EAST MIDLAND DIALECT OF 1120. Extracts from a forged Peterborough Charter (inserted in the year 656): Đa seonde se kyning after pone abbode pet he cuesThen sent the king after the abbot that he speedily telice scolde to him cumon. and he swa dyde. Da cwæd quoth should come SO did se kyning to pan abbode. La leof Sæxulf. ic haue geseond Lo, loved æfter pe for mine saule purfe. and ic thee soul's need secgon for hwi. Min broðor Peada and say why brother min leoue freond loved friend Oswi ongunnen an mynstre Criste to loue and Sancte minster to Christ's glory began But Petre. Oc min broper is faren of pisse liue. swa swa Crist gone from life as wolde. Oc ic wile pe gebidden. la leoue freond. pat hii pray to they wirce auostlice on pere werce. and ic pe wile finden may work diligently the pærto gold and siluer. land and ahte. and al pet pærto goods behofeð. Da feorde se abbot ham. and ongan to wircene. behoves Swa he spedde swa him Crist hude. swa pet in feuna granted few geare was pat mynstre gare. Da pa kyning heorda þæt ready. When years heard gesecgon. pa wærd se swide glæd. heot seonden geond was he right glad he bade said through al hi peode æfter alle his þægne. æfter arcebiscop. and æfter biscopes. and æfter his eorles. and æfter alle pa F those pe Gode luuedon, þat hi scoldon to him cumene. and that come seotte pa dæi hwonne man scolde pat mynstre gehalegon. set day when hallow And ic bidde ealle pa pa æfter me cumen. beon hi mine all those that be they sunes. beon hi mine breðre. ouper kyningas pa æfter me or kings cumen. pat ure gyfe mote standen. swa swa hi willen our gift may beon delnimende on pa ece lif. and swa swa hi wilen partakers in the eternal ætbeorstan pet ece wite. Swa hwa swa ure gife ouper punishment. Whosoever escape opre godene manne gyfe wansiad. wansie him seo of other good men lessens the heofenlice iateward on heofenrice. And swa hwa swa heavenly gate-ward heaven-kingdom hit eceð. ece him seo heofenlice iateward on heofenrice. increases Das sindon pa witnes pe par waron. and pa pat gewriten These are wrote mid here fingre on Cristes mele. and ietten mid here with their tunge. Drihtnes Lord's Des writ was gewriton æfter ure. acennednesse DCLXIIII. pes kyningas birth Wulhferes seouepende gear. pes arcebiscopes Deusdedit seventh IX gear. saints' and al cristene folces. pe ani ping undyde pat þær wæs THE CONTRAST TO THE EAST MIDLAND. (About A.D. 1120.) Ure hlaford almihtig God wile and us hot pat we hine lufie. and of him smage and spece. naht him to mede ac hus to freme and to fultume. for him seize alle hiscefte. Gif non man ne poht of Gode. non ne spece of him. Gif non of him ne spece. non hine ne lufede. Gif non hine ne lufede. non to him ne come. ne delende. nere of his eadinesse. nof his merhðe. Hit is wel swete of him to specene. penche zie ælc word of him swete. al swa an huni tiar felle upe ziure hierte. Heo is hefone liht and eorde brihtnesse. loftes leom. and all hiscefte zimston. anglene blisse. and mancenne hiht and hope. richtwisen strenhope. and niedfulle frouer.1 Page 219. Seraphim birninde oder anhelend. God lét hi habben ázen chire, to chiesen. 221. Forgáng þu ones treówes westm. 235. He cwed a wunder worder. 223. Pa weran bode deadlice. 225. Ic wille halden þe and tí wif. Ic wille settan mi wed (covenant). 233. He us forðteh alse is cyldren. Feder, of wam we sielpe habbeð. ogen Gif ic fader ham. innoð. Wer ladieres móche. 239. Wic zéie, wic dredness wurð. 'Old English Homilies, edited by Dr. Morris (Early English Text Society), p. 217. These go to p. 245. The passage I give above is an original one of the transcriber's, written long after Ælfric's time, This Southern English, as anyone may see, is far more archaic than the English of Peterborough. After the year 1000, Ælfric wrote many homilies in the English of his day, and these were popular in our land long after his death. A clean sweep, it is true, was made of a Latin sentence of his, wherein he upholds the old Teutonic idea of the Eucharist, and overturns the newfangled Transubstantiation, a doctrine of which Lanfranc, seventy years later, was the great champion in England. But otherwise Elfric's teaching was thought sound, and his homilies were more than once turned into the corrupt English of succeeding centuries. We have one of these versions, drawn up about the time of the forged Peterborough charters; this is headed by the extract given above. The East Midland, with its stern contractions, is like the Attic of Thucydides; the Southern English, with its love of vowels and dislike of the clipping process, resembles the Ionic of Herodotus. The work we have now in hand, being written far to the South of the Mercian Danelagh, holds fairly well by the Old English forms; thus, instead of the Peterborough de, we find the older se, si, pat; and we sometimes meet with the old Dative Plural in um, though the old Genitive is often replaced by the form with of, and the endings of Verbs are often clipped. A guess may be given as to the place where these Homilies were adapted to the common speech. Forms like fer (ignis) and gelt (scelus) point to some shire near Kent. The combination ie, used by King Alfred, is here found, 1 See Faber's Difficulties of Romanism (Third Edition, p. 260) as to erasures made in Elfric's text by theologians of a later age. and does not appear later except in Kent and Essex. The letter o in this work begins to supplant the old a, though not often. This corruption is found in full vigour a hundred years later both in Suffolk and Dorset. Some town lying nearly half-way between the two shires, may have given birth to the new form. We now find mor, long, non, ogen (own), and haligost, for the old már, lang, nán, ágen, and hálig gást. Moreover, as we learn from the Conqueror's English charter to London, the great city was the abode of a large French-speaking population. From these men (Becket's father was one of them), it seems likely that their English fellowsubjects learned to turn the hard c into the soft ch; ceósan and rice into chiésen and riche. Long before this time, the French castel had become chastel. The changes of the a and the c, most sparingly found as yet, are the two main corruptions that our Standard English has borrowed from the South. Yet the old sounds are apt to linger in proper names; as in Aldgate and Peakirk— a village not far from Rutland. The letter h is now often found wrongly used, or is dropped at the beginning of words. We find the true Southern shibboleth, the Active Participle ending in inde, as birnind instead of the old birnende. Fourscore years later, this was to be still further corrupted. In page 235, we find pes wer isent. This of old would have been wron gesended. The old English án is now pared down into a, and is sometimes also seen as one; so nan ping become na ping. What was bathe at Peterborough is found in the Homi 1 The French escole (schola) appears in these Homilies (p. 243) as iscole. |