A web-based edition of early seventeenth-century political poetry from manuscript sources. It brings into the public domain over 350 poems, many of which have never before been published.
I17 Great heart, who taught thee so to dye
Notes. In one source this epitaph on Ralegh is attributed to “Mr Cicill” (Beinecke MS Osborn b.197); in another, to “A. B.” (NLS MS 2060); in another, to “Captaine Kinge” (i.e. Samuel King) (Bod. MS Eng Hist c.272); and in one more to John Hoskyns (e.g. WCRO 865/500). (On its authorship, see Ralegh, Poems 193).
“Upon Sir Walter Rauleigh’s Death”
Great heart, who taught thee so to dye,
Death yielding thee the Victory?
Where tookst thou leave of life? If there,
how couldst thou be so free from feare?
But sure thou dyedst & quitt’dst the state
5of flesh & Bloud, before that fate?
I saw in every stander by
pale death, life onely in thy Eye;
Farewell, Truth shall thy story say,
We dyed, thou onely liv’dst, that day.
10Source. BL Add. MS 33998, fol. 96v
Other known sources. Ralegh, Poems 193; Bodleian MS Eng. Hist. c.272, p. 51; Bodleian MS Eng. Poet. e.14, fol. 98v; Bodleian MS Rawl. D. 954, fol. 35r; Bodleian MS Rawl. Poet. 26, fol. 69v; Bodleian MS Rawl. Poet. 209, fol. 10r; Bodleian MS Tanner 306, fol. 251r; BL Add. MS 33998, fol. 96v; BL Add. MS 58215, fol. 42r; BL MS Cotton Titus c.7, fol. 95r; BL MS Harley 791, fol. 49r; BL MS Harley 7332, fol. 215r; BL MS Lans. 777, fol. 64r; NLS MS 2060, fol. 2r; St. John’s MS S.32, fol. 40v; WCRO MS 865/500; Beinecke MS Osborn b.197, p. 47; Folger MS V.a.103, fol. 3v; Folger MS V.a.125, fol. 7v; Folger MS V.a.262, p. 55; Folger MS V.a.308, fol. 128v; Folger MS V.a.418, fol. 5r; Folger MS V.b.43, fol. 32r; Houghton MS Eng. 1278, item 10; Rosenbach MS 239/27, p. 357; Rosenbach MS 1083/17, fol. 71v
I17
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