id	author	title	date	pages	extension	mime	words	sentences	flesch	summary	cache	txt
en-wikisource-org-4945		Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Gower, John - Wikisource, the free online library			.html	text/html	5427	360	74	GOWER, JOHN (1325?–1408), poet, is loosely described by Caxton, who first printed his 'Confessio Amantis' in 1483, as 'a squyer borne in Walys in the tyme of kyng Richard the second.' The poet was certainly not a Welshman by birth, and, since in 1400 he described himself as 'senex,' it is probable he was born in the second or third decade of the fourteenth century. Attached to all three, in continuation of the poem, is Gower's 'Chronica Tripartita,' in three books of rhyming Latin hexameters, giving a hostile account of Richard II's conduct of affairs from the appointment of the commissioners of regency, 19 Nov. 1386, till the king's death, and the accession of Henry IV. But in a preface addressed to the 'reder' Berthelette prints from a manuscript the earlier dedication to Richard II, and gives an account of Gower's tomb and of his intimacy with Chaucer. In the earlier version of the 'Confessio' (dedicated to Richard II) Gower, at the close of his poem, makes Venus address Chaucer in highly complimentary verse.	./cache/en-wikisource-org-4945.html	./txt/en-wikisource-org-4945.txt