Chaucer
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Chaucer. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
Geoffrey, chaw'ser, jef'fre (1340-1400), an English poet. He was the son of a London wine merchant. He was brought up at court as a ladies' page. In 1359 he went to France in the army of Edward III, was taken prisoner and ransomed. A little later he went abroad several times as an ambassador. In this way he became familiar with Italian literature , this being before the day of printing. He was at one time collector of customs. In 1386 he was dismissed by the court to a life of poverty, yet in the end received a pension, and at his death he was the first to be buried in that part of Westminster Abbey now known as the Poets' Corner. There were several English dialects. Chaucer made his dialect so prominent that it became the literary language of England. At a time when printed books were unknown and diverting manuscripts few, Chaucer wrote to amuse the queen and the court. A parliament of the birds, a story of the Trojan war, a story of a glass temple on which famous names are carved, but which continually melt away, and stories of famous women, such as Dido and Cleopatra, are some of the subjects. His fame rests on the Canterbury Tales, the best stories in verse in the English language. Chaucer is called the father of English poetry. He was not the first to write verse, but his predecessors wrote in Anglo-Saxon, almost as difficult to read as French. Chaucer is the first great English poet. The Tales were not the invention of a day. It was the fashion of the time to make a pilgrimage to the shrine of Thomas a Becket at Canterbury, "the holy blissful martyr for to seek." A company of people representative of the different classes of society happens together at the Tabard Inn in Southwark. This inn is still to be seen in southwest London at the beginning of the Canterbury road. The poet introduces the characters in a prologue. Some of the more prominent of them are a clerk, or scholar, who would rather have twenty books of Aristotle in "blak or reed" than rich robes, "And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche"; a "veray parfit gentil knight," and his son, a yonge squire, who was A lovyere and a lusty bachelor; a prioress, That of her smyling was ful symple and coy; a ruddy, baldheaded monk, fond of hunting, A fat swan loved he best of any roast; a wanton merry friar, He was an esy man to give penance; a merchant with a forked beard and Flanders' beaver hat; a wise sergeant of the law, Nowher so besy a man as he ther n'as, And yet he semed besier than he was; a franklin, Whit was his berd as is a dayesye; he cared not who was his cook, if the sauce were right; a doctor, who spoke of "phisik and surgerye" and who loved gold; a good wife with red stockings and new shoes, a bold face and a shrewd tongue, and yet she was a worthy woman all her lyve: Housbondes at chirce dore she hadde fyve; a poor parson rich in holy thought and work, who visited the sick and set an example of a right life, preaching the gospel, That firste he wroghte and afterward he taughte. Other characters are a plowman; and a miller Well koude he stelen corn and tollen thries, a reve; a pardoner; a haberdasher; a carpenter; a weaver; a dyer; a cook; a shipman; and, lastly, their host of the Tabard Inn. All these characters, twenty-nine in all, Chaucer sets on horseback under the guidance of the Tabard host. Under the influence of a common purpose, restraint is for the once relaxed, social distinctions are laid aside. They set off a merry company. As they jog along each is to tell a tale. It is difficult to describe the tales without repeating them. So far as Chaucer found time to compose them, he puts into the mouth of each such a tale as might be expected of one in that particular walk of life. In this way the tales give a picture of the manners, jokes, and ways of thinking of the different kinds of people then living. The full number of tales was never completed. The study of Chaucer is not at all difficult if undertaken with an edition provided with a vocabulary. The old spellings, plurals, possessives, and verb forms are instructive. Swete and smale, each pronounced in two syllables, are the old forms of sweet and small; ton, eyen, and shoon are old plurals of toe, eye, and shoe, formed by adding ``n'' to the singular. Slepen and longen are the equivalents of the verbs, sleep and long. The prologue is one of the most artless, cutting, musical bits of writing in the English language. Some of the tales are certainly a trifle coarse. Chaucer ingeniously pleads that he is not at fault, that he must tell the tales as they were told. Chaucer was called by his contemporaries the Flower of Poets. The star of a misty morning.--Welsh. The firste fynder of our fair language.--Occleve. Our greatest poet of the Middle Ages .--Hallam. Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled. --Edmund Spenser.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
GEOFFREY, "the father of English poetry"; born in London p probably about 1340. He was the son vintner named John Chaucer. of a Nothing is known of his education, but in 1356-1359 he was a page to Princess Lionel. In 1359 he bore arms in France and was taken prisoner. He was ransomed next year, the king paying $80 toward the necessary sum. În 1367 his name appeared as a valet of the king's chamber. In 1367 he received a pension of 20 marks, and between 1370 and 1380 he was employed abroad in seven diplo matic missions. În 1374 he was ap pointed comptroller of the customs on con wool at London, a lucrative post, and he also received an annual allowance. In 1377 he was sent to Flanders and France on diplomatic business and next year to Lombardy. In 1382 he was appointed comptroller of the petty customs. In 1386 he was returned to Parliament as knight of the shire for Kent, but in the same year he shared the disgrace of his patron, John of Gaunt, was CHAUDIÈRE dismissed from his comptrollership, and reduced to a state of comparative poverty. Three years later, however, he was made clerk of the works at two shillings a day, and afterward had other offices and one or two annuities bestowed upon him, but in 1394-1398 must have been quite poor. In 1399 he got a pension of 40 marks from Henry IV., but did not live long to enjoy it. His most celebrated work, "The Canterbury GEOFFREY CHAUCER Tales," was written at different periods between 1373 and 1400. It consists of a series of tales in verse (two in prose), supposed to be told by a company of pilgrims to the shrine of St. Thomas (Becket) at Canterbury in 1386. In its pages we get such pictures of English life and English ways of thought in the century as are found nowhere else. 14th Besides his great work Chaucer wrote many poems: "The Book of the Duchess" (1369), "The Parliament of Fowls" (1374), "Troilus and Cressida" (1380- 1859. In 1862 he became chancellor of 1382), "The Legend of Good Women" (1385), "The House of Fame" (1386), etc., some of which are founded on French or Italian works. He also trans- | lated "Boethius." He died in London, Oct. 25, 1400, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. CHAUDIÈRE (shōd-yār'), a river and lake of Canada. The river joins the St. Lawrence from the S., 7 miles above Quebec, and, 2½ miles from its mouth, forms the celebrated falls of Chaudière. The lake-merely one of the many expansions of the Ottawa-has on its right the city of that name, the capital of the Dominion.