Well met, i’ faith! You are most heartily bid welcome to the Songbook, Gentle Reader. The Author humbly offers you this Prefatory Work, by way of Ouverture to the Grand Concert, in the pious Hope that it shall resolve certain of the Concerns expressed by other Lectors, shall e’en shew the Courses of the Plott and Schema of the events of which it relateth the Feigned Historie, and may furnish the Reader with Usefull Information (by some called “Back Story” – a barbarous Coinage, as the purer Authorities would hold), whereby the Characters may be the better understood.

To that end, moreover, the Author hath gladly undertaken somewhat to Re-Order the Songbook, that it may better follow the Chronologie of the Events therein depicted, and, by means of Academicall Notes, to solicit the Reader’s attention to the portions of the Songbook in which Matter is to be found.

Knowing no better Scheme but to follow the Ancients, viz. mighty Homer, the Author doth respectfully beg you, Gentle Reader, e’en to begin here, in medias res.