The Testament of Cresseid is a narrative poem written by Robert Henryson sometime in the 15th-century. The poem was translated into modern English by Irish poet, Seamus Heaney, in 2009.
The poem follows the life of Trojan woman, Cresseid, who despairs after she is banished by her lover Diomedes, an Achaean hero. She is angry at the cruelty of Venus and Cupid and calls them out on how they have treated her. As punishment for her blasphemy, they punish her and give her symptoms of leprosy, thus stripping herself of her natural beauty. However, she soon realizes that there is still goodness in the world, when she is taken pity on by Troilus, her old love.
Peter McDonald, of The Guardian, stated that whilst "Henryson's poem is now relatively little known…The poem is a masterpiece”. Heaney himself said Henryson "belongs in the eternal present of the perfectly pitched” and praises him for making his mark on northern renaissance literature.
