Anonymous: Le Père Sévère
KING LOUIS on his bridge is he,He holds his daughter on his knee.
She asks a husband at his handThat is not worth a rood of land.
‘Give up your lover speedily,Or you within the tower must lie.’
‘Although I must the prison dree,I will not change my love for thee.
‘I will not change my lover fairNot for the mother that me bare.
‘I will not change my true loverFor friends, or for my father dear.’
‘Now where are all my pages keen,And where are all my serving men?
‘My daughter must lie in the tower alway,Where she shall never see the day.’
Seven long years are past and goneAnd there has seen her never one.
At ending of the seventh yearHer father goes to visit her.
‘My child, my child, how may you be?’‘O father, it fares ill with me.
‘My feet are wasted in the mould,The worms they gnaw my side so cold.’
‘My child, change your love speedilyOr you must still in prison lie.’
‘’Tis better far the cold to dreeThan give my true love up for thee.’
Words in this poem
- rood n.
- A representation in sculpture or in painting of the cross with Christ hanging on it. [AS. rr, D. roede rod, G. ruthe, rute, OHG. ruota. CF. Rod a measure.]
- dree v. i.
- To be able to do or endure.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- mould n.
- Crumbling, soft, friable earth; esp., earth containing the remains or constituents of organic matter, and suited to the growth of plants; soil. [OE. molde, AS. molde; akin to D. mul, G. mull, mulm, OHG. molt, molta, Icel. mold, Dan. muld, Sw. mull, Goth. mulda, and E. meal flour. See Meal, and cf. Mole a]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Anonymous: Le Père Sévère is in the public domain. This text is taken from Ballads and Lyrics of Old France, with Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #795, the Andrew Lang translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Various, Anonymous: Le Père Sévère, in Ballads and Lyrics of Old France (1872), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #795, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lang-old-france/le-pere-severe.html, id L26917.
Form and metre
Anonymous: Le Père Sévère is 28 lines in 14 stanzas of 2 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%).
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, other poems in iambic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AA heA · kneeA
- 2 AA handA · landA
- 4 AA dreeA · theeA
- 5 AA fairA · bareA
- 11 AA beA · meA
- 12 AA mouldA · coldA
- 14 AA dreeA · theeA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| KING LOUIS on his bridge is he, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| He holds his daughter on his knee. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| She asks a husband at his hand | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| That is not worth a rood of land. | 8 | ········ |
| ‘Give up your lover speedily, | 8 | ···/˘/˘˘ |
| Or you within the tower must lie.’ | 8 | ·····/·· |
| ‘Although I must the prison dree, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| I will not change my love for thee. | 8 | ········ |
| ‘I will not change my lover fair | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Not for the mother that me bare. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| ‘I will not change my true lover | 8 | ······/˘ |
| For friends, or for my father dear.’ | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| ‘Now where are all my pages keen, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And where are all my serving men? | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| ‘My daughter must lie in the tower alway, | 10 | ·/˘····//˘ |
| Where she shall never see the day.’ | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Seven long years are past and gone | 8 | /˘······ |
| And there has seen her never one. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| At ending of the seventh year | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Her father goes to visit her. | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| ‘My child, my child, how may you be?’ | 8 | ········ |
| ‘O father, it fares ill with me. | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| ‘My feet are wasted in the mould, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The worms they gnaw my side so cold.’ | 8 | ········ |
| ‘My child, change your love speedily | 8 | ·····/˘˘ |
| Or you must still in prison lie.’ | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| ‘’Tis better far the cold to dree | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Than give my true love up for thee.’ | 8 | ········ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.