Skelton was a classical scholar, and at one time tutor to Henry
VIII. The great humanist, Erasmus, spoke of him as the "one light and
ornament of British letters." Caxton asserts that he had read Vergil,
Ovid, and Tully, and quaintly adds, "I suppose he hath dronken of
Elycon's well."
In refreshing contrast with the artificial court poetry of the 15th and
first three quarters of the 16th century, was the folk poetry, the
popular ballad literature which was handed down by oral tradition. The
English and Scotch ballads were narrative songs, written in a variety of
meters, but chiefly in what is known as the ballad stanza.
In somer, when the shawes[14] be shene,[15]
And leves be large and longe,
Hit is full merry in feyre forest,
To here the foulys song.
To se the dere draw to the dale,
And leve the hilles hee,[16]
And shadow them in the leves grene,
Under the grene-wode tree.
[Footnote 14: Woods.]
[Footnote 15: Bright.]
[Footnote 16: High.]
It is not possible to assign a definite date to these ballads. They
lived on the lips of the people, and were seldom reduced to writing till
many years after they were first composed and sung. Meanwhile they
underwent repeated changes, so that we have numerous versions of the
same story.
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