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Italy, 9. A knowledge of the ancient pronunciation of our Language ncceffary in order to form a judgment of the Verfification of Chaucer, 10. How a critick in the age of Auguftus would have proceeded in judging of the metre of Ennius, § 11. The fame method recommended with refpect to Chaucer. General reafons for believing that he understood and practifed the ordinary rules of metre, 12. The offences against metre in an English verfe enumerated, as arifing from 1.a fuperfluity, 2. a deficiency of syllables, and 3. a misplacing of accents, 13. No fuperfluity of fyllables in Chaucer's verfes, § 14. The fceming deficiencies in his metre may generally be fupplied by restoring the ancient pronunciation of certain fyllables, ◊ 15.; and especially of thee feminine. Reasons for believing that the finale in our ancient Lan.. guage was pronounced like the e feminine of the French, 16. The third kind of irregularity, arising from a misplacing of aceents, may be rectified, in many infiances, by accenting certain words in a manner different from that now in ufe, and more agreeable to the French practice. Proofs that fuch a mode of accentuation was used by Chaucer in words of Saxon as well as of French original. The early poets in France and Italy not exact in the difpofition of their accents, § 17. Illuftration of the foregoing theory by a grammatical and metrical analyfis of the firft eighteen lines of The Canterbury Tales, 18.

AN ESSAY, &c.

THE Language of Chaucer has undergone two very different judgments. According to one (1) he is the "well of English undefiled;" according to the other he has corrupted and deformed the English idiom by an immoderate mixture of French words (2). Nor do

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(1) Spenfer, F. Q. b. IV. c. ii. ft. 32.

(2) Verftegan, c. 7. "Some few ages after [the conqueft] 84 came the poet Geffery Chaucer, who writing his poefies in "English is of fome called the first illuminator of the English 'tongue. Of their opinion I am not, though I reverence Chau46 cer as an excellent poet for his time. He was indeed a great "mingler of English with French, unto which language (belike "for that he was defcended of French or rather Waloon race) " he carried a great affection."

Skinner, Etymol. L. A. Præf. "Ex hoc malefano novitatis "pruritu, Belga Gallicas voces paffim civitate fua donando "patrij fermonis puritatem auper non leviter inquinârunt, et

the opinions with refpect to his Verfification feem to have been lefs difcordant. His contemporaries (3), and they who lived nearest to his time, univerfally extol him as the "chief poete of Britaine," "the "flour of poetes," . titles which muft be fuppofed to imply their admiration of his metrical fkill as well as of his other poetical talents; but the later criticks (4), though they leave him in poffeffion of the fame founding titles, yet they are almoft unani

"Chaucerus poeta, peffimo exemplo, integris vocum plaufiris "ex eadem Gallia in noftram linguam inveâis,eam, nimis antea "a Normannorum victoria adulteratam, omni fere nativa gratia et nitore fpoliavit."

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(3) Lydgate, Occleve, et al. See the Teftimonies prefixed to

this volume.

(4) I fall only quote Dryden, Pref. to his Fables. "The "verfe of Chaucer, I confefs, is not harmonious to us-They "who lived with him, and fome time after him, thought it mu"fical, and it continues fo even in our judgment, if compared "with the numbers of Lydgate and Gower, his contempora"ries. It is true I cannot go so far as he who published the last "edition of him, [Mr. Speght,] for he would make us believe "the fault is in our ears, and that there were really ten fyilables. "in a verfe where we find but nine: but this opinion is not "worth confuting; it is fo grofs and obvious an errour that "common fenfe (which is a rule in every thing but matters of "faith and revelation, muft convince the reader that equality " of numbers in every verie which we call Heroick was either ⚫not known or not always practifed in Chaucer's age. It were 66 an eafy matter to produce fome thousands of his verfes which "are lame for want of half a foot, and sometimes a whole one, "and which no pronunciation can make otherwife.”—This peremptory decifion has never fince (that I know) been controverted, except by Mr. Urry, whofe defign of reftering the metre of Chaucer by a collation of mff. was as laudable as his execution of it has certainly been unsuccessful

moufly agreed that he was either totally ignorant or negligent of metrical rules, and that his verfes (if they may be fo called) are frequently deficient by a fyllable or two of their juft meafure.

It is the purpose of the following Effay to throw fome light upon both these questions. Admitting the fact that the English of Chaucer has a great mixture of French in it, I hope to fhew that this mixture (if a crime) cannot fairly be laid to his charge: I thall then proceed to ftate fome obfervations upon the most material peculiarities of the Norman-Saxon or English Language, as it appears to have been in general ufe in the age of Chaucer; and, laftly, applying thefe obfervations to the poetical parts of The Canterbury Tales, as they are faithfully printed in this edition from the beût mff, which I could procure, I shall leave it to the intelligent reader to determine whether Chaucer was really ignorant of the laws, or even of the graces, of Verfification, and whether he was more negligent of either than the very early poets in almoft all languages are found to have been.

PART THE FIRST.

§ 1. In order to judge, in the first place, how far Chaucer ought to be charged as the importer of the many French words and phrafes which are fo vifible in all his writings, it will be neceffary to take a fhort view of the early introduction and long prevalency of the French language in this country before his time. It might be fufficient perhaps for our purp ofe to begin this view at the conqueft; but I cannot help obferving from a contemporary hiftorian, that fevemal years before that great event the language of France had been introduced into the court of EngVolume I.

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land, and from thence among the people. The account which Ingulphus gives of this matter is (5), that Edward, commonly called The Confeffor, having been educated at the court of his uncle Duke Richard II. and having refided in Normandy many years, became almoft a Frenchmen: upon his return from thence, and acceffion to the throne of England. in 1043, he brought over with him a number of Normans, whom he promoted to the highest dignities; and (according to Ingulphus) under the influence of the King and his Norman favourites the whole nation began to lay afide their English fafhions, and imitate the manners of the French in many things; in particular, he fays exprefsly that all the nobility in their courts began to fpeak French as a great piece of gentility.

$ 2. This fathion, however, of fpeaking French, having been adopted only in compliance with the caprice of the reigning prince, would not probably have spread very wide or lafted very long; but at the revolution, which followed foon after in 1066, the language of the Norman conqueror was interwoven with the new political fyftem (6), and the

(5) Ingulph. Hift. Croyl. p. 62. ed. Gale. "Rex autem Ed"wardus natus in Anglia, fed nutritus in Normania et diutiffine immoratus, pene in Gallicum tranfierat, adducens ac "attrahens de Normania plurimos, quos variis dignitatibus promotos in immenfum exaltabaf.-Cœpit ergo tota terra fub Regc et fub aliis Normanis introducis Anglicos ritus dimittere, et Francorum mores in multis imitari, Gallicum [fcilicet] idioma omnes Magnates in fuis curiis tanquam magnam gentilitium loqui, chartas et chirographa fua more Fran"corum conficere, et propriam confuetudinem in his et in aliis multis erubefcere."

(6) Robert Helkot (as quoted by Selden, ad Eadmer, p. 189,)

feveral establishments which were made for the fupport and fecurity of the one all contributed, in a greater or lefs degree, to the diffusion and permanency of the other.

$3. To begin with the court. If we confider that the King himself, the chief officers of ftate, and by far the greatest part of the nobility, were all Normans, and could probably speak no language but their own, we can have no doubt that French (7) fays that the Conqueror" deliberavit quomodo linguam "Saxonicam poffet deftruere, et Angliam et Normaniam in "idiomate concordare.”—But Holkot wrote only in the 14th century, and I do not find that the earlier hiftorians impute to the King fo filly a project. On the contrary Ordericus Vitalis [1. iv. 520,] affures us that William-" Anglicam locutionem plerumpque fategit ediscere: ut fine interprete querelam "fubjectæ legis poffet intelligere, et scita rectitudinis unicuique (prout ratio dictaret) affectuose depromere. Aft a perceptione hujufmodi durior ætas illum compefcebat, et tumultus mul"timodarum occupationum ad alia neceffario adtrahebat."-And several of his publick inftruments, which are ftill extant in Saxon, [Hickes G. A. S. p. 164—Præf. ↑. xv, xvi,] provė that he had no objection to using that language in business; so that it feems more natural to suppose that the introduction of the French language was a confequence only and not an objea of his policy.

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(7) I apprehend that long before this time the Danish tongue had ceased to be spoken in Normandy; it was never general there, as appears from a pallage of Dudon, 1. iii. p. 112. Duke William I. gives this reason for sending his fon Richard to be educated at Baieux; “Quoniam quidem Rotomagenfis civitas "Romanâ potius quam Dacifcâ utitur eloquentiâ, et Bajoca"centis fruitur frequentius Dacifcâ linguâ quam Romanâ, volo " igitur ut ad Bajocacenfia deferatur quantocius mœnia," . If we recollect that the Danith fettlers under Roilo were few in comparison with the original inhabitants, and had probably Carce any ufe of letters among them, we thall not be surprised

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