2015-08-21
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England in the 14th Century. In the first half of the 14th century the Norman kings made London their residence. It became the most populous town in England. The London dialect was the central (midland) dialect, and could be understood throughout the country. It was the London dialect from which the national language developed. The burgesses (bourgeoisie) became rich through trading with Flanders (a country across the Channel that is now part of Belgium). The English shipped wool to Flanders where it was sold as raw material. King Edward 3 was a powerful feudal lord. He wished to make himself king of France as well, because some province, such as Normandy, had once belonged to England and others had belonged to Edward’s mother, a French princess. While Edward was determined to get back these provinces, the king of France decided to seize the free towns of Flanders, which supported England, and thus deprive her of her wool-market. A collision was inevitable. The war with France began in 1337 and is now called the Hundred Years’ War because it lasted over a hundred years.
England was successful at the beginning of the war and won several important battles. But the ruin of France and famine brought about a terrible disease called the Plague. It was so infection that there was no escape from it. People affected died within twenty-four hours. It was brought to England from France. The English soldiers called it the Black Death. By the year 1348 one-third of English population had perished. The peasants who survived were forced by drastic measure to till the land of their lords because there were not enough labourers to do the work. A law called “The Statute [‘stэtju:t] of Labourers” was issued in 1351; it was a step back to feudalism.
As more money for the war was needed, Parliament voted for extra taxes. “the Poll Tax” particularly fanned the flame of discontent among the people (“poll” means “head”; it was a tax paid for every member of the family). But nothing made the people so angry as the rich foreign bishops of the Catholic Church who carried on their policy with little regard for the suffering of the people. In 1381, during the reign Richard 2, the oppressed peasants revolted. Sixty thousand people from the counties of Essex and Kent marched to London led by Wat Tyler and Jack Straw. But the rebellion was suppressed. Wat Tyler was treacherously murdered and the peasants were dispersed.
THE LITERATURE OF THE 14TH CENTURY
The protest against the Catholic Church and the growth the national feeling during the first years of the war found an echo in literature. There appeared poor priest who wandered from one village to another and talked to the people. They protested not only against rich bishops but also against churchmen who were ignorant and could not teach the people anything.
William Langland (1332?-1400?). One such poor priest was the poet William Langland. His parents were poor but free peasants. He denounced the rich churchmen and said that everybody was obliged to work. His name is remembered for a poem he wrote, “The Visions of William Concerning Piers the Ploughman”. (Nowadays the poem is called “piers Plowman”. Piers[p’iez] –Peter).
The poem “Piers Plowman” is a dream allegory. Vice and Virtue1 are spoken as if they were human beings. Truth is a young maiden, Greeds is an old witch. There are many themes. The author suddenly darts from allegory to real history. The poem was exceedingly popular in the Middle Ages. It was one of the last written in alliterative verse.
The content is as follows. On a fine May, the poet William went to the Malvern Hills. After a time he fell asleep in the open. Piers Ploughman is a peasant who appears in the dream of the poet. Piers told him about the hard life of the people. It was the peasants alone who work and keep the monks and the lords in comfort, and the monks think they do quite enough by praying for the peasants.
Langland’s attacks on the evils of the Church are the most outspoken of his time. The poem helped the people to concentrate their minds on the necessity to fight for their rights. Before the Peasant’s Revolt of 1381, the poem was used to formulate proclamation which easily spread among the people.
John Wyclif (1320?-1384). John Wyclif was also a poor English priest. He started to write much later than Langland. He was a student at Oxford, later he was employed as counsel for the Crown in a debate about papal claims. He was sent on a mission to Bruges [bru:z] (Flanders) in 1374. He challenged everything that set the Pope of Rome above the English bishops. He denied the Church’s right to be rich, declared the Catholic Church to be corrupt and appealed to the authorities to reform it.
John Wyclif had developed his views on the Church by 1377, which views may be called the first step towards materialistic ideas in England. Wyclif denied the miraculous change of things from one substance into another – as the conversion of bread and wine into the body and blood of the people was called the “The Lollard movement”. John Ball, a follower Christ together with his soul (one of the chief principles of the Roman Catholics), - which brought him into the conflict with one of the English bishops. He told his associates to leave the Church and go among the people to teach the truth.
Wyclif met demand of the people by translating the Bible into English. In those days it was a daring things to do. The last years of his life he lived in retirement occupied with his literary work and organizing his “poor priests”.
Wyclif is remembered because he discussed political questions with the common people in the common tongue, and because he translated the Bible into English. He set the authority of the Bible against the authority of the Church. Thus he developed the English mind and helped the peasants to prepare for the uprising of 1381. After his death the Pope ordered his writings to be destroyed and his body to be dug up and burnt and the ashes to be thrown into a river.
The followers of Wyclif were called “Lollards”1, and their work among of Wyclif, was very popular among the common people. He turned parts of Langland’s “Piers Plowman” into proclamation’ he recited “Piers Plowman” when he talked to the people and often ended with Wyclif’s words:
When Adam delved 2and Eve span3
Who was then the Gentleman?
