Table of Contents

Preface; Acknowledgements; Note on quotations and references; List of abbreviations; 1. Introduction: tradition and the new anticlericalism; 2. The usurpation of priestly power and the transformation of an antifraternal satire; 3. Poverty: an old controversy and a new polemic; 4. Charity: the ground of anticlericalism 5. Antireligious traditions and a new satire in the C-text; 6. Clerical dominion and authority in new anticlerical literature; Notes; Bibliography; General index; Index of Piers Plowman citations.

Promotional Information

This book is an extended investigation of the anticlericalism of the medieval English poem Piers Plowman.