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VI Introduction These repeated reproductions made the ‘ Narrenschiff’ well known in England, and in 1509 two English translations appeared. The first of these, ‘The grete shyppe of fooles of this worlde,’ was a prose version, made from the ‘rethoryke Frensshe’ of Drouyn by one Henry Watson. His own prologue tells all that is known of him. He was young, ‘ indygne and symple of vnderstandynge,’ conscious of his imperfect training: ‘y* tendernes of my yeres hathe so affusked me that I haue not applyed me vnto the lettres as I ought to haue done.’ The work was entrusted to him by his ‘ worshypfull mayster Wynkyn de Worde, thrughe the entysement & exhortacyon of the excellent prynces Margarete, countesse of Rychemonde and Derby’, the Lady Margaret whose professors still lecture at Oxford and Cambridge, ‘ grandame vnto our moost naturall souerayne lorde kynge Henry y viii, whome Ihesu preserue from all encombraunce. Watson’s translation, though reprinted in 1517, is now almost forgotten: one copy of his first edition alone survives, in the Bibliothéque Nationale at Paris.
