Oral Medieval Literature: Periods, Languages, and Literary Genres

Oral Medieval Literature

Previous Knowledge

1. What time period does "Medieval literature" refer to, and why is it significant in the history of English literature?
2. What are the main themes of medieval literature?
3. How many languages were spoken in England during the Middle Ages?
4. What is an epic poem, and can you name a famous Medieval English epic poem?
5. What role did storytelling and oral tradition play in Medieval literature, and how did it influence the development of written texts?
6. Who were some of the notable authors of Medieval literature, and what are their contributions to the literary canon?
7. Who was king Arthur? What do you know about his legend?
8. Apart from epic poems, what other literary forms are produced in medieval England?

Introduction to Medieval Literature

1. Introduction

Introduction

• Medieval period: year 450 - 15th century
• Year 450 -> collapse of the Roman Empire and Anglo-Saxon invasions
• End of the 15th century -> Tudor dynasty and beginning of the Renaissance
• 3 periods - 3 languages
• Anglo-Saxon literature -> 450-1066
• Anglo-Norman literature -> 1066-13th century
• Middle English literature -> 14th & 15th centuries
• Anglo-Saxon -> mainly oral till Christianity
• Celts < Anglo-Saxons -> Christianity in remote areas
• The myth of Arthur builds up

5. Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum

• Anglo-Normans -> drastic change in the English language
• Literature still mainly oral but we keep more written documents

Oral Medieval Literature Definition

Definition

• Both prose and verse narratives
• Epic poems, ballads, dramas, romances, riddles, etc
• Delivered to a live audience
• In continuous change as it is transmitted orally
• Bards, minstrels and songmakers
• Musical instruments
• Multiple authorship

Main Techniques

• Repetition
• Formulaic expressions
• Common motifs and episodes
• Realistic details

Anglo-Saxon Literature Forms

• Epic poems
• Religious poems
• Elegiac poems
• Riddles

Types of Oral Literature: Epic Poems

• Myths and legends of nationhood
• Heroic characters & heroic code
• Supernatural or mystic atmosphere
• Christian values and references
• Best Anglo-Saxon examples
• Beowulf
• Judith
• The Battle of Maldon
• The Battle of Brunanburh
• The Dream of the Rood
• Exodus

Beowulf Epic Poem

• Oldest and longest of Old English poems (manuscript c. 1000)
• Probably composed in the first half of the 8th century
• Although in Old English, it deals with the Danes and the Geats
• 3 stories
• Fist battle: Grendel
• Beowulf helps the Danish king, Hrothgar, to kill the monster Grendel
• Second battle: Grendel's mother
• Grendel's mother attacks the Danish.
• In an underwater cave, Beowulf kills her with a sword made for giants
• Final battle: the dragon
• Many years later, Beowulf is king of the Geats. He dies killing a dragon

Judith Biblical Narrative

• Biblical narrative
• The Book of Judith -> apocryphal for Protestants & Jews
• Plot
• The Israelite town of Bethulia is under siege by general Holofernes
• The widow Judith encourages her people not to surrender and promises to liberate them
• She enters the enemy camp with only one servant
• She claims she is escaping her people
• Holofernes is amazed by her beauty and demands to spend the night with her
• Judith beheads Holofernes and frees her people
• Example of Anglo-Saxon woman in power
• Not cunning and just beautiful
• But also a warrior

Religious and Elegiac Poems

• Mainly religious
• Caedmon & Cynewulf -> Christian scribes
• Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum
• Caedmon's Hymn
• Elegiac poems -> a lament
• The Wanderer
• The Seafarer
• The Ruin
• Resignation
• The Wife's Lament

Riddles in Old English

• Common to write them both in Latin and Old English
• Most of the old English ones can be found in the Exeter Book.
• No title or solution is given
• Riddle 1 What hangs down by the thigh of a man, under his cloak, yet is stiff and hard? When the man pulls up his robe, he puts the head of this hanging thing into that familiar hole of matching length which he has filled many times before.

Style in Anglo-Saxon Literature

• Epic descriptions
• Word selection
• Heiti -> for warrior: gumi or gunnarr. for "sword," hjorr or brandr
• Kenning -> water-wood, swan-road, life-house
• Variation
• Christ, King in the Heavens, true son of God, Saviour of Souls
• Digressions
• Stress & Alliteration:
• two hemistichs
• caesura
• stressed syllables -> 2 per hemistich -> alliteration

Cædmon's Hymn Text

Nū scylun hergan hefaenrīcaes Uard, metudas maecti end his modgidanc, uerc Uuldurfadur, suē he uundra gihwaes, ēci dryctin or āstelidæ he ærist scop aelda barnum heben til hrofe, haleg scepen. Tha middungeard moncynnæs Uard, eci Dryctin, after tiadæ firum foldu, Frea allmectig.

Anglo-Norman Literature Overview

• 1066 - Norman Conquest
• Church
• Monastic > scholastic
• Creation of new universities:
• Oxford (1167)
• Cambridge (1229)
• Change to secular language in literature:
• Anglo-Norman upper class
• From oral to written literature

Types of Oral Literature: Ballads

• Story through dialogue and action
• Stanzas
• quatrains in iambic tetrameter or trimeter (- ')
• Usually -> abcb rhyme
• Themes
• community life
• local or national history
• legend and folklore
• Robin Hood & the New Forest
• Lord Randall

Ballads Example

The horse fair Annet rode upon He ambled like the wind,With silver he was shod before, With burning gold behind The horse | fair Ann | et rode | upon He amb | led like | the wind , With sil | ver he | was shod | before, With burn | ing gold | behind

The Romance & the Breton Lay/Lai

• Origins -> Provence
• New hero -> love
• Courtly love -> religious passion: chaste but passionate
• Unrequited
• Involves knights, fighting
• Use of the supernatural
• A web of interwoven stories (cf. epics = linear)
• Style -> easy and colloquial
• Main Anglo-Norman authors
• Chrétien de Troyes
• Marie de France

The Breton Lay Structure

• The Breton lay = romance
• They add the Celtic idea of faerie
• Written in old French
• Main characteristic -> structure
• Integration -> there's a protected civilised state
• Disruption -> expelling of the hero/heroine into a wild place to be tested
• Reintegration -> return to the civilised state
• There can be variations in the pattern
• Sir Orfeo -> classic structure
• The Wife of Bath's Tale -> variation

Breton Lay Example

Ki Deu ad duné escience E de parler bon' eloquence Ne s'en deit taisir ne celer,Ainz se deit volunters mustrer. He to whom God has given knowledge And the gift of speaking eloquently, Must not keep silent nor conceal the gift. But he must willingly display it.

Thematic Division

The Arthurian Legend

Historical Background: Monmouth

• During the Anglo-Saxon invasions (450AD)
• Celtic resistance (Boudica) -> Britons moving to Wales and Cornwall
• Almost no written records of this time -> difficult to reconstruct an accurate history
• Very first reference to Arthur in a Welsh Celtic poem -> Y Gododdin (600AD)
• The poem is about the warrior Gwawrddur -> only one reference
• "Gwawrddur was skilled at slaying his enemies, but was no Arthur"
• Geoffrey of Monmouth - Historia Regum Britanniae (1135-38)
• Covering from King Brutus to Constantine
• Britain's foundation to the 6th century
• Constantine is Arthur's cousin
• Written in Latin
• Mixture of other works and his free invention
• Mentions Arthur as a king, Merlin and Uther Pendragon (Arthur's father & king too)

Historical Background: Wace & Layamon

• Wace's Roman du Brut
• Norman poet -> French (12th century)
• Monmouth's prose into a poem
• Made additions
• The Round Table is mentioned 3 times,
• BUT not explaining what it was.
• Layamon's Brut
• Translated Wace's poem into English
• Made additions -> creation of the Round Table
• It moves towards the romance

Sir Gawain and The Green Knight Plot

• Plot -> Classic quest formula: home > challenge + journey > home
• Christian poem
• At Christmas, Virgin Mary
• Main theme -> chivalry code
• Full of symbols: fox, deer ...
• Pentagon = 5 virtues of knights:
• generosity
• friendship
• chastity
• courtesy
• piety
• Camelot & the wilderness & a new castle
• 5 Seasons = infancy, youth, adulthood, middle age, old age
• The green girdle -> sin

Sir Gawain and The Green Knight Context

• 14th century (mid or late)
• Unknown author
• Cultivated -> accurate court life
• Northwest of the Midlands -> vocabulary used
• Inspired by Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval
• Arthurian Romances started in Brittany, France -> Common Celtic heritage
• Danish invasions in the 9th century
• Aspects belonging to the Anglo-Saxon oral tradition
• Use of synonyms
• Simple or no connectors
• Alliteration -> The Alliterative Revival
• The bob and wheel

Le Morte D'Arthur

• Written by Sir Thomas Malory around 1469
• published by Caxton in 1485
• Compilation of 8 tales
• Responsible for Arthur's popularity
• Moves away from French tradition
• More realism
• More centred on the action and dialogues
• No moral commentaries
• No theological digressions
• Description of combats (less fantasy)

Main Characters and Themes

• Merlin -> wizard
• Lady of the Lake -> enchantress (Excalibur)
• Avalon -> island where Excalibur was forged
• Guinevere -> King Arthur's wife and queen
• Sir Lancelot -> knight and Arthur's loyal friend
• His affair with Guinevere would cause Arthur's death and the downfall of the kingdom
• Round Table -> Arthur and his knight used to congregate
• The Holy Grail -> treasure with miraculous powers
• The cup Jesus Christ drunk from in the Last Supper
• Excalibur & The Sword in the Stone

Geoffrey Chaucer

Life of Chaucer

• Wrote in English -> Creator of English versification
• English of London -> standardisation -> Middle English
• Born in a prosperous wine merchant family around 1343
• Fluent in French, and received schooling in Latin
• Worked as a page for the Countess of Ulster, married to Prince