John Lydgate, The Fall of Princes

J. Allan Mitchell (University of Victoria)

Ed. by Hugh Magennis, Queen's University Belfast
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.02: English Writing and Culture: High and Late Medieval, 1066-1485.
Vol. editors: Kate Ash-Irisarri (University of Edinburgh), Rory Critten (Université de Lausanne), David Fuller (University of Durham), Natalie Hanna (University of Liverpool), Nicole Kennedy (University of Newcastle), Hugh Magennis (Queen's University Belfast), Jamie McKinstry (University of Durham), Sarah Peverley (University of Liverpool), Sean Seeger (University of Essex), Sebastian Sobecki (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen)

Dates

First circulation or publication c. 1431 - 1438

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Poetry (any)

Resources

John Lydgate's Fall of Princes (c. 1431-38) recounts the lamentable tragedies of famous men and women, compiled in nine books and over 36,000 lines of verse, beginning with Adam and Eve and ending with King John of France. A rich and varied treasury of biblical narrative, classical lore, and medieval chronicle, Lydgate's Fall is an English rendering of Laurent de Premierfait's Des Cas de nobles hommes et femmes (1409), itself a prose redaction of Boccaccio's De casibus virorum illustrium (1355-60). Lydgate's poem is therefore an early and ambitious English foray into de casibus tragedy, an encyclopedic genre that collects appalling and absurd instances of princely misgovernance. Yet the poem also exhibits aspects of the speculum principium (“mirror for princes”), an advisory genre offering not just negative examples but positive affirmations. As...

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1849 words

Citation: Mitchell, J. Allan. "The Fall of Princes". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 07 March 2007; last revised 10 October 2007. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=909, accessed 05 December 2025.]

John Lydgate, The Fall of Princes

Dates

Places

Genres and Modes

Resources

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