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The knight
The ugly but wise old woman in the Tale is a common character in legends: the loathly lady, or the woman who seems to be an unimportant old woman but actually contains magical powers. The old woman helps the knight on the condition that he promises to do whatever she wants.
The old woman Quotes in The Canterbury Tales
The The Canterbury Tales quotes below are all either spoken by The old woman or refer to The old woman. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Wife of Bath’s Tale
Quotes
For gentilesse nys but renomee
Of thyne auncestres, for hire heigh bountee,
Which is a strange thing to thy persone.
Thy gentilesse cometh fro God alone.
Thanne comth our verray gentilesse of grace;
It was no thing biquethe us with our place.
Related Characters:
The old woman (speaker), The knight
Related Themes:
Get the entire The Canterbury Tales LitChart as a printable PDF.
The old woman Quotes in The Canterbury Tales
The The Canterbury Tales quotes below are all either spoken by The old woman or refer to The old woman. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Wife of Bath’s Tale
Quotes
For gentilesse nys but renomee
Of thyne auncestres, for hire heigh bountee,
Which is a strange thing to thy persone.
Thy gentilesse cometh fro God alone.
Thanne comth our verray gentilesse of grace;
It was no thing biquethe us with our place.
Related Characters:
The old woman (speaker), The knight
Related Themes:
