Man in the moon

Hawthorn: the preferred thorn for hedging in the British Isles. 

Man in the moon   stands and strides

On his pitchfork    his burden he beareth

It is much wonder    that he na down slides

For doubt lest he fall    he shuddereth and sheareth

When the frost freezes    much chill he bides

The thorns beeth keen    his clothing to teareth

No wight in the world    knows when he reclines

Nor but it be the hedge    what weeds he weareth

Whither trowest this man   hath the way take?

He hath set his one foot    his other beforen

For none haste that he hath   nor mishap may him shake

He is the slowest man    that ever was y-boren

Like as in the field    setting his stakes

In hope of his thorn-plants   to knit up his dooren 

He must with his twaybill    more trusses make

Or else all his day's work   shall be for-loren

This same man on high    when as he be there

As if in the moon    he were born and bred

He leaneth on his fork    just like a grey friar

This crooked dottard   sore he is a-dread

It is many days a-gone    since that he was here

I reckon of his errand     he must not have sped

He hath hewed somewhere   a burden of briar

And hence some hayward    hath taken his pledge

What if thy pledge be taken    bring home thy truss

Set forth thine other foot    stride over street

We shall pray the hayward    home to our house

And put him at his ease      to the Nth degree

Drink to him dearly    with full good booze

And our dame douce    shall sit by his knee

When he is as drunk    as a drowned mouse

Then the pledge from the bailiff    we shall redeem

This man hears me not     though I to him cry

I reckon the churl is deaf    the Devil him to-draw

Though I yell full loud    he will not hie

The listless lad    kens nowt about the law

Hop forth Hubert       hosèd pie

I reckon thou art swallowed      into the maw

Though I harangue him    till my teeth grind

The churl will not a-down    ere the day dawn

A medieval lyric that's an outlier in many respects. Nothing churchly about it, nothing courtly or romantic, no clear social or political message. And thus, more undisguisedly than usual, we come up against our deep ignorance of medieval life: why does this poem exist, why was it written, who for, what is the occasion and performing context?

Composed maybe around 1300 CE. From the celebrated Harley MS (2253). The meaning of some of the lines remains very debatable, partly because of unusual language and partly because the nature of the poem is unfamiliar and common conventions of medieval lyric don't help a lot. 

My rendering is basically focussed on trying to share the feel of the poem, eg. the elaborate rhyme scheme (abababab) combined with an Old English rhythm (half-lines with two stresses in each) and alliteration to taste. I've done my best to approximate the meaning too, but if you object that it's scarcely a translation, I couldn't disagree.

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The poem embroiders on a legend of the man in the moon as a peasant carrying a bundle of thorns.  In many versions he's banished to the moon for committing an offence, and sometimes there's an association with Cain, and perhaps the idea that if you're stuck on the moon you'll never get beyond the sublunary zone and up to heaven.

Shakespeare refers to the legend:

QUINCE  Ay, or else one must come in with a bush of thorns and a lantern and say he comes to disfigure or to present the person of Moonshine  (Midsummer Night's Dream, III.1)

ANTONIO (plotting) ..... The man i’ th’ moon’s too slow .... (The Tempest, II.1)

STEPHANO (to Caliban) Out o’ th’ moon, I do assure thee. I was the

man i’ th’ moon when time was. (The Tempest, II.2)

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Mandatory hedging was a big part of a medieval peasant's existence. The kind of hedging method referred to here is as follows:

1. Set a line of stakes, a meter or two apart. 

2. In the gaps (doors) plant young thorn plants. (Hawthorn is the preferred species.)

3. Cut and gather bundles of thorn, brushwood or briar and heap them over the living plants. This protects them and it also makes the hedge stockproof while they grow to maturity. Eventually the living plants will displace the cut material. 

The scenario posited in Stanza 3 is that the man has been caught by the hayward cutting briar (=bramble) improperly (e.g. on a Sunday) or from somewhere he wasn't supposed to; someone else's hedge, maybe. He's been forced to give a pledge (basically an IOU), which the hayward passes on to another officer, the bailiff, for safekeeping. The pledge must be redeemed by paying a fine.

The idea in Stanza 4 is presumably to use money pilfered from the drunken hayward to pay the fine.

(Cooking up this nefarious scheme constitutes "knowing about the law", it would appear!)

[More info:

R.J. Menner, "The Man in the Moon and Hedging", The Journal of English and Germanic Philology, Vol 48 No 1 (Jan 1949), pp. 1-14 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/27714995 .)]

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Here's the original Middle English text:

Mon in þe mone stond & strit

on is botforke is burþen he bereþ

hit is muche wonder þat he na doun slyt

for doute leste he valle he shoddreþ ant shereþ

when þe forst freseþ muche chele he byd

þe þornes beþ kene is hattren to tereþ

Nis no wyþt in þe world þat wot wen he syt

ne bote hit bue þe hegge whet wedes he wereþ

whider trowe þis mon ha þe wey take

he haþ set is o fot is oþer toforen

For non hiþte þat he haþ ne syþt me hym ner shake

he is þe sloweste mon þat euer wes yboren

Wher he were o þe feld pycchynde stake

for hope of ys þornes to dutten is doren

He mot myd is twybyl oþer trous make

oþer al is dayes werk þer were yloren

Þis ilke mon vpon heh whener he were

wher he were y þe mone boren ant yfed

He leneþ on is forke ase a grey frere

þis crokede caynard sore he is adred

Hit is mony day go þat he was here

ichot of is ernde he naþ nout ysped

He haþ hewe sumwher a burþen of brere

þarefore sum hayward haþ taken ys wed

Yef þy wed ys ytake bring hom þe trous

sete forþ þyn oþer fot stryd ouer sty

We shule preye þe haywart hom to vr hous

ant maken hym at heyse for þe maystry

Drynke to hym deorly of fol god bous

ant oure dame douse shal sitten hym by

When þat he is dronke ase a dreynt mous

þenne we schule borewe þe wed ate bayly

Þis mon hereþ me nout þah ich to hym crye

ichot þe cherl is def þe del hym todrawe

Þah ich ȝeȝe vpon heþ nulle nout hye

þe lostlase ladde con nout o lawe

Hupe forþ hubert hosede pye

ichot þart amarscled into þe mawe

Þah me teone wiþ hym þat myn teh mye

þe cherld nul nout adoun er þe day dawe

(Text from Frances McSparran's transcription of Harley MS 2253:  

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/c/cme/HarLyr?rgn=main;view=fulltext . This poem is headed "Brook 30; Ker 81". The only thing I've changed is to separate the stanzas.)

The University of Michigan's online Middle English Dictionary is very helpful (select "Entire Entry" when you're searching):

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/middle-english-dictionary/dictionary/MED20777 .

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I'm drawn to Matti Rissanen's idea of the poem as a recitation piece in a tavern context. (Stanza 4's "our house" being the tavern, and our "dame douce" the landlady). Though, as ever, it's hard to conceive how genuine oral minstrel work created in a popular context would be artfully rhymed and end up being recorded in a manuscript. Though the tone of "The Man in the Moon" is unique, its elaborate form has a general resemblance to other Harley poems. One of them, the doleful "Song of the husbandman", likewise speaks of haywards and bailiffs and pledges. Perhaps our poem's comedy connects with the four Anglo-Norman fabliaux that appear in the same booklet. The overall impression given by the Harley ms is of a resourceful and sophisticated trilingual  literary culture.

Still, a tavern feels like the kind of imaginary recitation context projected by the poem itself.

I also agree with him that "Hubert" probably relates more to the proverbial magpie than to the man himself. In other words Hubert isn't actually the name of the man in the moon, as some commentators assume.

[Matti Rissanen, "Colloquial and Comic Elements in 'The Man in the Moon'", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, Vol 81 No 1 (1980), pp. 42-46 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/43343303 .)]

To build on the tavern idea, there's the delightful intuition that the reciter addresses (but is ignored by) a mute fellow-performer who represents the Man in the Moon by standing on one leg or hopping about. I'm not sure who came up with that, but I found it in the notes on David Haden's translation: 

https://potbanks.files.wordpress.com/2022/03/man_in_the_moon_mar_2022.pdf

The author even proposes that there's a third performer who represents the Hedge. Which perhaps too closely recalls Shakespeare's "rude mechanicals" with their Moonshine and Wall.

But if I was planning a school class, I would absolutely incorporate a performance along those lines!

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On a vaguely related note...  How to tell common hawthorn from midland hawthorn:

https://michaelpeverett.blogspot.com/2012/05/how-to-tell-midland-hawthorn-from.html