Fiche de révision : British Literature: The Medieval Period

📋 Plan du Cours

1. Repères historiques et chronologiques
2. Société médiévale et institutions
3. Langues et évolution de l’anglais
4. Genres littéraires médiévaux
5. Allégorie et poésie allitérative
6. Roman médiéval et chevalerie
7. Chaucer et ses œuvres
8. Les Contes de Canterbury
9. Portraits du Prologue général
10. Middle English : prononciation et lexique
11. Caedmon et l’Old English
12. Thèmes et méthode d’analyse

📅 Repères chronologiques

1. 1066William of Normandy defeats Harold Godwinson at Hastings during the Norman Conquest.
2. 1170Thomas Becket is murdered in Canterbury Cathedral, and his cult helps make Canterbury a major pilgrimage destination.
3. 1348The Black Death contributes, alongside war and famine, to concerns about death, sin and salvation.
4. 1476William Caxton establishes a printing press at Westminster, helping English texts circulate more widely.
5. 1485The Battle of Bosworth traditionally marks the end of the medieval period and the beginning of the Tudor period.

📖 1. Repères historiques et chronologiques

★ À maîtriser

• The period conventionally studied as the English Middle Ages or Middle English period extends from 1066 to 1485.

Compléments

• The London variety gradually gains importance after the introduction of printing, but Caxton does not standardize English instantly.

💡 Astuce mémo

1066 Hastings → 1476 Caxton → 1485 Bosworth

📖 2. Société médiévale et institutions

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Feudal society : A strongly hierarchical society structured by landholding, obligations and social status.

★ À maîtriser

• The Church is central to medieval education, culture and morality, while Latin is the principal language of Western Christian scholarship and liturgy.

Compléments

• After the Norman Conquest, Anglo-Norman French is closely associated with the court and ruling elite.

• Their lives are affected by :

  • agricultural work
  • taxation
  • war
  • famine
  • disease

• The urban and merchant class grows in importance during the later Middle Ages as trade and towns develop.

• Medieval society includes nobles, clergy, knights, merchants, artisans, peasants and other groups, rather than only the Church and peasants.

📖 3. Langues et évolution de l’anglais

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Middle English : A collection of evolving regional varieties of English that gradually develops from Old English.

★ À maîtriser

• The Norman Conquest does not instantly replace English; England remains multilingual for several centuries.

• The three major languages are :

  • English
  • Anglo-Norman French
  • Latin

Compléments

• English acquires French words in law, government, social hierarchy, cuisine and culture, including court, justice, government, noble, parliament, beef and mutton.

• The movement toward Early Modern English occurs later, especially from the late fifteenth century onward and through the Renaissance.

💡 Astuce mémo

Latin pour l’Église et le savoir ; français anglo-normand pour la cour ; anglais pour des variétés régionales

📖 4. Genres littéraires médiévaux

★ À maîtriser

• Medieval literature includes : oral songs, poems and folk ballads, religious drama, including mystery or miracle plays and morality plays, romance narratives, poetry using allegory and alliterative verse, didactic writing

Compléments

• Many medieval literary texts aim to teach religious, moral or practical lessons.

📖 5. Allégorie et poésie allitérative

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Allegory : the professor’s slide - A form that conveys a hidden moral, spiritual or political meaning through symbolic characters and events and can function as an extended metaphor.
• Alliterative poetry : Verse in which the repetition of initial consonant sounds is a fundamental structural element, creating rhythm and musicality.

★ À maîtriser

📌 An allegorical narrative has a literal level describing what happens in the story and a symbolic level showing what its characters or events represent beyond the story.

Compléments

• Abstract qualities may be personified as characters, including :

  • Gluttony
  • Envy
  • Truth

• Allegory can also satirize people, institutions or social behaviour.

• The Tortoise and the Hare can be read allegorically as a contrast between perseverance and overconfidence. - the slide

• Pearl and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight belong to the Middle English alliterative tradition.

• Alliterative verse is especially important in Old and Middle English and has roots in Germanic poetic traditions, but it is not the only poetic tradition of the period.

💡 Astuce mémo

L’allégorie donne un sens symbolique au récit ; l’allitération organise les sons initiaux

📖 6. Roman médiéval et chevalerie

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Romance : A vernacular narrative tradition often following a hero through adventures, tests, battles, journeys or quests.
• Quest : A journey or mission through which a hero is tested.

★ À maîtriser

• Chivalric ideals include :

  • courage
  • loyalty
  • honour
  • service

• The three traditional bodies of matter are :

  • Matter of Britain, associated with Arthurian material
  • Matter of France, associated with Charlemagne and Roland
  • Matter of Rome, associated with classical or ancient material

Compléments

• In medieval romance, honour is often central because reputation and moral or social status are tested.

• Romances may include :

  • supernatural events
  • monsters
  • magic
  • extraordinary adventures

💡 Astuce mémo

CLOS : courage, loyauté, honneur, service

📖 7. Chaucer et ses œuvres

★ À maîtriser

• Geoffrey Chaucer lived approximately from 1343 to 1400 and is traditionally called the Father of English Literature, an honorific rather than a claim that he was the first English writer.

• Chaucer’s most famous work is The Canterbury Tales, probably written from the late 1380s into the 1390s.

Compléments

• Chaucer’s other works include :

  • Troilus and Criseyde
  • The Book of the Duchess
  • The House of Fame
  • The Parliament of Fowls

• Chaucer contributes to the development of literary English through complex characterization, irony, social observation and experimentation with genre.

📖 8. Les Contes de Canterbury

★ À maîtriser

• 🔄 The frame narrative proceeds as follows :

  1. Pilgrims meet at the Tabard Inn in Southwark.
  2. They travel toward Canterbury to visit the shrine of St Thomas Becket.
  3. They tell stories in a contest proposed by the Host.

• Twenty-four tales survive in The Canterbury Tales, the work remained unfinished, and the traditional estimate of Chaucer’s original plan is 120 tales: four per pilgrim, two on the way to Canterbury and two on the return.

Compléments

• The Canterbury Tales combines verse and prose, with comic, ironic and sometimes ribald tones as well as serious, religious, tragic or moral tones.

• The Canterbury Tales draws on Dante’s Divine Comedy, Boccaccio’s Decameron, Petrarch, French works such as Le Roman de la Rose and Le Roman de Renart, and other traditions.

💡 Astuce mémo

Tabard Inn → pèlerinage → concours de récits

📖 9. Portraits du Prologue général

★ À maîtriser

• The General Prologue is a gallery of portraits introducing the pilgrims, and the slide describes 29 pilgrims preparing to leave the Tabard Inn.

• Chaucer characterizes pilgrims through physical details, clothing, occupation, social position and behaviour, producing descriptions that can be realistic, comic and ironic.

Compléments

• Major pilgrims include the Knight, the Squire, the Prioress, the Monk, the Friar, the Merchant, the Clerk, the Sergeant of Law, the Franklin, the Wife of Bath, the Parson, the Miller and the Pardoner.

💡 Astuce mémo

Le narrateur peut louer un personnage tandis que les détails révèlent ses contradictions

📖 10. Middle English : prononciation et lexique

★ À maîtriser

• The Miller is portrayed as physically powerful, coarse, noisy and morally dubious, through accumulated grotesque physical details.

Compléments

• His grotesque features include :

  • a red beard
  • a wart
  • a tuft of hair
  • wide nostrils
  • an enormous mouth

• The Miller’s physical strength is suggested by his brawn and bones, wrestling ability and capacity to break doors, while his sword and buckler suggest aggression.

• The Miller is called a “janglere” (talkative) and a “goliardeys” (a coarse or jovial entertainer), and he can steal corn and take extra tolls.

• The proverb “An honest miller hath a golden thumb” is used ironically against the Miller’s dishonesty.

• Chaucer uses the Miller’s grotesque physical imagery and dishonesty to create humour and comment on social morality.

📖 11. Caedmon et l’Old English

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Great Vowel Shift : A major set of systematic changes in the pronunciation of long vowels between Middle English and Modern English, occurring after Chaucer.
• adoun : Adoun signifie « down ».
• agast(e) : Agast(e) signifie « afraid; frightened ».
• agayn(s) : Agayn(s) signifie « against; toward ».
• ago / agoon : Ago / agoon signifie « gone; ago ».
• al : Al signifie « all ».
• al be that : Al be that signifie « although ».
• also : Also signifie « also; as well ».
• anon : Anon signifie « at once ».
• artow : Artow signifie « art thou; you are ».
• atte : Atte signifie « at; at the ».
• aventure : Aventure signifie « chance ».
• ay : Ay signifie « always ».
• benedicite : Benedicite signifie « bless us ».
• bet : Bet signifie « better ».
• beth : Beth signifie « are; be ».
• bitwixen : Bitwixen signifie « between ».
• blake : Blake signifie « black ».
• blyve : Blyve signifie « quickly; soon ».
• brenne : Brenne signifie « burn ».
• brest / brast : Brest / brast signifie « burst ».
• can / kan : Can / kan signifie « know; be able ».
• canstow : Canstow signifie « can you?; you can ».
• cas : Cas signifie « happening; chance ».
• certes : Certes signifie « surely; certainly ».
• certeyn : Certeyn signifie « certainly; sure ».
• chees / chesen : Chees / chesen signifie « choose; chose ».
• cheere / chiere : Cheere / chiere signifie « facial expression ».
• clepe(n) : Clepe(n) signifie « call ».
• clerk : Clerk signifie « scholar ».
• conne : Conne signifie « learn; know; be able ».
• conseil : Conseil signifie « counsel; advice ».
• coude : Coude signifie « could; knew how to ».
• coy : Coy signifie « quiet ».
• deel : Deel signifie « bit; portion ».
• delit : Delit signifie « delight; pleasure ».
• deme : Deme signifie « judge; suppose ».
• deyvse : Devyse signifie « tell; describe ».
• deye : Deye signifie « die ».
• dorste : Dorste signifie « dare; dared ».

★ À maîtriser

• The major pronunciation difference between Chaucer’s Middle English and Modern English concerns the long vowels, while consonants are generally closer to their written forms in Middle English. - the professor’s pronunciation slide

Compléments

• In Chaucer’s Middle English, the initial consonant groups kn- in knight and wr- in write are pronounced more fully than in Modern English, and r is pronounced more fully than in modern non-rhotic English.

• The slide’s simplified pronunciation guide associates y or i in myne and sight with a vowel close to the one in meet.

• The slide’s guide distinguishes the close e in me, meet and mete from the open e in begge and rede, which is unlike the vowel in modern meet.

• The slide’s guide presents a long a in mate and maat, a long u in hus and hous, a close o in bote and boot, and an open o in lof and ok.

💡 Astuce mémo

Caedmon → Old English → Conquête normande → Middle English → Chaucer

📖 12. Thèmes et méthode d’analyse

★ À maîtriser

• Recurring medieval themes include : religion, mortality, social hierarchy, appearance versus reality, honour and chivalry, corruption, storytelling, the gradual rise of English as a literary language

Compléments

• Caedmon’s Hymn is an Old English text celebrating the Creator, beginning “Nu scylun hergan hefaenricaes Uard…”.

• Caedmon’s Hymn displays Germanic vocabulary, inflections and strongly rhythmic poetry, illustrating the linguistic distance between Old English and Middle English.

• A text analysis can examine context, form, description, language, tone, themes and interpretation, distinguishing what the narrator says from what the text suggests.