Footnotes:
[1] See Jusserand, “Hist. Litt.,” L. III., ch. i., and the Preface to his “Vie Nomade”; also chap. xix. of Prof. Tout’s volume in the “Political Hist. of Engd.” It is nearly one hundred and fifty years since Tyrwhitt showed, by abundant quotations, the stages by which English fought its way to final recognition as the national language.
[2] Froissart, ed. Luce, i., 359, 402. There was in 1444 a similar attempt to keep up Latin and French among the Benedictine monks, since from ignorance of one or the other language “they frequently fall into shame.” Reynerus, “De Antiq. Benedict,” p. 129.
[3] “He chalenged in Englyssh tunge” (“Chronicles of London,” ed. Kingsford, p. 43, where the exact form of words used by Henry is recorded; cf. Dymock’s challenge, ibid., p. 49).
[4] It is difficult to go altogether with Prof. Skeat in his repudiation of the sense commonly attached to this phrase (note on Prologue, i., 126). Chaucer seems to say that the Prioress (a) knew French, but (b) only French of Stratford, just as he explains that the parish clerk (a) could dance, but (b) only after the School of Oxenford. For this Oxford dancing, see Dr. Rashdall’s “Universities of Europe,” ii., 672.
[5] For the most interesting account of this fusion, see Jusserand, “Hist. Litt.,” p. 236. (Bk. III., ch. i.)
[6] “English Garner,” 15th century, ed. A. W. Pollard, p. 240; J. R. Green’s “Short History,” p. 291. “And one of them named Sheffield, a mercer, came into a house and asked for meat, and especially he asked after eggs; and the goodwife answered that she could speak no French, and the merchant was angry, for he also could speak no French, but would have had eggs, and she understood him not. And then at last another said, that he would have ‘eyren’; then the goodwife said that she understood him well. Lo, what should a man in these days now write, eggs or eyren?”
[7] See the cases given in full by Thorold Rogers, “Oxford City Documents,” pp. 168, 170, 173, and H. Rashdall’s “Universities of Europe,” ii., 363, 369, 403.
[8] See the articles by Prof. Maitland and Mr. A. L. Smith in vol. ii. of “Social England.”
[9] Cf. Reynerus, “De Antiq. Benedict,” pp. 107, 136, 425, 468, 595. The pages in italics contain startling lists of defaulting abbeys and priories.