BOOK One of these Anglo-Saxon translators and transVIII. fusers was Layamon, a well-known name. But it has HISTORYOF not yet been remarked, that no work shews more POETRY. satisfactorily than his Chronicle, the benefits which Layamon's English poetry and literature have derived from the ENGLISHI metrical history. Anglo-Norman. In this composition we see a poem substantially Anglo-Saxon, but with none of that peculiar style of Anglo-Saxon mind and phrase which were its pervading characteristics. It is the simple style of the Anglo-Norman poetry transferred into the Anglo-Saxon: hence, it presents to us the first state of our vernacular English poetry, divested of the inversions, transitions, obscurities, and metaphors of the Anglo-Saxon school, and approaching that form of easy and natural phrase which has been the nurse of our truest poetry and cultivated intellect. Arthur's account of his dream may be cited and read as an 5 4 This historical poem exists in MS. in the Cotton Library, Calig. A9, and Otho, C 13. He states himself to have been a priest, who resided at Ernlege, on the Severn. He says, that he composed his work from three books; from Bede's History; from St. Alban's and Austin's; and from Wace, the French clerk that well knew how to write, and gave it to the noble Eleanor, that was Henry's queen.' MS. Calig. A 9. 5 ARTHUR lai alle longe niht, And spac Ne him sugge Tha hit was dai margen, Swile he weore swithe seoc. Tha axede hine an vair cniht, Lauerd hu havest thu waren to Arthur tha answarede, A mode him was unethe. To niht a mine slepe, Ther ich lay on bure, ARTHUR lay all the long night, And speech with that young knight, So never would he have; Nor say to him Truly how it went. Then it was day in the morning, And the nobles began to stir. Arthur then rose up, And stretched his arms. He rose up and sat down; Then asked him a true knight, ፡ Lord! how hast thou been to illustration of these remarks; and as a specimen of the CHAP. improvement of mind and style which English com Thervore ich ful sari am. Tha halle ich gon bestriden, And Walwain sat bivoren me; Tha cam Moddred faren there He bar an his honde Ane wiax stronge. Tha seide Modred, Have that. Mid deore mine sweorede, And seo dethen ich heo adun sette In ane swarte putte. And all my volc riche Sette to fleme; That niste ich under Criste Whir hor bicumen weoren. But in hmi seof ich gond astonden Uppen ane wolden, And ich ther wondren agon, Thereof I am full sorry. I dreamt that men raised me The hall I began to bestride, I there saw over all. And Walwain sat before me; Then came Modred to go there And all the posts cut down There I saw Gwenhever, Then said Modred, 'Take that.' With both his arms broken. And smote off Modred's head, And all my great people That I knew not under Christ But I myself stood beyond And there I began to wonder, Then came a golden Lion; ..I.. ENGLISH ENGLISH POETRY. BOOK position derived from its Anglo-Norman masters. To VIII. feel how great a revolution in our literature was thus HISTORYOF begun, the reader may refer to the extracts which have been given in a former work, from the poetry of the Anglo-Saxons. The Dream of Arthur has a title to be considered as poetry, because, however rudely expressed, it is entirely a fiction of the imagination, and displays more invention than our versifying chroniclers usually attempted, or have expressed at all in so small a space. We must place Layamon after 1155° and as Nor Tha ure drihten make And weri of sorgen, Tha gon ich iwakien, Tha answarede the cniht, Then our Lord made Then I saw the water come. I began then to wake, Then answered the knight, 6 The date of Wace's work, from which Layamon professes to have taken his own. Mr. Ellis mentions 1180 as the earliest date that can be assigned to Layamon. Spec. Eng. Poetry, vol. 1. p. 76. I would postpone it till after 1200, POETS WHO PRECEDED mandy was not severed from England till after 1200, CHAP. I would not date the rise of English composition I. before that period, because the great, whose encou- ENGLISH ragement has been the chief producing cause of our literature, were not previously interested to reward GoWER. any other than the Anglo-Norman, in which they had been studiously educated. From the time of Layamon, English versification began to be cultivated in various branches. We have an evangelical history, the lives of saints, satirical ballads, moral ballads, songs, and a larger satire, that were composed when our vernacular poetry first began to acquire a definite shape. The historical Chronicle of Robert of Glou- Robert or cester, written about 1280, affords a still ampler spe- ter's Chrocimen of our poetical diction at that early period. nicle. The eclipse in 1264, which he states that he saw, attests the chronology of his life." 8 Glouces Between Layamon and Robert of Gloucester may The dialogue of be placed a poem, consisting of a dialogue between the Owl an Owl and a Nightingale, disputing for superiority. It deserves notice, as one of those which marks the 7 Apud ducem Neustriæ educatur, eo quod apud nobilissimos Anglos, usus teneat filios suos apud Gallos nutriri, ob usum armorum et linguæ nativa barbariem tollendam. Gerv. Tilb. otia imper. For these works the reader may consult Mr. Warton's History of English Poetry; Mr. Ellis's Specimens of our Ancient Poets; and Mr. Tyrrhwit's Introduction to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. 9 He thus describes it : As in the North West a dark weather there arose, Suddenlike swart enow that many man agros, And overcaste it thro all that lond that men might unnethe see, Grisloker weather than it was, ne mighte an erthe bẹ. And few drops of rain there fell great enow, This tokninge wel in this lond, tho me this men slou That first this book made, and was well sore aferd. Hearne's Rob. Gl. p. 560. and Night ingale. VIII. ENGLISH POETRY. BOOK stage of the transformation of the Anglo-Saxon into English poetry.10 It is not so ancient as Layamon, HISTORYOF but it retains Saxon enough to belong to the period of transition from the Anglo-Saxon to English. It is also curious for being one of our oldest original compositions, and for the successful efforts which it occasionally exhibits to form the true rhythm of English poetry. A few passages may be quoted of its happiest metre," and one, in which the Owl's boast of her merit, alludes to some of the superstitious prognostications of the day." Brunne's poems. From 1300, English poetry attained a certain and definite existence. At this period Robert de Brunne, or Robert Mannyng, appears to us well known for his metrical Chronicle of England, translated in its first part from Wace, and in its second from the French of his contemporary Piers de Langtoft;13 but 10 It is in MS. in the Cotton Library, Calig. A 9, and begins thus:- 12 For ich am witiful I wis, Ich wot who shall beon anhonge, Ich wat gif cwalm shall come on And gif deor shall ligge and starve. MS. ib. 13 This latter part was printed by Hearne, from which Mr. Ellis has given some extracts, pp. 115 and 118. The last is an instance of the genuine ballad metre. |