ABSTRACT
In terms of stylistic dexterity and thematic originality, few fifteenth-century poems can be compared with Robert Henryson’s Testament of Cresseid. Yet because of its attractiveness and very obvious indebtedness to Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde, this poem has always proved vexing to literary historians. The disparity between the two poems has seemed so great that many critics would deny that Henryson merits the honorific epithet “Chaucerian.” The cosmic interpretations of the Testament ultimately depend on taking Cresseid’s dream at face value. But since Henryson’s knowledge of Chaucer’s poetry is so obviously detailed, it seems unlikely that he could be unaware of Macrobian and Boethian topoi about the nature of dreams. The information which Henryson provides about Cresseid’s state immediately before her dream shows that he intends the reader to recognize the appearance of the gods as part of an insomnium.
