The Tale of Melibeus

The Tale of Melibeus, one of the 24 stories in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer.

Reproved by the host of the inn for his tedious narrative of “The Tale of Sir Thopas,” Chaucer in his own persona offers this prose allegory, a close translation of a French adaptation of a 13th-century Italian story. Long (over a thousand lines) and—despite the host’s earlier entreaties for something lively—dull, it is essentially a moral debate between Prudence and her husband Melibeus, with occasional comments by his friends, on the subject of vengeance. Prudence urges her husband to forgive the enemies who have assaulted and wounded their daughter. Her advice is couched largely in proverbs, and both sides quote liberally from such various moral authorities as the biblical figure Job, St. Paul, St. Augustine, Ovid, Seneca, and Cicero. Melibeus eventually agrees to make peace with his enemies, but only after he has rebuked them.