The Middle English period spans from the Norman conquest in 1066 to the Renaissance, characterized by three phases: early, high, and late Middle Ages, with significant French cultural influence. The social structure was hierarchical with distinct classes: aristocracy, clergy, and peasantry, each having specific roles and languages. The era saw the evolution of English literature, heavily influenced by French literature, with notable works in chivalric romance and allegory, alongside the impactful writings of figures like Chaucer, Dante, and Boccaccio.

1. Middle English Period
Prepared By
Mr. Anirban Singha
State Aided College Teacher
Department of English
Krishna Chandra College,
Hetampur,Birbhum

2. THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD
 Extends from Norman Conquest(1066) to the Renaissance
• Three phases in Europe:
• Early Middle Ages ( 5th
c to 10th
c; in England, this is old English
Period)
• High Middle Ages(11th
to 13th
c)
• Late Middle Ages (14th
to 16th
c)
 French influence in culture and society
 Feudalism; Strict social hierarchy
 Three Social classes( Called Estates)
• Aristocracy( King,barons and knights)
• Episcopacy( Clergy)
• Peasantry

3. The Aristocracy
• The kings ruled by “Divine Right” theory
• The right to rule
• Is granted by God
• Is passed on by Heredity
• Barons were the king’s direct subordinates
• Aristocracy spoke French and read poetry
• Associated with the ideals of Chivalary

4. Chivalry
• Knights constituted the lower nobility who
became identified with the ideals of chivalry
during the late Middle ages.
• A boy under training as a knight was called a
squire.
• Chivalry was a knight’s code of behaviour
• Songs about knights were sung by troubadours

5. The Episcopacy
• The clergy were divided into
• High clergy( who were like the Barons)
• Low clergy( who were like the serfs)
• The church leaders held great power and were
active in politics and governments
• A diocese was like a spiritual manor headed by a
bishop
• Many bishops also governed real manors
• Spoke and wrote in Latin( prose)

6. The Peasantry
• The serfs/peasants
• Live in bondage and were treated mercilessly by
the nobility and high clergy
• Were treated like animals,and were sold along
land
• The peasants believed that their after-life would
be in heaven
• The peasants lived a life of squalor, superstition
and ignorance.

7. Early Middle English Period (11th to 13th c)
• Transformation of the English language
• Simplified in spelling, grammar
• Influence of Norman French
• London became the administrative centre
• This later determined the spoken and written forms of standard
English
• Aristocratic society and taste for French Literature
• This affected the nature and scope of English literature
• Militaristic culture
• England became aggressive, confident and militaristic, which
later determined the boundaries of a vast empire.
• England entered the full current of European life; enriched by
cosmopolitan cultures and literatures

8. England in the 14th century
• Population increased, leading to calamities like
the Black Death in the Late Middle Ages
• Economy prospered
• Intellectual, spiritual and artistic flowering in
the Christian monasteries

9. Late Middle English Period
• 14th to 16th century, following High Middle Ages
• Beset with famines, plague and revolts
• Great Famine (1315-17)
• Black Death (1348 onwards)
• Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453)
• Peasants’ Revolt (1381)
• Fall of Constantinople (1453)
• Invention of printing by movable types (1456)
• Wars of the Roses (1455-1485)
• Awakenings of Renaissance and Reformation

10. Middle English Literature: An Overview
 Extensive influence of French literature
 Major genres
• Allegory (Piers the Plowman)
• Tales of Chivalry and Adventure (Gawain and
the Green Knight)
• Arthurian Legends (Morte d’Arthur)
 Period of Chaucer

11. Dream Allegory: Famous Examples
•
Roman de la Rose (The Romance of the Rose, French)
• Guillaume de Lorris (c. 1230)
• Jean de Meung (c. 1270)
• Divina Commedia (The Divine Comedy, Latin, 1321)
• Dante Alighieri
• The Pearl (English)
• 14th century elegy
• Anonymous
• Piers Plowman (English, c. 1394)
• William Langland
• The Book of the Duchess, The House of Fame and The
Parliament of Fowls (English)
• Geo rey Chaucer (14th century)
ff

12. Later works with elements of Dream
Allegories
• Pilgrim’s Progress (John Bunyan, 1678)
• The Triumph of Life (P.B. Shelley, 1824)
• The Fall of Hyperion: A Dream (John Keats,
1819)
• Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis
Caroll, 1865)
• News from Nowhere (William Morris, 1890)
• Finnegan’s Wake (James Joyce, 1939)

13. Chivalric Romances
• Knighthood and chivalry were favourite
themes in medieval literature
• Originated in France.
• Chivalric romances were written in prose or
verse and concerned adventure, romance and
courtly love

14. Elements of chivalric romance
• Idealization of the hero
• Hero’s identity is mysterious
• Hero’s willingness to comply with the lady’s caprices
• Use of the supernatural to generate suspense
• Emphasis on dangerous and dramatic events
• Encounters with dragons
• Jousting tournaments
• Magical enchantments

15. Famous Chivalric Romances
 Lancelot and Perceval (2 romances)
• Chrétien de Troye
• 12th century
• French
 King Horn
• Anonymous
• 13th century
• English
 Parzifal
• Wolfram von Eschenbach
• 13th century
• German

16. Famous Chivalric Romances
 Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
• Anonymous
• 14th century
• English
Le Morte D’Arthur
• Sir Thomas Malory
• 15th century
• English

17. Alliterative Revival (c. 1350-c.1500)
• Resurgence of alliterative verse which was popular in the
Old English period
• Probably due to the nationalistic spirit of the post-Black
Death years, and a reaction against French poetic styles
• Examples
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (by the Pearl poet)
• The Alliterative Morte Arthure (anonymous)
• Piers Plowman (by William Langland)
• The Destruction of Troy (John Clerk from Lancashire)
• Poetry by William Dunbar

18. Dante Alighieri (1265-1321)
• Born in Florence, in Italy
• Belonged to the Florentine political group
called White Guelphs
• Works helped establish the Tuscan dialect of
Latin, upon which standard Italian is based.
• Fell in love with Beatrice Portinari at age nine
• Wrote the first sonnets in world litt addressed
to her
• She died in 1290
• Dante turned to writing

19. Dante’s Works
• Convivio (The Banquet) – long philosophical poems
• Monarchia – political philosophy
• On Eloquence in the vernacular – Latin essay supported
the use of vernacular language in poetry
• Eclogues
• Le Rime (The Rhymes, a collection of lyric poems)
• Vita Nouva (The New Life) – collection of courtly verse
on his love for Beatrice

20. The Divine Comedy
• Three parts: Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso
• Written in three-lined terza rima stanzas, rhyming aba
bcb cdc etc.
• 100 cantos: 34 in Inferno, 33 each in Purgatorio &
Paradiso
• The number three is part of the numerical symbolism
of the Divine Comedy
• Three is the number of the Holy Trinity
• There are nine circles of Hell (3 times 3); nine levels
of Paradise (with the Garden of Eden at the summit as
a 10th level)
• Dante’s Satan is a three-headed monster.

21. Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-75)
• First great writer of prose in any modern language
• Initiated several literary forms
• Filocolo is the first Italian prose romance
• Filostrato is the first Italian verse romance other than
those written by minstrels
• He also wrote the first Italian idyll
• Teseida a poem on the story of Theseus, Palamon and
Arcite (retold by Chaucer, Shakespeare, etc)
• Wrote a life (biography) of Dante
• Wrote a number of encyclopedic works in Latin which
were widely read in England
• (Probably) invented ottava rima

22. Decameron (1349-53)
• 100 stories told over a period of 10 days
• 7 young women and 3 young men flee
Florence during the Black Death and take
refuge for two weeks in the countryside
• They spend hot afternoons by telling
stories
• Each day the group selects a king or
queen who determines the general theme
of stories of that day

23. Francisco Petrarch (1304-74)
• Influential scholar who was crowned the Poet
Laureate in Rome
• Travelled widely to discover manuscripts of
works by classical writers
• Father of Humanism
• Established that there is no essential conflict
between classical and Christian thought
• Fell in love with Laura, whose beauty he
describes throughout his poetry. This later
takes on a Christian dimension

24. Works by Petrarch
• Wrote more than 400 poems, mostly sonnets,
in Italian
• 366 of these are in the sonnet sequence
Canzoniere
• Themes
 Beauty of Laura
 Haunting sense of the passage of time
The vanity of earthly endeavours
 Conflict between spiritual and earthly values
• Familiar Letters is one of the many volumes of
letters (epistles) written by Petrarch in Latin

25. Petrarchan or Italian Sonnet
• The sonnet originated in Italy in the 13th c.
• Petrarch perfected the sonnet
• 14 lines of iambic pentameter divided into an octave
(two quatrains) and a sestet
• Caesura in between
• Rhyme scheme: abba abba cdc cdc / cde cde
• Employed artificial love-theme and Petrarchan
conceits:
• Far-fetched images
• Idealized and exaggerated comparisons applied to the
disdainful mistress (cold, cruel and beautiful) and to
the distresses of her worshipful lover
• Blason convention: detailed description of the body

26. Other English works of this period
• Layamon’s Brut (c. 1190)
• Long poem about the history of Britain
• Named after Britain’s mythical founder
Brutus of Troy
• Based on Wace’s Roman de Brut
• Last alliterative poem before the
Alliterative Revival

27. Other English works of this period
• The Owl and the Nightingale
• Poet overhears an owl and a nightingale
debating on which is better, happiness or
sorrow
• One of the earliest examples of “debate
poetry”
• Ancrene Riwle (or Ancrene Wisse)
• Guide for anchoresses (a monastic profession)
• Anchorite life was popular in Europe, esp.
England, at this time

28. Thank You
Everyone.