The Canterbury tales

1. The Canterbury tales By Geoffrey chaucer

2. History of the evolution of English language: • 410: Romans leave England • c. 450: arrival of Angles, Saxons, Jutes • 800-1000: Viking invaders and colonists • 1066: Arrival of Norman French William the Conqueror, Battle of Hastings

3. History of the evolution of English language: • The Norman Conquest of 1066 CE—the Anglo-Saxon period ends as Norman tribes expel the Danes and Vikings and conquer the Anglo Saxons • William of Normandy (better known as William the Conqueror) led the Norman Invasion of Britannia in 1066 • As the self-determining ruler of England, he would later become known as King William I, taking control of nearly all of Britannia over the course of five years. • He erratically ruled until his death in 1087 • During this time, the Norman Conquest resulted in the invocation of French as the language of aristocracy and official language of the state • Following William’s death, the Normans stayed. They merged with the Anglo Saxons to become the English that we tend to think of today. • The Anglo Saxons and the Norman share a common Scandinavian ancestry

4. Exploring the Phonology • the science of speech sounds including especially the history and theory of sound changes in a language or in two or more related languages • the phonetics and phonemics of a language at a particular time

5. Middle English: in the middle of what? • The great vowel shift • All consonants pronounced • unstressed <e> sound pronounced • <r> possibly rolled • <h> possibly unpronounced

6. Can you guess what this says?

7. Historical Context for The Canterbury Tales: • Geoffrey Chaucer: The Father of English Poetry • Lived and wrote at the end of the Middle Ages, just as English society was heading toward the Renaissance. • Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales as a sketch of society from the previous 350 years and offers a glimpse of ideas and trends to come

8. Feudalism a comprehensive, hierarchical system of social, political, and economic relationships. Power extends from the top down. Introduced by William immediately after the Norman Conquest, feudalism held sway for several centuries but would slowly begin to erode over time as ordinary people gained greater control over their lives.

9. Feudalism cont. • At the top, you have the King—consolidated his power by granting land in exchange for loyalty. • Next, you have the nobles—wealthy landowners who pledged their loyalty to the king • Underneath the nobles were the church officials—bishops and cardinals who were often of Nobel birth • Knights—warriors who pledged t defend their lords’ lands in exchange for fiefs (land grants) • These social dynamics composed what we would consider to be the top 10% • Vassals—people who received fiefs, becoming powerful landholders • The majority of the rest of the population was known as peasants or serfs • Working class, in fields…some under serfdom (lawfully bound to area)

10. Historical Context for The Canterbury Tales: Medieval society was divided into three estates: • the Nobility (those who fought) • the Church (those who prayed) • the Peasantry (those who worked). The General Prologue establishes The Canterbury Tales as an estates satire. • In the Host’s portraits of the pilgrims, he sets out the functions of each estate and satirizes how members of the estates – particularly those of the Church – fail to meet their duties.

11. Historical Context for The Canterbury Tales: • By the late fourteenth century, the rigid organization of these three estates had begun to break down. • A merchant class had begun to rise and was quickly gaining money and power throughout secular society. • An intellectual class was also rising – people trained in literature but, unlike monks, not destined for church life. 

12. Historical Context for The Canterbury Tales: • Women in Medieval England: • Under the chivalric code, women are elevated to an ideal. • As the foundation of the code, the concept of courtly love holds that a knight, acting in the name of a lady, would perform more bravely and act more honorably. • With its roots in the Cult of the Virgin Mary, courtly love depended on the continued purity of the woman. Sexual union between her and her knights guaranteed the dissolution of both the love and the society of which the two were a part. • In terms of what they could do with their lives, medieval women had a very narrow range of choices: • Peasant women: childbearing, house work, field work • Aristocratic women: childbearing, household supervision • In all cases, women depended heavily upon their husbands for support

13. Getting acquainted with the language “How can you read this? There’s no pictures.”