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From: <>
Subject: History of English - Part 2
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 19:15:52 EDT

A Brief Look at the History of English (Part Two -- Middle English)

The period of Middle English extends roughly from the twelfth century through
the fifteenth. The influence of French (and Latin, often by way of French)
upon the lexicon continued throughout this period, the loss of some
inflections and the reduction of others (often to a final unstressed vowel
spelled -e) accelerated, and many changes took place
within the phonological and grammatical systems of the language.

A typical prose passage, especially one from the later part of the period,
will not have such a foreign look to us as Aelfric's prose has; but it will
not be mistaken for contemporary writing either. The following brief passage
is drawn from a work of the late fourteenth century called Mandeville's
Travels. It is fiction in the guise of travel literature, and, though it
purports to be from the pen of an English knight, it was originally written
in French and later translated into Latin and English.

In this extract Mandeville describes the land of Bactria, apparently not an
altogether inviting place, as it is inhabited by "full yuele [evil] folk and
full cruell."

~~In þat lond ben trees þat beren wolle, as þogh it were of scheep; whereof
men maken clothes, and all þing þat may ben made of wolle. In þat contree
ben many ipotaynes, þat dwellen som tyme in the water, and somtyme on the
lond: and þei ben half man and half hors, as I haue seyd before; and þei
eten men, whan þei may take hem. And þere ben ryueres and watres þat ben
fulle byttere, þree sithes more þan is the water of the see. In þat contré
ben many griffounes, more plentee þan in ony other contree. Sum men seyn þat
þei han the body vpward as an egle, and benethe as a lyoun: and treuly þei
seyn soth þat þei ben of þat schapp. But o griffoun hath the body more gret,
and is more strong, þanne eight lyouns, of suche lyouns as ben o this half;
and more gret and strongere þan an hundred egles, suche as we han amonges vs.
For o griffoun þere wil bere fleynge to his nest a gret hors, 3if he may
fynde him at the poynt, or two oxen 3oked togidere, as þei gon at the
plowgh.~~

The spelling is often peculiar by modern standards and even inconsistent
within these few sentences (contré and contree, o [griffoun] and a [gret
hors], þanne and þan, for example). Moreover, in the original text, there is
in addition to thorn another old character 3, called "yogh," to make
difficulty. It can represent several sounds but here may be thought of as
equivalent to y. Even the older spellings (including those where u stands for
v or vice versa) are recognizable, however, and there are only a few words
like ipotaynes "hippopotamuses" and sithes "times" that have dropped out of
the language altogether.

We may notice a few words and phrases that have meanings no longer common
such as byttere "salty," o this half "on this side of the world," and at the
poynt "to hand," and the effect of the centuries-long dominance of French on
the vocabulary is evident in many familiar words which could not have
occurred in Aelfric's writing even if his subject
had allowed them, words like contree, ryueres, plentee, egle, and lyoun.

In general word order is now very close to that of our time, though we notice
constructions like hath the body more gret and three sithes more þan is the
water of the see. We also notice that present tense verbs still receive a
plural inflection as in beren, dwellen, han, and ben and that while
nominative þei has replaced Aelfric's hi in the third person plural, the form
for objects is still hem. All the same, the number of inflections for nouns,
adjectives, and verbs has been greatly reduced, and in most respects
Mandeville is closer to Modern than to Old English.

This thread:

• History of English - Part 1 by <>

  • History of English - Part 2 by <>