After Go Men By The Hill Beside The Plains Of Galilee Unto
Nazareth, Where Was Wont To Be A Great City And A Fair; But Now
There Is Not But A Little Village, And Houses Abroad Here And
There.
And it is not walled.
And it sits in a little valley, and
there be hills all about. There was our Lady born, but she was
gotten at Jerusalem. And because that our Lady was born at
Nazareth, therefore bare our Lord his surname of that town. There
took Joseph our Lady to wife, when she was fourteen year of age.
And there Gabriel greeted our Lady, saying, AVE GRATIA PLENA,
DOMINUS TECUM! that is to say, 'Hail, full of grace, our Lord is
with thee!' And this salutation was done in a place of a great
altar of a fair church that was wont to be sometime, but it is now
all down, and men have made a little receipt, beside a pillar of
that church, to receive the offerings of pilgrims. And the
Saracens keep that place full dearly, for the profit that they have
thereof. And they be full wicked Saracens and cruel, and more
despiteful than in any other place, and have destroyed all the
churches. There nigh is Gabriel's Well, where our Lord was wont to
bathe him, when he was young, and from that well bare he water
often-time to his mother. And in that well she washed often-time
the clouts of her Son Jesu Christ. And from Jerusalem unto thither
is three journeys. At Nazareth was our Lord nourished. Nazareth
is as much to say as, 'Flower of the garden'; and by good skill may
it be clept flower, for there was nourished the flower of life that
was Christ Jesu.
And two mile from Nazareth is the city of Sephor, by the way that
goeth from Nazareth to Akon. And an half mile from Nazareth is the
Leap of our Lord. For the Jews led him upon an high rock for to
make him leap down, and have slain him; but Jesu passed amongst
them, and leapt upon another rock, and yet be the steps of his feet
seen in the rock, where he alighted. And therefore say some men,
when they dread them of thieves in any way, or of enemies; JESUS
AUTEM TRANSIENS PER MEDIUM ILLORUM IBAT; that is to say, 'Jesus,
forsooth, passing by the midst of them, he went': in token and
mind, that our Lord passed through, out the Jews' cruelty, and
scaped safely from them, so surely may men pass the peril of
thieves'. And then say men two verses of the Psalter three sithes:
IRRUAT SUPER EOS FORMIDO & PAVOR, IN MAGNITUDINE BRACHII TUI,
DOMINE. FIANT IMMOBILES, QUASI LAPIS, DONEC PERTRANSEAT POPULUS
TUUS, DOMINE; DONEC PERTRANSEAT POPULUS TUUS ISTE, QUEM POSSEDISTI;
and then may men pass without peril.
And ye shall understand, that our Lady had child when she was
fifteen year old. And she was conversant with her son thirty-three
year and three months.
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