (cuthe hit, about the poem).↩back to note source

freo. “noble,” with another latent meaning: “free, unattached.” Thomas invites the question of why a woman dedicated to Christ would seek onother soth lefmon (line 2).↩back to note source

5 res. “madness, frenzy, a fit of delirium.” See MED, res (n.), sense 3a, and compare The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 512.↩back to note source

7 theines. Means “men” generically, but the primary sense “servants, attendants” implies men subject to a higher authority — God or death. Compare Death (art. 14): “Hwer beoth thine theynes that the leove were?” (line 89).↩back to note source

12 ofdryve. “to drive (something) away, dispel” (MED, ofdriven (v.)); this rare word, not recorded in Old English, is documented only here and once in a fifteenth-century text.↩back to note source

14 vouh ne gray. “variegated or gray fur.” The phrase, derived from OF vair et gris and common in Middle English verse, appears several times elsewhere in Jesus 29: The Passion of Jesus Christ (art. 1), line 66; Poema Morale (art. 3), line 357; and Doomsday (art. 13), line 14. See also line 53. Dickins-Wilson explain that the first kind of fur comes “from the grey back and white belly of a sort of squirrel, the second from the grey back alone” (p. 197n116). See MED, fou (adj. as n.), sense 2, and grei (n.(2)), sense 1a.↩back to note source

15 enne. “a single one”; see MED, on (num.), sense 4f, “the space of one day, a single day,” and compare line 44.↩back to note source

20 Ye. This use of the second-person plural pronoun is unique in the poem and may be an error for Thu. If not, Thomas’s usually intimate tone of address to the maiden is here more generalized as he expounds on the transience of life.↩back to note source

that wouh goth forth, abak that soth. The phrasing is probably proverbial. Compare the owl’s argument in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), lines 877–78: “If riht goth forth and abak wrong, / Betere is my wop than thi song” (If right goes ahead and wrong behind, / My weeping is better than your song).↩back to note source

22 mereuh. “unstable, variable.” See MED,meruw(e) (adj.), sense 1c. This occurrence is the only one cited as a description for love. More commonly the adjective describes people (“frail”).↩back to note source

21–24 Theo luve that . . . lef on bouh. For another evocation of fleeting love in the Jesus sequence of English poems, see The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), lines 1449–58.↩back to note source

26 funde. “depart, go away, leave.” See MED, founden (v.(1)), sense 2a.↩back to note source

27 alunde. “elsewhere, afar.” This adverbial word is attested only here. I translate it contextually in opposition to her, “here.” See MED, alunde (? ppl.), “? remote, estranged.”↩back to note source

bed. “offer to fight, challenge.” See MED, bidden (v.), sense 7d.↩back to note source

29–32 Yf mon is riche . . . from him take. The guarded treasure of this stanza is analogous to the soon-to-be-described treasures of heaven and the maid’s virginity. The wealth described here is, of course, the false kind threatened by theft or decay (Luke 12:34).↩back to note source

33–36 Hwer is Paris and Heleyne . . . is of the cleo. This stanza uses the ubi sunt formula (“Where are they now?”). Hector and Caesar are among the Nine Worthies of the past, used to show the futility of worldly dominance, but Thomas’s main emphasis is on pairs of famous lovers, Paris and Helen, Amadas and Idoine, Tristram and Isolde. Many commentators have praised Thomas’s elegaic tones; see especially Woolf, pp. 62, 95–96; Pearsall, Old and Middle English Poetry, p. 97; and Bloomfield, “Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” pp. 55–56. On the ubi sunt topos evoked here, compare Poema Morale (art. 3), line 358 (note); Death (art. 14), lines 49–56; and On Serving Christ (art. 18), lines 69–72.↩back to note source

36 so the schef is of the cleo. “as the sheaf is cut by the scythe.” The meaning of the word cleo is uncertain. The definition provided is the choice of most commentators. Bloomfield connects the half-line to Apocalypse 14, the Son of Man with a sickle (“Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” pp. 56–57), which would tie the image to many other allusions to Apocalypse. The etymological problem is whether cleo derives from OE clif, cleofu, “hillside, cliff,” or from OE clawu, clea, “hook.” Brown accepts the former, cites the word’s appearance in Poema Morale (art. 3), line 343, and implicitly translates: “as the sheaf from the hillside” (p. 249, s.v. cleo). If, as seems more likely, the word is derived from clawu, there is no other record of it as a farm implement: other usages signify a claw, a talon, a crosier, and an instrument of torture. See MED, claue (n.1), sense 2b.↩back to note source

40 fere. “appearance.” Derived from OF ofaire, the word is rare in Middle English. MED, fere (n.5) cites only three occurrences, this one being the earliest, the others dating from the fifteenth century.↩back to note source

41 Henry ure kyng. Henry III, king of England, who reigned 1216–1272. See also line 51; and compare the reference to “Kyng Henri” in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 1091.↩back to note source

42 Absalon. David’s son, noted for his beauty. See 2 Kings 14:25; and Chaucer’s Legend of Good Women, Prol. F 249.↩back to note source

44 Mayde, if thu wilnest after leofman, ich teche the enne treowe King. The sponsa Christi theme begins here, with Christ described as the Divine Lover the maiden should seek. The logic behind the depiction is that Christ endured the Passion to prove his love for humankind, so certainly he desires each soul in a way best expressed through terms of passionate human love. Courtly terms applied to Christ are typical of the anchoritic texts that preceded Love Rune. Compare the presentation of Christ’s appeal in Ancrene Wisse: “Let everyone now choose one of these two, earthly comfort or heavenly, whichever she wants to keep — because she must let go of the other . . . Stretch out your love to Jesus Christ, and you have won him. Reach for him with as much love as you sometimes have for some man. He is yours to do all that you want with” (Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, p. 197). On the sponsa Christi motif, see Swanton, English Literature before Chaucer, p. 248; and Bugge, Virginitas, pp. 82, 87–96; and compare the lyric In a Valley of This Restless Mind (Fein-MLSL, pp. 68–71).↩back to note source

45 childe. “a youth of noble birth,” a title common in romances and ballads. See MED, child (n.), sense 6a.↩back to note source

47 of wisdom wilde. “strong of wisdom.” See MED, welde (adj.), “powerful, mighty,” which cites this line.↩back to note source

50 est and west, north and suth! At the center of the luve ron, Thomas invokes the four cardinal directions (a sign of the Cross) to sanctify the rune so that it may bring the Holy Bridegroom to the maiden. The Cross signifies Jesus’s Passion, which signifies God’s love for mankind. This line activates the rune’s holy efficacy for the reader. Compare On Serving Christ (art. 18), lines 39–40 (note). Referencing the four cardinal points before naming the king of “Engelonde” might also be meant to invoke a sense of the nation, its length and breadth, as geographically specified in The Shires and Hundreds of England (art. 27).↩back to note source

51 Henri, King of Engelonde, of hym he halt and to hym buhth. Henry III was a great patron of the Franciscan order in England, and so the head-of-a-recto positioning of this compliment might have been intended for royal eyes in a presentation copy (not Jesus 29). See also line 41; and compare the reference to “Kyng Henri” in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 1091.↩back to note source

52 sonde. “message.” Following all editors, the MS reading schonde, “shame, disgrace,” has been emended to sonde; see MED, sond(e) (n.). Thomas styles himself an emissary from God, a role analogous to that of Gabriel at the Annunciation. Note that Song of the Annunciation (art. 20) follows Love Rune in Jesus 29. On the allusion, see Levy, “The Annunciation.”↩back to note source

cuth. On the resonance of the word cuth, see note to line 3, above; and also MED, couth (adj. and n.), sense 2c, “acquainted or familiar,” where this line is cited.↩back to note source

53 vouh ne gray. See note to line 14, above.↩back to note source

rencyan. “a kind of cloth made in or associated with Rheims.” See MED, rencian (n.). The word is recorded only twice: here and in On Serving Christ (art. 18), line 70. The verbal correspondence and physical juxtaposition may be clues that Thomas authored both poems. See also the note to line 50, above.↩back to note source

57 bolde. “castle, mansion, tower, dwelling place, abode”. See MED, bold (n.). The figure of a castle carries some traditional meanings: Solomon’s temple, the heavenly city, Christ’s body, the human body. Thomas’s Franciscan contemporary Robert Grosseteste deployed the figure in his Anglo-Norman Chasteau d’Amour (VLT, pp. 40–45) and Latin Templum Dei. The latter begins with a meditation on 1 Corinthians 3:17, “For the temple of God is holy, which you are” (see also 1 Corinthians 6:19). The castle of the body is the guiding metaphor for Sawles Warde and a frequent figure in Ancrene Wisse. On how another connotation of bolde will eventually complement the rune’s spiritual eroticism, see the note to line 60, below.↩back to note source

that wrouhte the wise Salomon. Solomon’s temple is described in 3 Kings 6–8. It symbolizes the heavenly mansion, yet also signifies that mankind’s best building is infinitely exceeded by God’s edifice in heaven. The biblical account explains how God entered the temple in the guise of a cloud (3 Kings 8:10–12). Hugh of St. Victor used the biblical passage to illustrate how God conceals the “treasure . . . hidden in the field of the human heart,” that is, God’s image in man (Selected Spiritual Writings, p. 102). In Thomas’s contemporary climate, a mention of Solomon’s temple might readily recall Henry III’s signature building project: Westminster Abbey. Renevey notes that “Thomas of Hales may have written his poem . . . while or after Westminster Abbey was built in a record time of twenty-four years (1245–69) . . . [R]eferences to Solomon’s temple . . . and other building imagery recall the construction of an English templum dei whose magnificence echoed that of Solomon’s temple” (“1215–1349: Texts,” p. 101). On Solomonic kingship as a model for Henry III, see also Paris, The History of Saint Edward, trans. Fenster and Wogan-Browne, pp. 14–15. For another reference to Solomon’s temple in the poems of Jesus 29, see The Passion of Jesus Christ (art. 1), line 245. For other mentions of Solomon, see Death’s Wither-Clench (art. 7), lines 21–26 (note), and The Proverbs of Alfred (art. 24), lines 217–18, 274.↩back to note source

58 Of jaspe, of saphir, of merede golde, / and of mony onother ston? The imagery of gems will come to be associated with the maiden’s viginity (lines 81–84). On the jewels of Solomon’s temple, see 3 Kings 7:9–10. Compare, too, the gems of the new Jerusalem in Apocalypse 21:18–21 and in the dreamer’s vision at the end of Pearl, lines 985–1032 (Andrew and Waldron, eds., Pearl, pp. 101–03). Bloomfield cites a letter on virginity by Osbert of Clare, twelfth-century Prior of Westminster, that names the “twelve stones of virginity from the Apocalypse” (“Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” p. 57).↩back to note source

60 bold. In Love Rune, the word bolde expands from its basic meaning “castle” and its metaphorical meaning “the maiden’s body” to embrace a sense of phallic masculinity (“tower”): God’s bolde will stand forever, while mere men who are bolde wither like meadow grass (lines 7–8). When given to the maiden, God’s bolde is here both a figure for her intact body and his virile presence by which she may find spiritual ecstasy with her Divine Lover. The masculine sense of the word boldhede (an erect penis) is explicit in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), lines 513–16: “Vor hwanne he haveth ido his dede, / Ifalle is al his boldhede; / Habbe he istunge under gore, / Ne last his luve no leng more” (For as soon as he’s done the deed, / All his passion collapses; / Once he’s stung under a skirt, / His love lasts no longer).↩back to note source

61 mote. “hill, eminence, mound” (from OF mote), not “moat, ditch,” a meaning not recorded before 1378. See MED, mote (n.(1)), sense 1a.↩back to note source

62 Ne may no mynur hire underwrote. “No miner may undermine it (or her),” or “no Minorite may falsify it through his meager writing.” This line conceals a personal reference to the poet. For the primary meaning of mynur, “one whose military function it is to undermine fortifications, tunnel into a town, etc.,” see MED, minour (n.), sense 1. The line is the earliest recorded instance of the usage, also found in Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale (CT I[A]2465). When bold is understood not as “it” but as her body (hire), the action becomes sexually charged. The second meaning puns on mynur and underwrot; see MED, Menour (n. and adj.). By veiled language, the poet deflects the maid’s attentions away from himself and toward Christ. The innuendo is sexual: “No friar Minor may undermine the castle of God.” Shakespeare uses a similar pun in a comic exchange that quibbles on virginity in military figures; see All’s Well That Ends Well 1.1.118–22 (The Riverside Shakespeare, p. 506). In the verb underwrot, Thomas extends the pun, calling his writing inadequate to the purpose; God, however, will overlook it in his love for the maiden.↩back to note source

63 gleo and gal! “mirth and song.” For gal, see MED, gal(e) (n.(1)), sense 1a, “song, singing.” Compare The Eleven Pains of Hell (art. 28), line 56, where gal appears as a rare adjective, with the sense “lascivious”; and also The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 256 (note), where the Owl taunts the Nightingale by calling her a “galegale.”↩back to note source

71 He is day withute nyhte! See Apocalypse 21:25: “And the gates thereof shall not be shut by day: for there shall be no night there.”↩back to note source

72 Nere he, mayde, ful seoly that myhte wunye myd such a knyhte? On the figure of Christ as Lover-Knight, see Woolf, “The Theme of Christ the Lover-Knight.”↩back to note source

73 tresur. The idea that God gives each person a treasure when he or she relinquishes worldly possessions appears often in the gospels; see Matthew 19:21, Mark 10:21, Luke 12:33–34, Luke 18:22. Such treasure is both the promise of heaven and God’s image in the soul. As Christ within, the treasure is also profound wisdom, as described by Paul: “their hearts may be comforted, being instructed in charity, and unto all riches of fulness of understanding, unto the knowledge of the mystery of God the Father and of Christ Jesus: In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:2–3). The concept of treasure as inner wisdom where Christ is present is key to the rune-poem (Bloomfield, “Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” p. 59). In medieval mysticism, virginity itself was a key to God’s wisdom (Bugge, Virginitas, pp. 120–22).↩back to note source

74 And bit the luke thine bur, and wilneth that thu hit wyte wel. “And bids you lock (or watch over) your bower, and desires that you guard (or know) it well.” The word luke triggers two verbal meanings. It means both “lock” (MED, louken (v.(1)), sense 1b) and “watch over, guard, defend” (MED,loken (v.(2)), senses 8a, 8b, 12b(a)). “Lock, fasten,” pertains specifically to physical virginity, which the maid must keep hidden and intact. “Watch over” indicates that the maid must protect her bur (bower) but treats the treasure as something she may view and enjoy. These two meanings carry over into the also ambiguous verb wyte, which can mean both “guard” and “know” (see note to line 3, above). Compare, too, A Little Sooth Sermon (art. 16), line 38, where a girl’s locked box is ironically opposed to her flirting in church: “At hom is hire Paternoster, biloken in hire teye” (Her Paternoster is at home, locked in her box).↩back to note source

76 Thu art swetture than eny flure hwile thu witest thene kastel. The language comparing the maiden to a sweet flower is traditional in both love poetry (see, for example, Annot and John, lines 11–20 (CHMS, 2:120–23)) and also in devotional descriptions of virginity, as in Holy Maidenhood: “Maidenhood is the flower that once completely cut down never blooms again” (Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, p. 228).↩back to note source

84 witest under thine hemme. The pun latent in the verb witen (see note to line 3, above) comes forth in a sexualized way — “know God under hem” — beside “guard virginity under hem.” Thomas brings mystic eroticism to a courtly love lyric. The phrase under thine hemme invokes a secular motif in which a male poet enjoys imagining what is under a woman’s clothes and expresses a desire to be there. The usual phrase is under gore (“skirt”) or under bis (“linen”). A sexual intent is unambiguous in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 515, and such phrases are frequent in the secular love lyrics of Harley 2253 (Fein, “A Saint ‘Geynest under Gore’”).↩back to note source

85 vertu. “power.” The word refers to an occult efficacy or curative power thought to inhere in a substance. Precious stones and plants were thought to possess virtues, which were enumerated in lapidaries and herbals.↩back to note source

86 lectorie. This is the first recorded occurrence of the word in Middle English, and the only one spelled without the prefix a-. See MED, alectorie (n.) and lectorie (n.). The word, derived from Latin alectoria, denotes a small, clear stone said to be found in a cock’s gizzard.↩back to note source

91 He is idon . . . of fyn amur. Both Christ and the gem of virginity are described as set in gold, as Thomas completes the love rune in a manner analogous to a goldsmith setting a gem. Fyn amur is a “technical term as used by Provençal poets” (Bloomfield, “Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” p. 59n10). Christ the Lover-Knight, proffering a castle, a treasure, and a gem, loves in the refined, noble manner of courtly love.↩back to note source

77–92 Hit is ymston . . . in heovene bur! The treasure in the castle of the body is now a gem named “maydenhod” (line 81). In order to grasp the meaning of the rune, one must read the pronouns he and hine in lines 78–92 in a double fashion: as the neuter pronoun “it” in reference to the gem virginity and as the masculine “he” and “him” in reference to Christ the Holy Gem, who actively desires, inhabits, and enjoys the virgin’s body. Virginity figured as a gem has a long tradition and figures in the twelfth-century anchoritic literature of England. Saint Margaret in the Katherine-group legend calls out to Christ in prayer: “Lord, listen to me! I have a precious jewel, and I have given it to you — I mean my maidenhood, the brightest blossom in the body that bears it and keeps it well . . . Lord, defend me, and protect it always for yourself” (Saint Margaret, in Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, p. 289). In anchoritic literature, the gem of virginity is closely identified with Christ himself: “The eagle keeps in his nest a precious gem called ‘agate,’ . . . This precious stone is Jesus Christ, true as a stone, and full of every power over all gemstones. He is the agate that the poison of sin never came near. Keep him in your nest, that is, your heart” (Ancrene Wisse, in Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, pp. 98–99). Virginity becomes the mark of physical linkage to Christ in spiritual marriage because Christ’s image is unmarred in the virgin’s intact body. The author of Holy Maidenhood so instructs the reader: “do not break the seal [of virginity] that seals you both together (Canticles 4:12) . . . No wonder if what is so like God is lovely to him; for he is the loveliest thing and all unbroken, and always was and is more pure than anything, and loves purity more than anything. And what is a more beautiful thing and more praiseworthy among earthly things than the power of maidenhood, unbroken and pure, modelled on him?” (Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, pp. 228–29). See further Bugge’s discussion of how the anchoritic texts are influenced by “the Christian gnostic tradition, wherein virginity is the image of the divine essence” (Virginitas, p. 120); and Swanton, English Literature before Chaucer, pp. 247–48.↩back to note source

92 bur. The term denoting the lady’s body now denotes heaven shining with Christ’s light; compare Apocalypse 21:23: “And the city hath no need of the sun, nor of the moon, to shine in it. For the glory of God hath enlightened it, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof.” Compare too the description of heaven in The Wooing of Our Lord: “You [Christ] loosed your prisoners and delivered them out of the death-house, and yourself took them with you to your jewelled bower, the abode of eternal joy” (Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, p. 250).↩back to note source

95–96 Ne doth he . . . the betere let gon? This rhetorical question, explaining the choice and making clear the proper answer, is expressed so delicately that it refers both to the maid’s proper choosing of Christ over Thomas and to Thomas’s noble choosing to write the luve ron rather than assenting to the maid’s desire.↩back to note source

97–98 open and withute . . . thu hit untrende. The verb untrende is attested only here; see MED, untrenden (v.), “to unroll (sth.), open up.” The poem is to be thought of as written upon an unsealed parchment roll. Hill argues that the original poem was in fact written on a roll, as were many other Franciscan lyrics (“The ‘Luue-Ron,’” pp. 322–25; see also Woolf, pp. 57–58), but the reference is likely figural rather than literal (Fein, “Roll or Codex?”). Stone interprets the absence of a seal (withute sel) as Thomas’s way of making the poem an open message rather than one perceived as a private love note (Medieval English Verse, p. 56). Levy finds here an allusion to scrolls in iconography associated with the Annuciation (“The Annunciation,” pp. 127–30). Allusions to Apocalypse may also be present: the opening of the scroll with seven seals (chap. 6) and the unsealed roll (chap. 10). Compare too the notion of virginity as the unbroken “seal” that keeps God’s image whole within the soul (Holy Maidenhood, in Savage and Watson, trans., Anchoritic Spirituality, p. 228).↩back to note source

100 Hwoso cuthe hit. “Whoever knows it.” On the resonance of the word cuthe, see note to line 3, above. ↩back to note source

hit wolde him stonde muchel stel. “it would afford him much help.” This idiom also appears in The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), line 1632 (note).↩back to note source

101 Hwenne thu sittest in longynge, drauh the forth this ilke wryt. This line opens the five-line epilogue. Millett notes that the maid appears to be literate in English, though probably not in Latin or French, and that she is pictured “in solitary but not silent meditation” (“Women in No Man’s Land,” p. 97).↩back to note source

102 Mid swete stephne thu hit singe, and do al so hit the byt. The song the maid will sing is both the love rune from Thomas (called a cantus in the incipit) and the “new song” of the 144,000 virgin brides of Christ in Apocalypse 14:3–4. Item cantus appears in the right-hand margin beside the opening line of the next piece, Song of the Annunciation (art. 20), directly below the Amen that concludes Love Rune. Thomas’s reference to the poem as a piece of writing to be used in the future by the maiden is comparable to the end of The Owl and the Nightingale (art. 2), where the birds’ debate (that is, the poem just read) is to be recited later before the one who will judge it; see Owl, lines 1785–86 (note).↩back to note source

103 he. This richly ambiguous pronoun refers to the message, the rune itself, or the messenger (either Thomas its conveyor or God the Wooer). The line alludes to the Annunciation; see note to line 52, above.↩back to note source

104 brudthinge. “bridal chamber.” According to MED, brud-þing (n.), “wedding feast,” this is the only occurrence of this Old English word in Middle English.↩back to note source

105 And yeve him god endynge that haveth iwryten this ilke wryt. This line is metrically part of the epilogue stanza extended to five lines. Lines 101–04 complete an image: the maid, sitting in longing, arrives as a bride before God who sits enthroned. The final line, Bloomfield writes, is “the last reminder of death in the poem — the writer’s own” (“Thomas of Hales’ ‘A Love Rune,’” p. 55). On how these lines bring the process of composition into the poem, see Scahill, “The Friar,” p. 3.↩back to note source