came one of the worst of all our corruptions, Layamon's Active Participle in ing instead of the older form: Robert leans to this evil change, but still he often uses the old East Midland Participle in and. With the North Robert has much in common: we can see by his rimes that he wrote the Norse pepen (page 81) and mykel (page 253), instead of the Southern pen and mochyl, which have been foisted into his verse by the Southerner who transcribed the poem sixty years later. The following are some of the forms Robert uses, which are found, many of them for the first time, in the Northern Psalter: childer, fos, ylka, tane, ire, gatte, hauk, slagheter, handmayden, lighten, wrecched, abye, sle, as sone as, many one, dounright, he seys, thou sweres, sky (coelum). He, like the translator of the Psalter, delights in the form gh; not only does he write sygh, lagheter, doghe, nyghe, neghbour, but also kneugh and nagheer (our knew and nowhere). This seems to show that in Southern Lincolnshire, in 1303, the gh had not always a guttural sound. He also sometimes clips the ending of the Imperative Plural;1 but turns the Yorkshire thou has into thou hast. In common with another Northern work, the Sir Tristrem, Robert uses the new form ye for the Latin tu; also the new senses given in that work to the old words smart and croun. To the bond (servus) of the aforesaid poem he fastens a French ending, and thus compounds a new substantive, bondage, wherewith he translates the French vileynage: this is a most astounding innovation, the source of much bad English. Our tongue might well seem stricken with barrenness, This is as great a change as if the Latin intelligite were to be written intellig. if English endings were no longer in request. He holds fast to the Norse of his forefathers when writing words like yole, kirk, til, werre (pejus). For the Latin idem he has both same and yche. We can gather from his poem that England was soon to replace zede (ivit) by went, oper by second; that she was soon to lose her swithe (valdè), and to substitute for it right and full: very is of rather later growth. Almost every one of the Teutonic changes in idiom, distinguishing the New English from the Old, the speech of Queen Victoria from the speech of Hengist, is to be found in Manning's work. We have had few Teutonic changes since his day, a fact which marks the influence he has had upon our tongue. He it was who sometimes substituted w for u, as down for down. In his writings we see clearly enough what was marked by Sir Philip Sidney almost three hundred years later: 'English is void of those cumbersome differences of cases, genders, moods, and tenses, which I think was a piece of the Tower of Babylon's curse, that a man should be put to schoole to learne his mother tongue; but for the uttering sweetly and properly the conceit of the minde, which is the ende of speech, that it hath equally with any other tongue in the world.'3 The Elizabethan knight ought to have been well pleased with the clippings and parings of the Edwardian monk. In the Handlyng Synne are the following Scandinavian words: The idea of swithe is kept in Pepy's mighty merry,' and the common phrase, 'you be main heavy.' 2 Since, nor, its, unless, below, until, are our main Teutonic changes since Manning's time. Quoted by Marsh, Lectures on the English Language, p. 88. Ekename (nickname), from the Swedish öknamn. Some words, which we have in common with other Teutons, are found for the first time; as plank and stumble; also midwife, which has been explained by Junius.1 There are a few remarkable changes in the meanings of English words. Kind had hitherto meant natural, but in page 167 we read, To serve hym (God) þat ys to us so kynde. The two senses were alike used for nearly 400 years, as we see in Milton's works. In page 161 we read, he is to hym mynde,' that is, inclined: mind was getting a new sense, used by us when we say, 'I have a mind to go;' 'ye that mind to come.' Truth had hitherto stood for fides, but it now comes to mean veritas, and in the end has all but driven out the good old sooth. To this day our true will translate either fidus or verus. Hyt ys no troupe, but fals belevyng.—Page 13. For ze wyte weyl, and have hyt herde, Pat troupe ys more pan alle pe worlde.-Page 88. Eton Bucks is the name that used to be given to the lads bred at King Henry the Sixth's renowned College. In the Handlyng Synne (page 102), we see how the Old English bucca (hircus) came to mean a dandy. 1 He explains it as a woman who comes for mede. And of pese berdede buckys also, Per whylys pey hade pat gyse on hande These are Robert's own rimes; for Waddington, writing earlier, had not thought it needful to glance at the beard movement, though he bore hard on the ladies and their dress. The Old English naddre (serpens) now loses its first letter, as it also did in the Alexander. Ekename, on the other hand, has since gained the letter n. And addres bete hym by pe fete.-Page 166. In this poem, both the Northern ky and the Southern keyn stand for the Latin vacca. Reafian gets the new sense of snatching: Refte pe saule unto helle.-Page 154. We have seen how in the South one came to stand for aliquis and quidam. It was brought into Lincolnshire, and is now used in a new sense, thereby avoiding the repetition of a substantive that has gone before; She ledde hym to a moche felde, So grete one nevere he behelde.-Page 104.1 London thieves speak of their booty as swag. The word of old meant nothing but a bag; the connexion between the two ideas is plain: Pere was a wycche, and made a bagge, A bely of leþyr, a grete swagge.—Page 17. In this century, many adjectives were to have one fastened on to them; we still hear, he is a bad un,' &c. Dr. Morris thinks that this one represents an old inflection ne. He quotes from the Ayenbite ane littlene (a little un). So schoolboys talk of bagging their mates' goods. We now find the first mention of 'ready money: ' And ten mark of pens redy.-Page 198. A well-known religious phrase is found in the following lines: bys erymyte lenede hym on a walle, Ande badde hys bedys.—Page 378. We have seen that hál or hol came to mean integer before 1100; we now find our well-known adverb compounded from it. Something had to be invented to replace the lost eallunga. Ta confessiun deit estre entere' is tranlated Alle holy owep by shryfte be doun.-Page 367. The old leosan (amittere) had had loren for its Past Participle and pu lure for the second Person Singular of the Perfect; we now light on a wonderful change: Here wurschyp ys lost for evermore.—Page 94. Pat pou lostest.-Page 373. We still keep the true Old English Gerundial form in the phrase, this house to let.' It was corrupted in Lincolnshire by the year 1303, and Tyndale unhappily followed this corruption in his account of St. Paul's rebuke to St. Peter. Robert of Brunne says— pey bep to be blamede eft parfore.-Page 50. The verb have was now gaining its sense of 'to drag : ' She had hym up, wyp here to go.-Page 104. |