Scholars solved a 130-year literary mystery and it hinged on one word
A medieval literary puzzle which has stumped scholars including M.R. James for 130 years has finally been solved. Cambridge scholars now believe the Song of Wade, a long lost treasure of English culture, was a chivalric romance not a monster-filled epic. The discovery solves the most famous mystery in Chaucer's writings and provides rare evidence of a medieval preacher referencing pop culture in a sermon. The breakthrough, detailed on July 15 in The Review of English Studies, involved working o