[Layamon, as is now supposed, wrote in the reign of John. See Sir Frederick Madden's edition, and Mr. Wright's Biographia Literaria. The best reason seems to be that he speaks of Eleanor, queen of Henry, as then dead, which took place in 1204. But it requires a vast knowledge of the language to find a date by the use or disuse of particular forms; the idiom of one part of England not being similar to that of another in grammatical flexions. See Quarterly Review for April 1848.
The entire work of Layamon contains a small number of words taken from the French; about fifty in the original text, and about forty more in that of a manuscript, perhaps half a century later, and very considerably altered in consequence of the progress of our language. Many of these words derived from the French express new ideas, as admiral, astronomy, baron, mantel, &c. "The language of Layamon," says Sir Frederick Madden, "belongs to that transition period in which the groundwork of Anglo-Saxon phraseology and grammar still existed, although gradually yielding to the influence of the popular forms of speech. We find in it, as in the later portion of the Saxon Chronicle, marked indications of a tendency to adopt those terminations and sounds which characterize a language in a state of change, and which are apparent also in some other branches of the Teutonic tongue. The use of a as an article—the change of the Anglo-Saxon terminations a and an into e and en, as well as the disregard of inflections and genders—the masculine forms given to neuter nouns in the plural—the neglect of the feminine terminations of adjectives and pronouns, and confusion between the definite and indefinite declensions—the introduction of the preposition to before infinitives, and occasional use of weak preterites of verbs and participles instead of strong—the constant recurrence of er for or in the plurals of verbs—together with the uncertainty of the rule for the government of prepositions—all these variations, more or less visible in the two texts of Layamon, combined with the vowel-changes, which are numerous, though not altogether arbitrary, will show at once the progress made in two centuries, in departing from the ancient and purer grammatical forms, as found in Anglo-Saxon manuscripts." Preface, p. xxviii.]
[m] Warton's Hist. of English Poetry, Ellis's Specimens.
[n] This conjecture of Scott has not been favourably received by later critics.
[o] Warton printed copious extracts from some of these. Ritson gave several of them entire to the press. And Mr. Ellis has adopted the only plan which could render them palatable, by intermingling short passages, where the original is rather above its usual mediocrity, with his own lively analysis.
[p] The evidences of this general employment and gradual disuse of French in conversation and writing are collected by Tyrwhitt, in a dissertation on the ancient English language, prefixed to the fourth volume of his edition of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales; and by Ritson, in the preface to his Metrical Romances, vol. i. p. 70.
[q] Rymer, t. v. p. 490; t. vi. p. 642, et alibi.
[r] Ritson, p. 80. There is one in Rymer of the year 1385.
[] [[Note IV.]]
[t] See Tyrwhitt's essay on the language and versification of Chaucer, in the fourth volume of his edition of the Canterbury Tales. The opinion of this eminent critic has lately been controverted by Dr. Nott, who maintains the versification of Chaucer to have been wholly founded on accentual and not syllabic regularity. I adhere, however, to Tyrwhitt's doctrine.