english

1. 1066-1485

2. Alfred the Great united all of England under one
ruler around 886.
He supported Christianity, encouraged education
He died in 899.
For over a hundred years after his death, England
was in a weakened state…

3. The Norman Conquest of1066 - invasion of England
by William the Conqueror.
 Ended the Anglo-Saxons’ control over country.
 Divided the conquered land among Normans, forcing most
Anglo-Saxons to become serfs.
 Ended Anglo-Saxon as the “official” language.
 Norman French became the language of the aristocracy.
 Latin was the language of the Church (Holy Roman Catholic)

4.  William II
 Henry I
 Stephen
 Henry II
 Richard I (Richard the Lion-Hearted)
 John (think Robin Hood!)
 Henry III
 Edward I 1272 (proclaimed himself king of Scotland, but not for long…the Scots
claimed their independence in the Battle of Bannockburn 1314)
 Edward II
 Edward III 1327 (Hundred Years’ War began)
 Great advances in literature and education during The Hundred Years’ War:
 English poetry became important for the first time
 Geoffrey Chaucer/ William Langland

5.  Richard II 1377 (Peasant’s Revolt)
 Henry IV
 Henry V 1413
 Henry VI 1422 (House of Lancaster)
 Nobles from the House of York wanted to overthrow him.
 Resulted in The Wars of the Roses.
 Edward IV (York - 1461)
 Henry VI (Lancaster -1470)
 Edward IV (York -1471)
 Edward V
 Richard III (self-proclaimed king) 1483-1485
 Middle English Period ends in 1485, with the ascension of Henry VII to the throne
of England, thereby ending The Wars of the Roses.

6.  Society was organized into a social pyramid based on a
feudal system (which was imported from France).
 A feudal society :
 oaths and obligations, vows and promises, and established
expectations and customs provide the only stability possible.
 Loyalty to others and fulfilling one's oaths are the most important
values in a feudal society.
 If these ties break down - then anarchy is possible.
 Feudalism reached its height between the 800s-1200s.
It disappeared in the 1400s.

7.  Medieval society was organized in a feudal tree or pyramid system. It
was based on the level of command each man had.
 The King was the highest and most important in command. The King
gave fiefs or grants of land to his noblemen, they were called Barons and
Bishops.
 In return for the land, each noble promised to supply the King with
soldiers in time for war.
 The idea of loyalty and service was important in feudal society. Anyone
who had land took an oath to serve the person who gave it to him.
 A noble pledged himself to be a King’s vassal, or a servant at a ceremony.
They kneeled before the King and swore an oath of loyalty. This was
known as an act of homage and fealty. The oath of loyalty was meant to
be binding for life. Anyone who broke it would be regarded as a traitor.

8.  At the bottom of the feudal system were the
people who made up the social class, this
included peasants (freeman), servants, serfs
(slaves), craftsmen, etc…
 Everyone owned a service to a person higher
up on the feudal pyramid. They either
farmed or fought for that person above them.
In return for their service they were given
either protection or land.

9.  Somewhat of a “figurehead ruler.”
 Kings ruled by divine right- people believed God had chosen
them to be king. The theory claimed that kings were
answerable only to God and it was sinful for their subjects to
resist them.
 That, however, did not stop all of the rebellions!
 If a king was a strong leader, he could control the barons. If he was
weak or indecisive, the barons would control him!
 Kings used lords to control parts of the country.

10.  Swore loyalty to the king.
 Gave wealth and support to their vassals: money, land, or
whatever treasures or goods were taken in battle.
 Were responsible for protecting the family of any vassal who
was killed.
 The children were protected as wards of the feudal lord
until they married (if a daughter) or became a vassal (if a
son).
 Widows, and their property, were also protected by the
feudal lord.
 In essence, the vassal achieved a kind of insurance for his
family by entering the service of a feudal lord.

11.  Had to swear an oath of loyalty to the king.
 Had to provide soldiers (knights) to fight so many days per
year.
 Had to pay homage to their lord - promising to always
defend him/his lands.
 After paying homage, the vassal received his fief.
 Fiefs were estates granted by the lord (including the land,
the buildings on it, and the peasants who worked it.)
He only received possession of the fief, not ownership.

12. The vassal could:
receive what the land produced
 collect taxes
 hold court & execute sentences
obtain labor as needed on the castle,
other buildings and roads of the fief
(estate.)

13. Were granted land from their lord for their
military service.
At first the knights lived with the lords & were fed, clothed &
armed by them.
Later, some knights were given fiefs from the lord-vassal’s own
fief estates.
Followed the Code of Chivalry. (see next slide)

14.  To fear God and maintain His Church
 To serve the liege lord in valor and faith
 To protect the weak and defenseless
 To help widows and orphans
 To refrain from the uncontrolled giving of offence
 To live by honor and for glory
 To despise reward in cash
 To fight for the welfare of all
 To obey those placed in authority
 To guard the honor of fellow knights
 To avoid unfairness, meanness and deceit
 To keep faith
 At all times to speak the truth
 To persevere to the end in any enterprise begun
 To respect the honor of women
 Never to refuse a challenge from an equal
 Never to turn the back upon a foe

15.  The code of chivalry did not always extend to the peasants.
The "weak" was widely interpreted as "noble women and
children." The knights were often brutal to common folk.
 The code of chivalry stated that knights must give mercy to a
vanquished enemy. However, the very fact that knights were
trained as men of war was in conflict with this code.

16.  By 1250, the steady growth of trade and
industry led to a rising middle class-the
merchants.
Merchant guilds
Craft guilds

17.  Worked the lord/vassal’s land and received a place to stay
and some of the food they produced.
 Half of the work week was spent on working the land
belonging to the lord and the church: maintenance, wood
cutting, land clearing, road building, etc.
 The rest of the time they could work on their own land.
 Sundays and saints’ days were holidays.
 Had to give 1/10 of everything they produced to the church
(crops, eggs, animals)…There were lots of rich bishops!
 Huts were shared with livestock.

18.  Not technically a slave, but bound to a lord for life.
 Couldn’t own property.
 Needed the lord’s permission to marry.
 Couldn’t leave the land without the lord’s
permission.
 If a serf ran to a town and managed to stay for 1 year + a
day, he was a free man.
 Worked just as hard as a peasant, but had no days
off/received no payment of crops, etc.

19.  Medieval society was dominated by two great institutions:
feudalism and religion.
 The idea of your social and legal obligations to your lord
pervaded all aspects of daily life for all the lower levels of
society.
 The idea of the afterlife, and where you would be spending
it, pervaded all aspects of society (and was used to
manipulate all levels of society.)
 Literature of the period can be grouped around these two institutions.

20.  King
 Pope
 Cardinals
 Archbishops
 Bishops
 Monsignors
 Priests
 The people

21.  Many new words, literary forms, and social attitudes
had entered England from France, and the whole
character of English language and literature had been
altered.
 The net effect was to enrich (rather
than to impoverish) English language and literature.
 Latin (the language of the church and of scholars)
influenced English language.
 Church controlled education
 Oxford and Cambridge universities were established during this
time period.

22.  French was the official language of England and the
language of the aristocracy.
 English vocabulary greatly enlarged; more than 10,000
French words were added to the English language.
 “English in the barn, French in the kitchen.”
 Words relating to culture, gov’t and “polite” terms
generally have French or Latin roots, while the “little
words of house and home” derive from Anglo Saxon roots.
 cow, sheep, pig (Old English)
 beef, pork, bacon (French)

23.  It wasn’t until the 14th
century that English again
emerged as a literary and political language.
Partly due to the war with France, the English
began to take a nationalistic pride in their country
and their culture.
English (instead of French) began to be taught
regularly in schools.

24.  Grammar was simplified.
 In the year 1000 the opening words of the Lord’s Prayer were
written in Old English:
Faeder ure thu eart on heafunum, si thin nama gehaigod…
In Wycliffe’s Bible (1389) it begins:
Our fadir that aart in hevenes, halwid be thi name…
 English thus made a giant stride from its Germanic
heritage toward the language we speak today.

25. Vocab. & language
seems foreign to us
Language is more
recognizable to us
Northern, Scandinavian
influences-vigorous,
virile, stirring, but rather
stark, humorless and
forbidding
Southern influences-
stressing love and
tenderness as much as
strength and courage;
possesses a gaiety and
delicacy
Hero of the old epic was
the warrior
Hero of the new
romance was the Knight

26. Warrior
 Brave
 Male
 Physically strong
Knowledgeable
offensive
Codes they lived by…
loyalty to tribal king
personal commitment
Boasting was acceptable
Knight
 Brave
 Male
 Physically strong
Knowledgeable/Educated
defensive
Codes they lived by…
feudalism
code of chivalry
Knights were expected to be
humble before others;
boasting was not
acceptable.

27. Four types of poems were popular during the
Middle Ages:
Religious lyric
Secular lyric(Ubi sunt, nature & love)
Popular ballad
Narrative poem

28.  The introduction of Latin hymns and the songs from
the French troubadours (after the Norman
Conquest) provided the English lyric with a new
style an a new subject-matter:
 Instead of alliteration—poems started to rhyme.
 The new subject-matter: courtly love, the
transitoriness of human life and nature description…
although religion continued to be the chief subject.

29.  Religious lyrics basically glorified the Virgin, a
saint, or Jesus Christ.

30. Courtly love was a concept that originated in the Middle Ages in
Europe. There were certain assumptions associated with the
idea of courtly love:
1. The characters involved must be of a higher social class- must
be from the Court.
2. There must be a certain amount of "ritual" associated with
their relationship:
a. the man must suffer, and it must show in the form of
physical manifestations-i.e. lack of sleep, pallor, loss of
appetite, etc.
b. the woman must present herself as indifferent to his grief-
at least in the beginning
c. there must be a rival for the woman's affections

31. d. there must be an element of secrecy involved in their
relationship-it may be caused by politics, other relationships,
social differences, etc.
e. there may not be any physical expression of love
f. it is unlikely the characters involved will marry (marriage
was for political, monetary or social benefit)
3. The love object was all the virtues personified- not a "real"
person, but rather the embodiment of all the elements that
make the “ideal” woman.

32.  The nature lyric describes nature…duh!
 The Cuckoo Song was sung as a round.
Sumer is icumen in,
Lhude sing cuccu!
Groweþ sed and bloweþ med
And springþ þe wode nu,
Sing cuccu!
Awe bleteth after lomb,
Lhouth after calve cu.
Bulluc sterteth, bucke verteth,
Murie sing cuccu!
Cuccu, cuccu, wel sings thu cuccu.
Ne swik thu naver nu.
Sing cuccu nu. Sing cuccu.
Sing cuccu. Sing cuccu nu!

33. Summer has come in,
Loudly sing, Cuckoo!
The seed grows and the meadow blooms
And the wood springs anew,
Sing, Cuckoo!
The ewe bleats after the lamb
The cow lows after the calf.
The bullock stirs, the stag farts,
Merrily sing, Cuckoo!
Cuckoo, cuckoo, well you sing, cuckoo;
Don't you ever stop now,
Sing cuckoo now. Sing, Cuckoo.
Sing Cuckoo. Sing cuckoo now!
"bucke uerteþ" means "the stag farts", a gesture of virility indicating the stag's potential for creating new life, echoing the
rebirth of Nature from the barren period of winter.

34.  Ubi Sunt poems lamented the transitoriness
of human life.
 Used to convey sadness about the temporary
nature of life and beauty.
 Ubi sunt literally means where are…?

35. Where beth they beforen us weren,
Houndes ladden and havekes beren,...?
They beren hem well swithe heye,
And, in a twinkling of an eye,
Hoere soules weren forloren.
--Anon (later 13th century)

36. Where are they, who were before us, led
hounds and bore hawks ...?
They bore themselves very loftily,
and in the twinkling of an eye, their souls
were lost.

37.  Popular ballads-are songs that tell a story.
 Popular ballads/traditional ballads have unknown
authors.
 Most were passed down orally.
 They relate violent or pathetic events of everyday
experiences in a simple, memorable, repetitive
style.
 Their subject matter usually includes: love, battles,
jealousy and/or revenge.

38.  Most are written about upper-class individuals or families.
 The material is drawn from history or from folklore.
 Bright colors and magic numbers (such as 3 or 7) often occur.
 Ballads are unlike lyrics because they are objective poems,
and the attention is on the characters and events of the story
rather than on the personal views or feelings of the narrator.
 They are usually composed of rhyming couplets or the ballad
stanza.

39.  Rhyming couplet: two lines that rhyme.
There were three ravens that sat on a tree,
They were as blacke as they might be.
 Ballad stanza: a stanza of 4 lines.
 Lines 2 & 4 almost always rhyme
 Lines 1 and 3 sometimes rhyme.
“Late late yestreen I saw the new moone,
Wi the auld moone in hir arme,
And I feir, I feir, my deir master,
That we will cum to harme.”

40.  There were three ravens sat on a tree,
 downe a downe, hay downe, hay downe,
 There were three ravens sat on a tree,
 with a downe,
 There were three ravens sat on a tree,
 They were as black as they might be.
- with a downe, derrie, derrie, derrie, downe, downe.
 The one of them said to his mate, Where shall we our breakfast take?
 Down in yonder green field, There lies a Knight slain under his shield.

41.  His hounds they lie down at his feet,
 So well they can their Master keep,
 His hawks they fly so eagerly,
 There's no fowl dare him come nie.
 Down there comes a fallow doe,
 As great with young as she might go.
 She lift up his bloody head,
 And kissed his wounds that were so red.

42.  She got him up upon her back,
 And carried him to earthen lake.
 She buried him before the prime,
 She was dead herself ere evening-song time.
 God send every gentleman,
 Such hawks, such hounds, and such a Leman.

43. A poem that tells a story.
An epic is a type of narrative, as is a ballad, etc..
Another example of a narrative poem is
Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

44.  What we now call Middle English appears after the great
silence of 200 years, in the 2nd
half of 14th
century.
 Prior to that time, vernacular (=not in Latin) literature
consisted primarily of religious writings. The second half of
14th
century produced the first great age of secular (=not
religious) literature.
 The best representative is Geoffrey Chaucer, ‘the father of
English poetry’. By making a conscious choice to write in
English, he symbolizes the rebirth of English as a national
language. His works also helped the London dialect of
English become a standard.
 We can read and understand Chaucer’s English fairly well –
this shows how much the language had changed.

45.  Chaucer’s most famous work is ‘The Canterbury Tales’ (about
1387), a long poem, or a collection of stories in verse. And it
is real verse – another novelty. The rhyme has taken place of
Old English alliteration.
 The story is about a party of pilgrims, the poet among them,
traveling to Canterbury to visit the grave of Thomas a
Becket. To pass the time, they agree to tell tales. In those
tales we get to know the characters themselves. They come
from every class of the society of the time, from the nobility,
members of the church, merchants and craftsmen, to
peasants.

46.  What is new and refreshing about Chaucer’s
work is that :
 the characters are seen as real people, having
both good and bad sides.
 Although he often makes ironic comments, and
sometimes may appear unsympathetic, the poet
has, on the whole, a positive attitude towards the
characters and a belief in the good in the world.