numbers by Saxon or Norman. As a result the (Celtic) Welsh language and
culture remained strong. Eisteddfods, national festivals of Welsh song and
poetry, continued throughout the medieval period and still take place
today. The Anglo-Norman lords of eastern Ireland remained loyal to the
English king but, despite laws to the contrary, mostly adopted the Gaelic
language and customs.
The political independence of Scotland did not prevent a gradual switch to
the English language and customs in the lowland (southern) part of the
country. First, the Anglo-Saxon element here was strengthened by the
arrival of many Saxon aristocrats fleeing the Norman conquest of England.
Second, the Celtic kings saw that the adoption of an Anglo-Norman style of
government would strengthen royal power. By the end of this period a
cultural split had developed between the lowlands, where the way of life
and language was similar to that in England, and the highlands, where
(Celtic) Gaelic culture and language prevailed – and where, because of the
mountainous landscape, the authority of the king was hard to enforce.
It was in this period that Parliament began its gradual evolution into the
democratic body which is it today. The word “parliament”, which comes from
the French word parler (to speak), was first used in England in the
thirteenth century to describe an assembly of nobles called together by the
king. In 1295, the Model Parliament set the pattern for the future by
including elected representatives from urban and rural areas.
Many food names in English are French borrowings. After the Norman Conquest
under William the Conqueror (1066) French words began to enter the English
language increasing in number for more than tree centuries. Among them were
different names of dishes. The Norman barons brought to Britain their
professional cooks who showed to English their skill.
Learners of the English language notice that there is one name for a live
beast grazing in the field and another for the same beast when it is killed
and coked. The matter is that English peasants preserved Anglo-Saxon names
for the animals they used to bring to Norman castles to sell. But the
dishes made of the meat got French names. That is why now we have native
English names of animals: ox, cow, calf, sheep, swine, and French names of
meals from whose meat they are cooked: beef, veal, mutton, pork. (By the
way “lamb” is an exception, it is a native Anglo-Saxon word). A historian
writes that an English peasant who had spent a hard day tending his oxen,
calves, sheep and swine probably saw little enough of the beef, veal,
mutton and pork, which were gobbled at night by his Norman masters.
The French enriched English vocabulary with such food words as bacon,
sausage, gravy; then: toast, biscuit, cream, sugar. They taught the English
to have for dessert such fruits as: fig, grape, orange, lemon, pomegranate,
peach and the names of these fruits became known to the English due the
French. The English learned from them how to make pastry, tart, jelly,
treacle. From the French the English came to know about mustard and
vinegard. The English borrowed from the French verbs to describe various
culinary processes: to boil, to roast, to stew, to fry.
One famous English linguist exclaimed: “It is melancholy to think what the
English dinner would have been like, had there been no Norman Conquest!”
The period of Middle English is the time of the fast development of English
literature. The greatest poet of the 14th century was Geoffrey Chaucer. He
is often called the father of English poetry, although, as we know, there
were many English poets before him. As we should expect, the language had
changed a great deal in the seven hundred years since the time Beowulf and
it is much easier to read Chaucer than to read anything written in Old
English. Here are the opening lines of The Canterbury Tales (about 1387),
his greatest work:
Whan that Aprille with his shoures swote
The droghte of Marche hath perced to the rote
When April with his sweet showers has stuck to the roots the
dryness of March…
There are five main beats in each line, and the reader will notice that
rhyme has taken the place of Old English alliteration. Chaucer was a well-
educated man who read Latin, and studied French and Italian poetry; but he
was not interested only in books. He traveled and made good use of his
eyes; and the people whom he describes are just like living people.
The Canterbury Tales total altogether about 17,000 lines – about half of
Chaucer’s literary production. A party of pilgrims agree to tell stories to
pass the time on their journey from London to Canterbury with its great
church and the grave of Thomas a Becket. There are more than twenty of
these stories, mostly in verse, and in the stories we get to know the
pilgrims themselves. Most of them, like the merchant, the lawyer, the cook,
the sailor, the ploughman, and the miller, are ordinary people, but each of
them can be recognized as a real person with his or her own character. One
of the most enjoyable characters, for example, is the Wife of Bath. By the
time she tells her story we know her as a woman of very strong opinions who
believes firmly in marriage (she has had five husbands, one after the
other) and equally firmly in the need to manage husbands strictly. In her
story one of King Arthur’s knights must give within a year the correct
answer to the question “What do women love most?” in order to save his
life. An ugly old which knows the answer (“to rule”) and agrees to tell him
if he marries her. At last he agrees, and at the marriage she becomes young
again and beautiful.
A good deal of Middle English prose is religious. The Ancren Riwle teaches
proper rules of life for anchoresses (religious women) how they ought to
dress, what work they may do, when they ought not to speak, and so on. It
was probably written in the thirteenth century. Another work, The Form of
Perfect Living, was written by richard rolle with the same sort of aim. His
prose style has been highly praised, and his work is important in the
history of our prose.
john wycliffe, a priest, attacked many of the religious ideas of his time.
He was at Oxford, but had to leave because his attacks on the Church could
no longer be borne. One of his beliefs was that anyone who wanted to read
the Bible ought to be allowed to do so;
but how could this be done by uneducated people when the Bible was in
Latin? Some parts had indeed been put into Old English long ago, but
Wycliffe arranged the production of the whole Bible in English. He himself
translated part of it. There were two translations ! 1382 and 1388), of
which the second is the better.
It is surprising that Wycliffe was not burnt alive for his attacks on
religious practices. After he was dead and buried, his bones were dug up
again and thrown into a stream which flows into the River Avon (which
itself flows into the River Severn):
The Avon to the Severn runs,
The Severn to the sea,
And Wycliffe's dust shall spread abroad,
Wide as the waters be.
An important Middle English prose work, Morte D'Arthur [= Arthur's Death],
was written by sir thomas malory. Even for the violent years just before
and during the Wars of the Roses, Malory was a violent character. He was
several times in prison, and it has been suggested that he wrote at least
part of Morte D'Arthur there to pass the time.
Malory wrote eight separate tales of King Arthur and his knights but when
Caxton printed the book in 1485 (after Malory's death) he joined them into
one long story. Caxton's was the only copy of Malory's work that we had
until, quite recently f1933-4;. a handwritten copy of it was found in
Winchester College.
The stories of Arthur and his knights have attracted many British and other
writers. Arthur is a shadowy figure of the past. but probably really lived.
Many tales gathered round him and his knights. One of the main subjects was
the search for the cup used by Christ at the East Supper. (This cup is
known as The Holy Grail. Another subject was Arthur's battles against his
enemies, including the Romans. Malory's fine prose can tell a direct story
well, but can also express deep feelings in musical sentences. Here is part
of the book in modern form. King Arthur is badly wounded:
Then Sir Bedivere took the king on his back and so went with him to the
water's edge. And when they were there. close by the bank, there came a
little ship with many beautiful ladies in it; and among them all there was
a queen. And they all had black head-dresses, and all wept and cried when
they saw King Arthur.
III. Modern English (1500-to the present day)
By the beginning of 20th century, Britain was no longer the world's richest
country. Perhaps this caused Victorian confidence in gradual reform to
weaken. Whatever the reason, the first twenty years of the century were a
period of extremism in Britain. The Suffragettes, women demanding the right
to vote, were prepared both to damage property and to die for their
beliefs; the problem of Ulster in the north of Ireland led to a situation
in which some sections of the army appeared ready to disobey the
government; and the government's introduction of new types and levels of
taxation was opposed so absolutely by the House of Lords that even
Parliament, the foundation of the political system, seemed to have an
