Middle English Dialects

OE Dialects	Kentish	West Saxon	Mercian		Northumbrian
					
ME Dialects	Kentish Dialect	South-Western Dialects	Midland Dialects		Northern Dialects
Examples	-	East Saxon Dialect London Dialect Gloucester Dialect	West Midland Dialect	East Midland Dialect		Yorkshire Dialect Lancashire Dialect

The most important dialect in the Middle English period was the LONDON DIALECT.

London Dialect

In the 12^th -13^th c. the London Dialect became the literary language and the standard, both in written and spoken form. The reasons why this happened:

• The capital of the country was transferred from Winchester, Wesses, to London

• The East Saxon Dialect (the basis of the London Dialect) became prominent in that period.

• Most authors of the Middle English period used the London Dialect in their works.

Features of the London Dialect:

• The basis of the London Dialect was the East Saxon Dialect

• The East Saxon Dialect mixed with the East Midland Dialect and formed the London Dialect.

• Thus the London Dialect became more Anglican than Saxon in character  The London Dialect is an Anglican dialect.

The formation of the national E language. The London dialect.

The formation of the national literary English covers the Early NE period.

Factors that influenced:

1. The unification of the country and the progress of the culture;

2. Increased foreign contacts influenced the grouth of the vocabulary.

The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge.

Latin invention of printing → spreading of written form of English.

Early NE → Renaissance: Shakespeare, Thomas More. The end of the 17^th cent. – books and dictionaries.

In the18th cent the speech of educated people differed from that of common people: 1) pronunciation; 2) choice of words; 3) grammar.

By the end of the 18^th cent the speech may be regarded as completed for new , it possessed both a written and spoken standart.

The history of London dialect reveals the sources of literary language in late ME. The London dialect fundamentally East Saxon.

ME division → LD belonged to the S. Western dial. group.

12-13^th S. West. districts – “Black Death” → new arrivals from the East Midland → London dialect became more Anglian.

Early Middle English: The earliest samples of Early ME prose are the new entries made in the Anglo-Saxon chronicles (1122) known as Peterborough chronicle, Poem morale (Moral ode) – Kentish dialect, Ormulum – North-East Midland dialect, Ancrene Riwle – South-Western dialect.

The dialect division which evolved in Early ME was on the whole preserved in later periods. In the 14^th, 15^th cent there were the same grouping of local dialects.

1. Southern group → Kentish

→ South-West dialect

2. Midland group → East Midland

→ West Midland

3. Northern group

French was ousted from official spheres and from the sphere of writing.

The Hourishing of literature which makes the second half of the 14cent testifies to the complete reestablishment of English as the language of writing. It was “the age of Chaucer”, the greatest author of this period. “Canterbury tales”

Chaucer was the most outstanding figure of the 14^th cent. He had the most varied experience as student, official member of Parliament. His later works were imitative of other authors. He never wrote in any other language than English. The culmination of his work as a poet is his unfinished collection of stories “The Canterbury tales”. He presented in the pilgrims a gallery of life-like portraits taken from all works of life. Chaucer’s literature language based on the mixed London dialect is known as classical ME, in the 15-16^th cent it became the basic of the national literary Engl language.

ME 12-15^th: