were many seats of learning in England, many writers, and many books; although, in the main, these have now become matter of curiosity to the antiquary only. The literature may be said to have had a kind of protracted existence till the breaking up of the language in the latter part of the twelfth century; but it was graced by no work of distinction. We are here called upon to advert to the historical production usually called the Saxon Chronicle, which consists of a view of early English history, written, it is believed, by a series of authors, commencing soon after the time of Alfred, and continued to the death of Stephen in 1154. Altogether, considering the general state of Western Europe in the middle ages, the literature of our Anglo-Saxon forefathers may be regarded as a creditable feature of our national, history, and as something of which we might justly be proud, if we did not allow ourselves to remain in such ignorance of it. This reproach, however, is daily becoming less general of application. The Anglo-Saxon Dictionary by Dr Bosworth, and the labours of able philologists, have facilitated our acquaintance with the ancient Teutonic tongue and with its existing productions. INTRODUCTION OF NORMAN-FRENCH. The Conquest, by which a Norman government and nobility were imposed upon Saxon England, led to a great change in the language. Norman-French, one of the modifications of Latin which arose in the middle ages, was now the language of education, of the law-courts, and of the upper classes generally; while Saxon shared the degradation which the people at large experienced under their conquerors. Though depressed, yet, as the speech of the great body of the people, it could not be extinguished. Having numbers on its side, it maintained its ground as the substance of the popular language, the Norman infusing only about one word for every three of the more vulgar tongue. But it was destined, in the course of the twelfth century, to undergo great grammatical changes. Its sounds were greatly altered, syllables were cut short in the pronunciation, and the terminations and inflections of words were softened down until they were entirely lost. Dr Johnson expresses his opinion, that the Normans affected the Anglo-Saxon more in this manner than by the introduction of new words. So great was the change, that the original Anglo-Saxon must have become, in the first half of the thirteenth century, more difficult to be understood than the diction of Chaucer is to us. The language which resulted was the commencement of the present English. Its origin will afterwards be traced more minutely. THE NORMAN POETS OF ENGLAND. The first literary productions which call for attention after the Conquest, form a class which may be considered as in a great measure foreign to the country and its language. Before the invasion of England by William, poetical literature had begun to be cultivated in France with considerable marks of spirit and taste. The language, which from its origin was named Romane (lingua Romana),* was separated into two great divisions-that of the south, which is represented popularly by the Provençal, and that of the north, which was subdivided into * Any book written in this tongue was cited as the livre Romans: as a great portion of these were works of fiction, the term has since given rise to the word now in general use, Romans (liber Romanus), and most frequently as simply the romance, French and Anglo-Norman, the latter dialect being that chiefly confined to our island. The poets of the south were called in their dialect trobadores or troubadours, and those of the north were distinguished by the same title, written in their language trouvères. In Provence, there arose a series of elegant versifiers, who employed their talents in composing romantic and complimentary poems, full of warlike and amatory sentiment, which many of them made a business of reciting before assemblages of the great. Norman poets, writing with more plainness and simplicity, were celebrated even before those of Provence; and one, named Taillefer, was the first man to break the English ranks at the battle of Hastings. From the preference of the Norman kings of England for the poets of their own country, and the general depression of Anglo-Saxon, it results that the distinguished literary names of the first two centuries after the Conquest are those of NORMAN POETS, men who were as frequently natives of France as of England. Philippe de Thaun, author of treatises on popular science in verse; Thorold, who wrote the fine romance of Roland; Samson de Nanteuil, who translated the Proverbs of Solomon into French verse; Geoffroi Gaimar, author of a chronicle of the Anglo-Saxon kings; and David, a trouvère of considerable eminence, whose works are lost, were the most noted predecessors of one of much greater celebrity, named Maistre WACE, a native of Jersey. About 1160, Wace wrote, in his native French, a narrative poem entitled Le Brut d'Angleterre (Brutus of England). The chief hero was an imaginary son of Æneas of Troy, who was represented as having founded the state of Britain many centuries before the Christian era. This was no creation of the fancy of the Norman poet. He only translated a serious history, written a few years before in Latin by a monk named GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH, in which the affairs of Britain were traced with all possible gravity through a series of imaginary kings, beginning with Brutus of Troy, and ending with Cadwallader, who was said to have lived in the year 689 of the Christian era. This history is a very remarkable work, on account of its origin, and its effects on subsequent literature. The Britons, settled in Wales, Cornwall, and Bretagne, were distinguished at this time on account of the numberless fanciful and fabulous legends which they possessed-a traditionary kind of literature resembling that which has since been found amongst the kindred people of the Scottish Highlands. For centuries previous, Europe had been supplied with tale and fable from the teeming fountain of Bretagne, as it now is with music from Italy, and metaphysics from Germany. Walter Calenius, archdean of Oxford, collected some of these of a professedly historical kind relating to England, and communicated them to Geoffrey, by whom they were put into the form of a regular historical work, and introduced for the first time to the learned world, as far as a learned world then existed. As little else than a bundle of incredible stories, some of which may be slightly founded on fact, this production is of small value; but it supplied a ground for Wace's poem, and proved an unfailing resource for the writers of romantic narrative for the ensuing two centuries; nor even in a later age was its influence exhausted; Spenser and Shakspeare adopted the story of Lear, and Sackville that of Ferrex and his Polyolbion, and it has given occasion to many Porrex, while Drayton reproduces much of it in allusions in the poetry of Milton. Pope contemplated an epic on the story of Brutus. Maistre Wace also composed a history of the Normans, under the title of the Roman de Rou-that a metrical Saxon or English translation, by one is, the Romance of Rollo, first Duke of Normandy- LAYAMON, a priest of Ernely, on the Severn, from the and some other works. Henry II., from admiration Brut d'Angleterre of Wace. Its date is not ascerof his writings, bestowed upon him a canonry in the tained; but if it be, as surmised by some writers, cathedral of Bayeux. Benôit, a contemporary of a composition of the latter part of the twelfth Wace, and author of a History of the Dukes of century (Mr Hallam says it must have been after Normandy; and Guernes, an ecclesiastic of Pont St 1155 when the original poem was completed, and Maxence, in Picardy, who wrote a metrical life of can hardly be placed below 1200), we must consider Thomas à Becket, are the other two Norman poets it as throwing a valuable light on the history of our of most eminence whose genius or whose writings language at perhaps the most important period of can be connected with the history of English lite- its existence. A specimen, in which the passage rature. These writers composed most frequently already given from Wace is translated, is presented in rhymed couplets, each line containing eight in the sequel. With reference to a larger extract syllables.* given by Mr Ellis, of which the other is a portion, that gentleman remarks: 'As it does not contain COMMENCEMENT OF THE PRESENT FORM any word which we are under the necessity of OF ENGLISH. Of the century following the Conquest, the only other compositions that have come down to us as the production of individuals living in, or connected with England, are works written in Latin by learned ecclesiastics, the principal of whom were John of Salisbury, Peter of Blois, Joseph of Exeter, and GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH, the last being the author of the History of England just alluded to, which is supposed to have been written about the year 1138. The most valuable of the ecclesiastical historians is William of Malmesbury, who carried a spirit of inquiry into his traditional researches. About 1154, according to Dr Johnson, the Saxon began to take a form in which the beginning of the present English may plainly be discovered.' It does not, as already hinted, contain many Norman words, but its grammatical structure is considerably altered. There is *Ellis's Specimens, i. 35-59. A short passage from Wace's description of the ceremonies and sports presumed to have taken place at King Arthur's coronation, will give an idea of the writings of the Norman poets. It is extracted from Mr Ellis's work, with his notes: 'Quant li rois leva del mangier, De la cité es champs issirent; Et les incaux chevalx monstrer: Cil qui son compaignon vainqueit, Qui por terre l'orent servi : Bois dona, et chasteleriez, Et evesquiez, et abbaiez. A ceulx qui d'autres terres estoient, referring to a French origin, we cannot but consider Saxon. it as simple and unmixed, though very barbarous At the same time,' he continues, 'the the first time, the admission of the soft g, together orthography of this manuscript, in which we see, for with the Saxon 3, as well as some other peculiarities, seems to prove that the pronunciation of our language had already undergone a considerable change. Indeed, the whole style of this composition, which is broken into a series of short unconnected sentences, and in which the construction is as plain and artless as possible, and perfectly free from inversions, appears to indicate that little more than the substitution of a few French for the present Saxon words was now necessary to produce a resemblance to that Anglo-Norman, or English, of which we possess a few specimens, supposed to have been written in the early part of the thirteenth century. Layamon's versification is also no less remarkable than his language. Sometimes he seems anxious to imitate the rhymes, and to adopt the regular number of syllables, which he had observed in his original; at other times he disregards both, either because he did not consider the laws of metre, or the consonance of final sounds, as essential to the gratification of his readers; or because he was unable to adapt them throughout so long a work, from the want of models in his native language on which to form his style. The latter is perhaps the most probable supposition; but, at all events, it is apparent that the recurrence of his rhymes is much too frequent to be the result of chance; so that, upon the whole, it seems reasonable to infer, that Layamon's work was composed at, or very near, the period when the Saxons and Normans in this country began to unite into one nation, and to adopt a common language.' SPECIMENS OF ANGLO-SAXON AND ENGLISH PREVIOUS TO 1300. We have already seen short specimens of the Anglo-Saxon prose and verse of the period prior to the Conquest. Perhaps the best means of making clear the transition of the language into its present form, is to present a continuation of these specimens, extending between the time of the Conquest and the reign of Edward I. It is not to be expected that these specimens will be of much use to the reader, on account of the ideas which they convey; but, considered merely as objects, or as pictures, they will not be without their effect in illustrating the history of our literature. [Extract from the Saxon Chronicle, 1154.] On this yær wærd the King Stephen ded, and bebyried there his wif and his sune wæron bebyried æt Tauresfeld. That ministre hi makiden. Tha the king was ded, tha was the eorl beionde sæ. And ne durste nan man don other bute god, for the micel eie of him. Tha he to Engleland come, tha was he underfangen mid micel wortscipe; and to king bletcæd in Lundine, on the Sunnen dæi beforen mid-winter-dæi. That When Literally translated thus:-1154 A.D. In this year was the King Stephen dead, and buried where his wife and his son were buried, at Touresfield. minister (minster or monastery?) they made. the king was dead, then was the earl beyond sea. And not durst no man do other but good for the great awe of him. When he to England came, then was he received with great worship; and to king consecrated in London, on the Sunday before mid-winter-day (Christmasday).' [Extract from the Account of the Proceedings at Arthur's Tha the king+ igeten1 hafde And heore here-thringes.4 Alle tha biscopes, And alle tha clarckes, Alle the eorles, And alle tha beornes. Alle tha theines, Summe heo gunnen lepen, The icumen weoren there, *The notes are by Mr Ellis, with corrections. Leoneden geond walles, He gef seolver, he gæf gold, [Extract from a Charter of Henry III., 1258 A.D., in the Common Language of the Time.] Henry, thurg Godes fultome, King on Engleneloande, Lhoaverd on Yrloand, Duk on Norman, on Acquitain, Earl on Anjou, send I greting, to alle hise holde, ilærde and ilewede on Huntindonnschiere. Thæt witen ge wel alle, that we willen and unnen, that ure rædesmen alle other the moare del of heom, that beoth ichosen thurg us and thurg that loandes-folk on ure kineriche, habbith idon, and schullen don in the worthnes of God, and ure treowthe, for the freme of the loande, thurg the besigte of than toforen iseide rædesmen, &c. Literal translation :- Henry, through God's support, King of England, Lord of Ireland, Duke of Normandy, of Acquitain, Earl of Anjou, sends greeting to all his subjects, learned and unlearned, of Huntingdonshire. This know ye well all, that we will and grant, what our counsellors all, or the more part of them, that be chosen through us and through the land-folk of our kingdom, have done, and shall do, to the honour of God, and our allegiance, for the good of the land, through the determination of the before-said counsellors,' &c. THE RHYMING CHRONICLERS. Layamon may be regarded as the first of a series of writers who, about the end of the thirteenth century, began to be conspicuous in our literary history, which usually recognises them under the general appellation of the RHYMING CHRONICLERS. The first, at a considerable interval after Layamon, was a monk of Gloucester Abbey, usually called from that circumstance ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER, and who lived during the reigns of Henry III. and Edward I. He wrote, in long rhymed lines (Alexandrines), a history of England from the imaginary Brutus to his own time, using chiefly as his authority the Latin history by Geoffrey of Monmouth, of which Wace and Layamon had already given Norman-French and Saxon versions.* The work is described by Mr Warton as destitute of art and + The original of this passage, by Wace, is given in an earlier imagination, and giving to the fabulous history, in many parts, a less poetical air than it bears in Geoffrey's prose. The language is full of Saxon peculiarities, which might partly be the result of his living in so remote a province as Gloucestershire. Another critic acknowledges that, though cold and prosaic, Robert is not deficient in the valuable talent of arresting the attention. "The orations with which he occasionally diversifies the thread of his story, are, in general, appropriate and dramatic, and not only prove his good sense, but exhibit no unfavourable specimens of his eloquence. In his description of the first crusade, he seems to change his usual 1 This lasted three days, such games and such plays. 2 Then, on the fourth day, the king went to council? 3 And gave his good knights all their rights or rewards. 4 He satisfied. Robert's Chronicle, from a particular allusion, is supposed to have been written, at least in part, after 1297. character, and becomes not only entertaining, but even animated.'* Of the language of Robert's Chronicle, the following is a specimen, in its original spelling: Engelond ys a wel god lond, ich wene of eche lond best, [The Muster for the First Crusade.] A good pope was thilk time at Rome, that hecht1 Urban, 6 The Earl Robert of Flanders mid 8 him wend also, And Eustace Earl of Boulogne, and mony good knight thereto. There wend the Duke Geoffrey, and the Earl Baldwin there, And the other Baldwin also, that noble men were, The Earl Stephen de Blois wend eke, that great power had on hond, And Robert's sister Curthose espoused had to wive. There wend yet other knights, the best that were alive; As the Earl of St Giles, the good Raymond, And Niel the king's brother of France, and the Earl And Tancred his nephew, and the bishop also [The Siege of Antioch.] ** In the month of Feverer the Saracens eftsoon For to help their fellows, whan they were were.5 The Duke Godfrey all so good on the shouldren smote one, each one, And they, for the wonder case, in dread fell anon. nome, And, thorough the grace of Jesus Christ, the Paynims they overcome, And slew to ground here and there, and the other flew anon, Tho wend forth this company, with mony a noble man, So that at a narrow brig there adrent mony one. * # * * twelve princes there were dead, That me cleped amirals, a fair case it was one The Christians had of them of armour great won, Of gold and of silver eke, and thereafter they nome The headen of the hext masters, and to Antioch come, And laid them in engines, and into the city them cast: Tho they within i-see this, sore were they aghast; That their masters were aslaw, they 'gun dread sore, And held it little worth the town to wardy more. 1 Took counsel. 2 Shrews, cursed men. 4 Then were there no more. 5 Weary. 8 So soon as they were prepared. 3 Six parties. 6 Fresh. 7 Foes. 9 Were drowned A master that was within, send to the Earl Beaumond, Tho Beaumond therein was, his banner anon he let rear; [Description of Robert Curthose.] He was William's son bastard, as I have i-said ere i-lome,2 The while he was young, and byhuld, and these words said: 'By the uprising of God, Robelin, me shall i-see, Curthose my young son stalward knight shall be.' For he was some deal short, he cleped him Curthose, And he ne might never eft afterward thilk name lose. Other lack had he nought, but he was not well long; He was quaint of counsel and of speech, and of body strong. Never yet man ne might, in Christendom, ne in Paynim, In battle him bring adown of his horse none time. In the list of Rhyming Chroniclers, Robert of Gloucester is succeeded by ROBERT MANNING, a Gilbertine canon in the monastery of Brunne or Bourne, in Lincolnshire (therefore usually called Robert de Brunne), who flourished in the latter part of the reign of Edward I., and throughout that of Edward II. He translated, under the name of a Handling of Sins, a French book, entitled Manuel des Péches, the composition of William de Wadington, in which the seven deadly sins are illustrated by legendary stories. He afterwards translated a French chronicle of England, which had been written by Peter de Langtoft, a contemporary of his own, and an Augustine canon of Bridlington, in Yorkshire. Manning has been characterised as an industrious, and, for the time, an elegant writer, possessing, in particular, a great command of rhymes. The verse adopted in his chronicle is shorter than that of the Gloucester monk, making an approach to the octosyllabic stanza of modern times. The following is one of the most spirited passages, in reduced spelling: [The Interview of Vortigern with Rowen, the Beautiful Daughter of Hengist.] Hengist that day did his might, 6 That all were glad, king and knight. On that language the king ne couth.10 Bregh hight that knight, born Breton, And gave the king, syne him kissed. Of that wassail men told great tale, [Fabulous Account of the First Highways in England.} Belin well held his honour, And wisely was good governor. Through muris, hills, and vallies, And ends unto Catheness. Another street ordained he, 本 And goes to Wales to Saint Davy. 3 Grown. 1 Interpreter. 4 As pleased her. 7 Pleased. 10 Went. 2 Esteems. 5 Went. 8 Pagan. 11 Breadthways. 3 Taught him. 6 Many times. 9 According to pagan law. |