Middle English fobbere and the Critical Editing of Piers Plowman

This essay examines a line in William Langland's Piers Plowman that caused the scribes considerable trouble and which involves the synonymous Middle English hapax legomena fob and fobbere. The word in question appears to differ across the three versions of the poem, "A," "B," and "C." The particular textual crux opens onto a general dilemma that faces Langland's modern editors. Editors of Piers Plowman have constantly to decide whether, and to what extent, to admit into evidence the testimony of parallel versions when editing any one version. Against the drift of a tendency toward parallel editing in the poem's twentieth-century reception, it is argued that the critical editing of Piers Plowman sometimes must involve holding at arm's length the apparently relevant testimony of parallel versions.