TR2. 22 Yě knówe ěk thát ǐn fórme ǒf spéche ǐs cháungě
TR2. 23 Wǐthínne ǎ thóusǎnd yéer, ǎnd wórděs thó
TR2. 24 Thǎt hádděn prís, nǒw wónděr nýce ǎnd stráungě
TR2. 25 Ǔs thínkěth hém, ǎnd yét thěi spáke hěm só,
TR2. 26 Ǎnd spédde ǎs wél ǐn lóve ǎs mén nǒw dó;
TR2. 27 Ěk fór tǒ wýnněn lóve ǐn sóndry̌ ágěs,
TR2. 28 Ǐn sóndry̌ lónděs, sóndry̌ bén ǔságěs.

Line Information

• Differences among the manuscripts and editions:
• English translations (Windeatt: 1998): You also know that over a thousand years there is change in the forms of speech, and words that were current then now seem amazingly silly and strange to us, and yet they spoke them like that and got on as well in love as people do now. To win love in different times and different places, customs differ.
• Japanese translations (Sasamoto: 2012): 皆さんも言語の形が千年も経たぬうちに変わることをよく存じているだろう、かつて高く評価した言葉は今ではひどくばかげて変に思われるが、その頃の人びとは言葉をそのように話して、今の人々と同じように恋愛に成功した。愛を得るためにも、いろいろな時代において、いろいろな土地において、作法は種々様々なのだ。
• Chinese translations (Fang: 1956): 你们都知道，每过一千年，语言就变了形式，当初很有意义的字眼，人人援用，如今却觉得琐屑怪癖；古人讲爱其实和今人同样认真；不过时代和地域既有不同，获爱的风尚也就悬殊了。

Word Information

• Etymology: OF
• Addresser: Narrator
• Addressee: N/A
• Adjectives with which juxtaposed: wonder, strange (straunge)
• Counterpart in its source (Fil): N/A
• Noun(s) (NPs) modified: language or speech (words)
• Attributive/ Predicative: predicative

Information in Previous Studies

• OED: Not quoted
• MED: Not quoted

• Commented in other previous works:
• Windeatt (2003: 52): nyce: ludicrous
• Fisher (1989): N/A
• Benson (1987): nyce: foolish
• Davis et al. (1979): ludicrous (s.v. nyce, adj.)
• Donaldson (1975: 750): nice: foolish
• Baugh (1963): N/A

Possible Definitions

ludicrous, foolish

Comments from the Editor

Windeatt (1998: 161) cited the modern English translation of Dante’s Convivio, 1.5, 55–66, which sheds light on Chaucer’s mention of “change in the forms of speech.” Dante’s passage states: “Hence in the cities of Italy, if we will look attentively back over some fifty years, we see that many words have become extinct and have come into existence and been altered; wherefore, if a short time so changes the language, a longer time changes it much more. Thus I say that if those who died a thousand years ago were to return to their cities, they would believe that these had been occupied by some foreign people, because the language would be at variance with their own.”