NOTES.
St. 1
Page 1, line 12. Cf. ll. 118, 187, 190, 198, 558, 924, 1924, 2183. So in Eglamour (Thornton Romances), l. 408:
‘The boke of Rome thus can telle,’
and The Erl of Tolouse, ed. Lüdtke, l. 1219:
‘Yn Rome thys geste cronyculyd ys.’
See Halliwell’s and Lüdtke’s notes to these passages. I agree with both of them, that an expression like that does not earnestly refer the reader to a Latin or Italian source of the story; there is evidently no difference at all between in Rome and in romance.