Physiognomy and Chaucer's Summoner and Alisoun

Chaucer's character descriptions contain details from the medieval science of physiognomy which create a stratum of meaning hidden to the modern reader. Curry and others have pointed out a number of these details; for instance, the significance of the physical traits ascribed to the Pardoner; the very different implication of those assigned to the Miller; the Wife of Bath's ‘gat-tothedness.’ in knowledge of physiognomy was widespread in the Middle Ages, Chaucer's contemporaries presumably recognized not only the details which modern scholars have identified but quite possibly many more also.