Specimens of English literature from the 'Ploughmans crede' to the ...

—VIII.SIR THO:\IAS MALORY.A.D. 1469.A FAMOUS book is ' Le IMorte Darthur,' compiled from numerousFrench romances by Sir Thomas iNIalory, completed by hhn,as he tells us, in the ninth year of Edward IV (i 469-1 470), andfirst printed by Caxton at Westminster in ij^8^. The colophonof Caxton's book is as follows :% Thus endeth thys noble and loyous book entytled le morte'Darthur / Notwithstondyng it treateth of the byrth / lyf / andactes of the sayd kynge Arthur / of his noble knyghtes of therounde table / theyr meruayllous enquestes and aduentures /thachyeuyng of the sangreal / & in thende the dolourous deth& departyng out of thys world of them al / Whiche book wasreduced in to englysshe by syr Thomas Malory knyght as aforeis sayd / and by me deuyded in to xxi bookes chapytred andenprynted / and fynysshed in thabbey westmestre the last day ofluyl the yere of our Lord M/CCCC/lxxx/V / ^ Caxton mefieri fecit.'Our extract relates the actual death of King Arthur, fromwhich the whole work took its name. It is printed fromSouthey's reprint (181 7) of Caxton's original edition (1485).An old Alliterative Poem called ' La Morte Arthure' w^s editedby Mr. Perry for the Early English Text Society, in 1865, fromthe Thornton MS. at Lincoln, and an old rimed version with thesame title was edited from the Harleian MS. 2252, in the BritishMuseum, by Mr. Furnivall in 1864. The latter most agrees withthe account in Malory. The Globe ' ' edition of INIalory's book,edited by Sir E. Strachey, is modernized from Caxton.