merthe

With merthe and mynstralsye, wyth metez at hor wylle,

A Literary History of the English People From the Origins to the Renaissance Jean Jules Jusserand

Sauf pley or merthe/strau {n} ge to spelle or reede

Early English Meals and Manners Frederick James Furnivall 1867

Thus we find John Lydgate writing in the early 15th century, They nentende nyght nor day/But unto merthe, and William Caxton, later in the century, penning, I ne entende but onely to reduce thauncient rhyme to prose.

VERBATIM: The Language Quarterly Vol III No 2 1976