Prick of Conscience

The Prick of Conscience is a Middle English poem dating from the first half of the fourteenth century promoting penitential reflection. It is, in terms of the number of surviving manuscripts, the best attested poem in Middle English, with over 130 manuscripts. It was attributed to Richard Rolle in some manuscripts, but contemporary scholars consider the poem anonymous.[1]

Not to be confused with Ayenbite of Inwyt.
pp 88–89 of Leeds University, Brotherton Library, BC MS 500 (Prick of Conscience). Catalogue record

The text is divided into seven sections: man's sinfulness, the transient nature of the world, death, purgatory, Doomsday and its tokens, Hell, Heaven.

Appearance in stained glass
Bottom central panel of the Prick of Conscience Window in All Saints Church, North Street, York, showing the second sign of doom: 'þe seconde day þe see sall be so lawe as all men sall it see' (cf. '¶The secounde day hit shal be low / That unnethe men shul hitte knowe' in the main manuscript version, ll. 5.753-54).

Unusually, passages from and illustrations of the account of the Fifteen Signs of Doom in the Prick of Conscience appear in stained glass form in the 'Prick of Conscience Window' in All Saints' Church, North Street, York. The window is thought to have been constructed around 1410–20.[2]

Influence

The Prick of Conscience's popularity can be judged from the fact that it survives in about 130 manuscripts – more than any other Middle English poem.[3]

Editions

References
  1. James H. Morey (ed.), Prik of Conscience, TEAMS Middle English Texts Series (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2012)
  2. Roger Rosewell, 'The Pricke of Conscience or the Fifteen Signs of Doom Window in the Church of All Saints, North Street, York', Vidimus, 45 (n.d.)
  3. James H. Morey (ed.), Prik of Conscience, TEAMS Middle English Texts Series (Kalamazoo, MI: Medieval Institute Publications, 2012)
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