Николас Остлер - Empires of the Word - A language History of the World

\iii. Also it is ordained and established, that every Englishman do use the English language, and be named by an English name, leaving off entirely the manner of naming used by the Irish; and that every Englishman use the English custom, fashion, mode of riding and apparel, according to his estate; and if any English, or Irish living among the English, use the Irish language among themselves, contrary to this ordinance, and thereof be attainted, his lands and tenements, if he have any, shall be seized and placed in the hands of his immediate lord, until he shall come to one of the places of our Lord the King, and find sufficient surety to adopt and use the English language … and also that beneficed persons of holy Church, living amongst the English, shall use the English language; and if they do not, that their ordinaries shall have issues of their benefices until they use the English language in the manner aforesaid; and they shall have respite in order to learn the English language, and to provide saddles, between this time and the feast of St Michael next coming. [652]

Later, continued use of one of these Celtic languages was considered not so much a threat to the survival of English abroad as a token of dubious loyalty. So Henry VIII, though himself the son of a king who had taken power with Welsh and Cornish support, included the following in the Act of Union of 1536 (now delivered in English):

Also be it enacted that all justices, Commissioners, sheriffs, coroners, escheators, stewards and their lieutenants, and all other officers and ministers of the law, shall proclaim and keep the sessions, courts, hundreds, leets, sheriff’s courts and all other courts in the English tongue; and all oaths of juries and inquests, and all other affidavits, verdicts and wagers of law to be given and done in the English tongue; and also that from henceforth no person or persons that use the Welsh speech or language shall have or enjoy any manner of office or fees within this realm of England, Wales or other the King’s dominion upon pain of forfeiting the same offices or fees, unless he or they use the English speech or tongue. [653]

In the same year, King Henry was writing to the citizens of Galway in the west of Ireland, urging: ‘every inhabitante within the saide towne indever theym selfe to speke Englyshe, and to use theym selffe after the English facion; and specially that you, and every one of you, do put forth your childe to scole, to lerne to speke Englyshe’. [654]

But five years later, the bill declaring Henry VIII king of Ireland still had to be presented in Irish both to the Irish Commons and Lords. [655]Although the Norman invasions had caused use of English to spread into all parts of the British Isles, it had not thereby eliminated the use of other languages.

Had the Norman and Angevin kings retained their twin domains on both sides of the Channel, it is possible that at some point there would have been enough flexibility in the social system to allow the prestige language, French, to trickle down, and become widespread all over their realm. But it was not to be. The French realm had never been able to abide the independence of the Norman kings, originally its vassals, and in 1204 King Philip II seized the opportunity to defeat one of them (King John) in battle, and so end their control of Normandy. Within the rigours of the feudal system, it was impossible for barons to maintain a divided loyalty: henceforth they must declare fealty either to the king of England or the king of France, and give up any lands they might hold in the other kingdom. In the sequel, English barons became determinedly English. Soon, as the Provisions of Oxford showed in 1258—a measure for the first time promulgated in English as well as French—they would no longer tolerate excess influence from France, even if coming from the king’s remaining fiefs in Anjou.

… we hoaten all ure treowe, in pe treowpe pBætheo us o$nIen, pæt heo stedefæstliche healden and swerien to healden and to werien $pBo i-setnesses $pBæt beon i-makede $pBur$nI $pBan toforen i-seide rædesmen o$pBer $pBur$nI $pBe moare dæl of heom, also alse it is beforen i-seide…

…comandons et enjoinons a tuz nos feaus et leans, en la fei k’il nus deivent, k’il fermement teignent, et jurgent a tenir et a maintenir les establissemenz ke sunt fet, u sunt a fere, par l’avant dit cunseil, u la greignure partie de eus, en la maniere k’il est dit desuz…

…we command all our subjects, in the fealty which they owe us, that they steadfastly keep and swear to keep and to protect the ordinances that are made and are to be made by the aforesaid counsellors or by a majority of them, as is said above … [656]

In England, from lack of day-to-day practice, French began to be a subject learnt at school, rather than the living language of the elite.

Earlier, when trying to explain the remarkable linguistic impact of the Anglo-Saxons, we conjectured that English originally established itself in Britain in the wake of a major epidemic, in the fifth century AD (see Chapter 7, ‘Einfall: Germanic and Slavic advances’, p. 313). But when it comes to the effects of the Black Death, no conjecture is necessary. This plague first reached England in 1348, and returned twice more before the century was out. No sector of society was safe, but by its nature—borne by fleas on people or rats—it was most virulent in highly populated areas, among them cities, courts and monasteries. England’s population was halved, and as an economic consequence net personal worth doubled. Even those who had no assets but their own health—or survival—benefited, since labour had become a scarce resource in relation to the still-constant amount of land. The result was massive disruption of the feudal system, including a rise in income at the lower end, and an increase in personal mobility, especially from country to town, as men became in effect free to seek their fortunes away from home. Linguistically, the position of the French-speaking nobility was undercut: professions throughout society were increasingly open to merit, but increasingly all that anyone really needed to make a career was literacy in Latin and English. A sign of the times was the Statute of Pleading of 1362: court proceedings would henceforth take place in English, though ‘enrolled in Latin’.

John de Trevisa, a curate and former fellow of Oxford, commented on the situation in 1385, taking issue with a text he was translating. Ranulph Higden had written, in his Polychronicon (Universal History) of the mid-fourteenth century, that there were two reasons for the corruption he saw in many people’s language, namely that children were taught to construe (i.e. translate Latin) into French, not their own language, and that country people laboured to pass themselves off as gentlemen by affecting French. After translating this, Trevisa adds:

This maner was moche used to fore the Grete Deth [i.e. the Black Death]. But syth it is somdele chaunged. For Sir John Cornouayl, a master of gramer, chayngede the lore in gramer scole and construction of Frenssh in to Englysshe. And other scoolmasters use the same way… and leve all Frenssh in scoles and use al construction in Englissh. Wherin they have avauntage one way, that is they lerne the sonner theyr gramer, and in another disavauntage, for now they lerne no Frenssh ne can none, which is hurte for them that shal pass the see, and also gentilmen have moche left to teche theyr children to speke Frenssh. [657]

By the late fourteenth century, then, French had been dropped as a medium of education in England as a needless barrier to vernacular understanding; there was no more presumption that any children would grow up with French. It was now a language that was only of use in overseas travel, if at all; but there was still a feeling that a proper gentleman should make sure that his sons had a decent grounding in it. [180]