The Abbot of Cockaigne
I am the Abbot of Cockaigne,And this is my counsel with topers;And in the sect of Decius (gamesters) this is my will;And whoso shall seek me in taverns before noon;After evensong shall he go forth naked,And thus, stripped of raiment, shall lament him:Wafna! wafna!O Fate most foul, what hast thou done?The joys of man beneath the sunThou hast stolen, every one!
Words in this poem
- whoso pron.
- Whosoever. Piers Plowman.
- 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,]
- evensong n.
- A song for the evening; the evening service or form of worship (in the Church of England including vespers and compline); also, the time of evensong. Wyclif. [AS. æfensang.]
- hast
- , 2d pers. sing. pres. of. Fave, contr. of havest.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Abbot of Cockaigne is in the public domain. This text is taken from Wine, Women, and Song Mediaeval Latin Students' songs; Now first translated into English verse, Project Gutenberg ebook #18044; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: John Addington Symonds, The Abbot of Cockaigne, in Wine, Women and Song (1884), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #18044, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/symonds-wine-women/the-abbot-of-cockaigne.html, id L11864.
Form and metre
The Abbot of Cockaigne is 10 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 82%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 10% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See 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 -------AAA cockaigne · topers · will · noon · naked · him · wafna · doneA · sunA · oneA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I am the Abbot of Cockaigne, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And this is my counsel with topers; | 9 | ····/˘··· |
| And in the sect of Decius (gamesters) this is my will; | 14 | ·············· |
| And whoso shall seek me in taverns before noon; | 12 | ·/˘····/˘··· |
| After evensong shall he go forth naked, | 11 | ··/˘˘····/˘ |
| And thus, stripped of raiment, shall lament him: | 10 | ····/˘·˘/· |
| Wafna! wafna! | 4 | ···· |
| O Fate most foul, what hast thou done? | 8 | ········ |
| The joys of man beneath the sun | 8 | ········ |
| Thou hast stolen, every one! | 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.