The Twa Cummeris

"The Twa Cummeris", also rendered as "The Twa Cumeris", is a short humorous poem in Middle Scots written at an unknown date by William Dunbar (born 1459 or 1460)[1] The poem takes the form of a dialogue during Lent between two close female confidants who have become indiscreet due to the drinking of wine.

The Concise Scots Dictionary defines it, literally, as a godmother and, figuratively, as "a female intimate or friend; a gossip."

The source texts of the poem are the Bannatyne Manuscript, the Maitland Folio and a side-note in the Minute Book of Sassines of Aberdeen.

The tane cowth to the tother complene, Graneand and suppand cowd scho say, "This lang Lentern makis me lene.

[1] She tells the other that she should refrain from fasting and, suggestively, that her husband should suffer instead, then adds This long Lent makes me lean.

"Your counsale, cummer, is gud" quod scho, "All is to tene him that I do, In bed he is nocht wirth a bene, Fill fow the glass and drynk me to, This lang Lentern makis me lene.

"The Twa Cummeris" illustrated by Walter Geikie in the early nineteenth century. ( British Museum ).
Fill fow the glass and drynk me to. A still-life by Pieter Claesz , 1642