The Talents (play)
# The Talents (play)

The Talents, or Processus Talentorum, is a play from the Middle English recitals The Towneley Plays (ca. 1460).

This play contains an early example of macaronic English-Latin verse, spoken by the character Pontius Pilate:

    Stynt, I say! gyf men place
    quia sum dominus dominorum!
    he that agans me says
    rapietur lux oculorum;
    Therfor gyf ye me space
    ne tendam vim brachiorum,
    And then get ye no grace
    contestor Iura polorum,
    Caueatis; Rewle I the Iure,
    Maxime pure,
    Towne quoque rure,
    Me paueatis.
    Stemate regali
    kyng atus gate me of pila;
    Tramite legali
    Am I ordand to reyn upon Iuda,
    Nomine wlgari
    pownce pilate, that may ye well say,
    Qui bene wlt fari
    shuld call me fownder of all lay.
