guerdon less (gerdonles)

[ But love alas quyte him so his wage With cruel daunger pleynly at the laste That with the dethe guerdonle e he paste. Lydgate, Complaint of the Black Knight, 1. 399. Guelf, Guelph (gwelf), n. [ Guelfo , It. form of G. Welf , a personal name, . [Native name.] 1. A welf, the young of dogs, and of wild animals, = AS. hwelp, E. whelp: see whelp.] A member of the papal and popular party of Italy in the middle ages, opposed to the Ghi bel lines, the imperial and aristocratic party. The Welfs (Guelfs) were a powerful family of Germany, so called from Welf I., in the time of Charlemagne. His descendants, several of whom bore the same name, held great po e ions in Italy, through intermarriage, were at different times dukes of Bavaria, Saxony, and Carinthia, and founded the princely house of Brunswick and Hanover, to which the present royal family of England belongs. The names Welf and Waiblingen (Guelf and Ghibelline) are alleged to have been first used as war-cries at the battle of Weinsberg in 1140, fought and lost by Welf VI. against the Hohenstaufen emperor Conrad III. The contest soon ceased in Germany, but was taken up on other grounds in Italy, over which the emperors claimed supreme power; and the names continued to designate bitterly antagonistic parties there till near the end of the fifteenth century. See Ghibelline.