Amy and Hir Nether Ye

Get smart by watching TV: I liked Dr. Amy Farrah Fowler, played by real-life neuroscience Ph. D. Mayim Bialik, from the beginning, which was in the final episode of season 3, The Lunar Excitation from May 24th, 2010.

Chaucer has been fun since 2001 A Knight’s Tale, with Paul Bettany prancing around naked and doing his stirring declamations for Sir Ulrich Von Lichtenstein (who does exist). By reciting The Miller’s Tale on a casual basis, Mayim Bialik gives the heteronormal male nerd something to fall in love with. And everybody else into smart big girls, of course.

——— Geoffrey Chaucer:

The Miller’s Tale

end: verse 3850–3854, c. 1385:

Thus swyved was this carpenteris wyf,
For al his kepyng and his jalousye;
And Absolon hath kist hir nether ye;
And Nicholas is scalded in the towte.
This tale is doon, and God save al the rowte!

In language …:

And that is how the carpenter’s wife was screwed, for all the carpenter’s watchfulness and paranoia; how Absolom kissed her nether eye; and how Nicholas got his ass burned. Thank you, and God bless every one of us!

… and explained …:

This passage, the rhyming conclusion to the Miller’s Tale, neatly resolves the story by offering a reckoning of accounts. Everyone in the story has learned his or her lesson and gotten the physical punishment he or she deserves. The carpenter’s wife, Alisoun, was “swyved,” or possessed in bed by another man, in this case, Nicholas. John, the ignorant and jealous carpenter, has been made a cuckold, despite his watchful and possessive eye. Absolon, the foolish and foppish parish clerk, has kissed Alisoun’s behind, fair punishment for evading his clerical duties. Nicholas, the smart-alecky student who cheated on the carpenter with Alisoun, has been burned on his bottom with a red-hot poker as payback for farting in Absolon’s face. Still, the distribution of punishments is not entirely equal. John is dealt the worst lot—he ends up with a broken arm and the whole town believing he has gone insane. Alisoun’s “swyving” is a double punishment for John, while Alisoun herself escapes unscathed.

… and in heavy use on girls‘ night as in The Big bang Theory, season 4, episode 8: The 21-Second Excitation, November 11th, 2010:

Amy: „And Absolon hath kist hir nether ye;
And Nicholas is scalded in the towte.
This tale is doon, and God save al the rowte!“

Penny: What the hell was that?

Amy: Bernadette dared me to tell a dirty story. The Miller’s Tale by Chaucer is the dirtiest story I know. It would have been hidden in sock drawers if people in the 14th century had worn socks.

HERE ENDETH THE MILLERE HIS TALE.

Images: Quirks and All, December 28th, 2013.

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