Canterbury Tales

Canterbury Tales, a body of tales by Chaucer, conceived of as related by a small company of pilgrims from London to the shrine of Thomas à Becket at Canterbury. They started from the Tabard Inn at Southwark, and agreed to tell each a tale going and each another coming back, the author of the best tale to be treated with a supper. None of the tales on the homeward journey are given.

Definition taken from The Nuttall Encyclopædia, edited by the Reverend James Wood (1907)