In the manner of Langland's Piers the Ploughman (see LINK 3 in this module), the Second Shepherd's Play (so called because it is the second of two plays about the shepherds who visited the stable in which Jesus was born, not because it is about the second of the three shepherds) was written in the Midlands, presumably near the village of Wakefield (near York, in northern England); it is one of the plays of the "Wakefield Master," who is famous for a vivid style and a robust sense of humor. We will be reading the Second Shepherd's Play later in the semester, so you can get ahead by reading it for this link.
The play is important not only because it represents the oppressed classes of the fourteenth century but because it shows that oppressions took place within class boundaries. You will notice in the illustrations of plowmen in this module that each seems to have a helping hand to guide the oxen, a "boy." Shepherds too had youths to assist them, as we see in the opening of this play.
The sequence is unmistakable: first shepherds complain about their land-owning lordly masters; but immediately thereafter we see the shepherds themselves acting like lordly masters when their servant or "knave," Daw, appears.
Here are some questions:
16. Shepherd, do you have any work?
17. Yes, lord, I have. In the early morning I drive my sheep to their pasture and stand over them through hot and cold, with the hounds, lest the pasture wolves devour them. And I lead them back to their fold and milk them twice a day. I left them into their fold and, in addition, make cheese and butter, and I am faithful to my lord.
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