Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/416

Rh 396 ENGLISH LANGUAGE are words from this source, which appear first in the work of Orm, of which the following lines may be quoted : &quot; J)e Judewisshe folkess hoc hemm se^de,patt henim birrde Twa bnkkes samenn to pe preost att kirrke-dure brinngenn ; And te^ fa didenn blipeli$, swa summ J&amp;gt;e boc hemm tahhte, And brohhtenn twe^enn bukkess pser Drihhtin paarwipp to lakenn. And att te kirrke-dure toe pe preost ta twe^enn bukkess, And o patt an he le^du Jar all pe^re sake and sinne, And le&quot;t itt eornenn forpwipp all ut inntill wilde wesste ; And toe and snap patt operr bucc Drihhtin paerwipp to lakenn. All f)iss wass don forr here ned, And ec forr ure nede ; For hemm itt hallp biforenn Godd to clennssenn hemm of sinne ; And all swa ma^ itt hellpenn pe 3iff patt tu willt [itt] fol jhenn. }iff patt tu willt full innwarrdlu wipp fulle trowwpe lefenn All patt tatt wass bitacnedd taer, to lefenn and to trowwenn.&quot; White s Ormulum, 1. 1324. The author of the Ormulum was a phonetist, and employed a special spelling of his own to represent not only the quality but the quantities of vowels and conson ants, a circumstance which gives his work a peculiar Talue to the investigator, Thirty years after the Ormulum, the east midland rhymed Story of Genesis and Exodus 1 shows us the dialect in a more southern form, with the vowels of modern English. In 1258 was issued the celebrated English proclamation of Henry III., or rather of Simon de Montfort in his name, which, as the only public recognition of the native tongue between William the Conqueror and Edward III., has been spoken of as the first specimen of English. It runs &quot; Henri Jmr$ godes fultume king on Engleneloande. Lhoauerd on Yrloande. Duk on Normandie on Aquitaine and eorl on Aniow Send igretinge to alle hise holde ilaerde and ileawede on Huntendoneschir?. J?aet witen $e wel alle psefe we willen and vnne?i pa&amp;gt;t pret vre nedesmen alle oper pe moare dagl of heom pret beop ichosen pur} us and Jmq paet loandes folk on vre kuneriche. habbep idou and schullen don in pe worpnesse of gode and on vre treowpe. for ps freme of pe loande. pur} pe beside of pan to-foren-iseide redesmen. beo stedefsest and ilestinde in alle pinge a buten tende. And we hoaten alle vre treowe in pe treowpe paet heo vs 03en. paet heo stedefaestliche healden and swerien to healden and to werien po isetnesses past beou imakecle and beon to makien pur} pan to-foren iseide raedesmen. oper pur} pe moare dael of heom alswo alse hit is biforen iseid. And paet aehc oper helpe paet for to done bi pan ilche ope a^nes alle men. Ri}t for to done and to foangen. And noan ne nime of loande ne of e}te. wherpurj pis beside mu}e beon ilet oper iwersed on onie wise. And }if oni oper onie cumen her on^enes ; we willen and hoaten poet alle vre treowe heom healden deadliche ifoan. And for paet we willen paet pis beo stedefaest and lestinde ; we senden jew pis writ open iseined wip vre seel, to halden a- inanges }ew ine hord. Witnesse vs seluen aet Lundene. pane Kjtetenpe day. on pe Monpe of Octobre In pe Tvvo-and- 1 Edited for the Early Englisli Text Society by Dr Morris, 1865. fowerti}pe jiare of vre cruninge. And pis wes idon aetforeu vre isworene redesmen &quot; And al on po ilche worden is isend in to aeurihce opre shcire ouer al paere kuneriche on Engleneloande. and ek in tel Irelonde.&quot; As to the dialect of this document, it is more southern than anything else, with a slight midland admixture, and represents no doubt the London speech of the day. London being in a Saxon county, and contiguous to the Saxon Kent and Surrey, had certainly at first a southern dialect ; but its position as the capital, as well as its proximity to the midland district, made its dialect more and more midland. Even in Chaucer, however, it has still southern features, for Chaucer s language is well known to be more southern than standard English eventually bscame. Inflexionally, the proclamation is much more archaic than the Genesis and Exodus or Ormulum; but it closely resembles the old Kentish Sermons and Proverbs of Alfred in the southern dialect of 1250. In the writings of the second half of this century, the language becomes rapidly more modern in aspect, till we arrive about 1300 at the name of Robert of Brunne in south Lincolnshire, with whom we pass from the Early to the Later Middle English. Different tests and different dates have indeed been proposed for subdividing the Middle English, but the most important is that of Mr Henry Nicol, based on the discovery that in the 13th century, as in Ormin, the Old English short vowels in an open syllable still retained their short quantity, as ndma, over, mete ; but by the beginning of the Hth century they were lengthened to nd-me, o-ver, me-te, a change which has also taken place at a particular period in all the Teutonic, and even the Romance languages, as in bud-no for bo-num, cd-ne for cd-nem, &c. The lengthening of the penult left the final syllable by contrast shortened or weakened, and paved the way for the disappearance of final e in the century following, through the stages na-me, nd-me, nd-m, ndm, the one long syllable in nam(e) being the quantitative equivalent of the two short syllables in nd-me; and thus came the idea that mute e makes a preceding vowel long, the truth being that the lengthening of the vowel made the e mute. The late Middle English produced the prose of Mandeville and Wycliffe, and the poetry of Chaucer, with whom it may be said to have culminated, and in whoso writings its main characteristics as distinct from Old and Modern English may be studied. Thus, we find final e in full use representing numerous original vowels and terminations as Him thoughte that his hert& wolde breke, in Old English Him jmhte pret his heorte wolde brecan, which may be compared with the modern German Ihm dauchte dasz sein Herze wollte brechen. In nouns the -es of the plural and genitive case is still syllabic Reede as the berstl-es of a sow-es eer-es. Several old genitives and plural forms continued to exist, and the dative or prepositional case often has a final e. Adjectives retain so much of the old declension as to have -e in the definite form and in the plural The tend-re cropp-es and the yong-e sonne. And smal-e fowl-es maken melodic. Numerous old forms of comparison were in use, which have not come down to Modern English, as hcrre, ferre, lenger, hext = higher, farther, longer, highest. In the pronouns, ick lingered alongside of // ye was only nominative, and you objective ; the northern thei had dispossessed the southern hy, but her and hem (the modern em) stood their ground asainst their and them. The verb is / lov-e, thou lov-est,