Cody Schmidt
Mrs. Gentry
English IV
11-09-17
The Prioress’ Tale
The Canterbury Tales are a set of stories that are all told by characters going on a pilgrimage to Canterbury. On the way there, they are competing to tell the best tale and whoever has the best one gets their food paid for by the other travelers. There are a lot of good Tales told by the travelers but the best tale was told by the Prioress.
The Prioress’s tale is about a Christian child who walks everyday through the Jewish Ghetto to get to school. Eventually he began to sing a song, “O Alma Redemptoris”, that he often heard while passing through the ghetto. This angered the Jewish people from the area, so much that they hired a murderer to slay the Christian child. …show more content…
One story that may have influenced this tale would be a murder of a boy in Lincoln, in 1255, who became known as Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln. This story involves a a boy’s death that was falsely accused to be attributed to Jews. That means that this story, though it was a bit exaggerated in the book, is associated to murders that actually happened around this time period. There is another tale that was told by the Physician that mentions a similar plot of an innocent that was persecuted by an unstoppable enemy. They also both have mentions of antisemitism which is discrimination against Jews. All of the other tales in the story involve an extreme plot and a very unrealistic story with fictional characters but, since the Prioress’ tale is the best story in The Canterbury Tales, it relates the real events that were happening around the time this story was written.
Work Cited
Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Canterbury Tales: The Miller's Tale Summary." Shmoop. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 14 Nov. 2017.
Wikipedia contributors. "The Prioress's Tale." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 4 Jul. 2017. Web. 14 Nov. 2017.
Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Prioress in The Canterbury Tales: General Prologue & Frame Story." Shmoop. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 14 Nov.
Mrs. Gentry
English IV
11-09-17
The Prioress’ Tale
The Canterbury Tales are a set of stories that are all told by characters going on a pilgrimage to Canterbury. On the way there, they are competing to tell the best tale and whoever has the best one gets their food paid for by the other travelers. There are a lot of good Tales told by the travelers but the best tale was told by the Prioress.
The Prioress’s tale is about a Christian child who walks everyday through the Jewish Ghetto to get to school. Eventually he began to sing a song, “O Alma Redemptoris”, that he often heard while passing through the ghetto. This angered the Jewish people from the area, so much that they hired a murderer to slay the Christian child. …show more content…
One story that may have influenced this tale would be a murder of a boy in Lincoln, in 1255, who became known as Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln. This story involves a a boy’s death that was falsely accused to be attributed to Jews. That means that this story, though it was a bit exaggerated in the book, is associated to murders that actually happened around this time period. There is another tale that was told by the Physician that mentions a similar plot of an innocent that was persecuted by an unstoppable enemy. They also both have mentions of antisemitism which is discrimination against Jews. All of the other tales in the story involve an extreme plot and a very unrealistic story with fictional characters but, since the Prioress’ tale is the best story in The Canterbury Tales, it relates the real events that were happening around the time this story was written.
Work Cited
Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Canterbury Tales: The Miller's Tale Summary." Shmoop. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 14 Nov. 2017.
Wikipedia contributors. "The Prioress's Tale." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 4 Jul. 2017. Web. 14 Nov. 2017.
Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Prioress in The Canterbury Tales: General Prologue & Frame Story." Shmoop. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 14 Nov.