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Found, the holy grail of medieval comedy scripts

By Victoria Allen Science Editor

ANYBODY who’s had to study Chaucer at school will know how much the medieval reader enjoyed slapstick and satire.

And there was – just as there is today – a considerable audience for jokes about breaking wind.

The range of humour enjoyed by audiences and readers more than 500 years ago has been confirmed by close analysis of a rare comedy manuscript from 1480.

This time it is not the work of Chaucer, but believed to be that of a scribe called Richard Heege from an area close to Sherwood Forest, at the boundary of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire.

Dr James Wade, of Cambridge University, has carried out a detailed study of the Heege manuscript – which had been preserved for posterity by historian and novelist Sir Walter Scott at the beginning of the 19th Century.

The first of the manuscript’s nine booklets contains a satirical story of a group of peasants who try to mimic the gentry by going hare coursing. But they fail to catch any hares, end up in a mass brawl and one man hits his head so hard that his rear end goes ‘quack’ every time he stands up.

The booklet also contains a satirical mock sermon, encouraging the audience to drink more or risk never making it to heaven.

Dr Wade said: ‘Even then comedians seem to have realised that if people drank more rapidly, they would potentially find the jokes funnier, and perhaps be willing to give more coin when the cup came around after the performance.’

There’s also a reference to a deadly hare which recalls the Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog from the film Monty Python And The Holy Grail.

Dr Wade, who came across the texts by accident while researching in the National Library of Scotland, first noticed that some of the material may be comedic from a note stating: ‘By me, Richard Heege, because I was at that feast and did not have a drink.’

Dr Wade said: ‘Manuscripts often preserve relics of high art. This is something else. It’s mad and offensive, but just as valuable.’

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2023-05-31T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-05-31T07:00:00.0000000Z

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