Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:49:33.410Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Presidential Address: The Peoples of Britain and Ireland, 1100–1400: IV Language and Historical Mythology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

R. R. Davies
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Since the beginning of the nineteenth century language has come to occupy a prominent place, often a provocative and intolerant one, in the ideology and rhetoric of nations. ‘Every people (Volk)’, so Herder asserted, ‘has its own language as it has its own culture (Bildung).’ Bishop Stubbs spoke with equal certainty, if only to vindicate the Germanic character of the English people and to clear it of the charge of being infected with Roman or Celtic traits. Language, he pronounced roundly, is ‘the nearest approach to a perfect test of national extraction’. It is a sentiment whose certainty and content would command almost no historical support today. We are much more likely to agree with Eric Hobsbawm's opinion that ‘language was merely one, and not necessarily the primary, way of distinguishing between cultural communities’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society , Volume 7 , December 1997 , pp. 1 - 24
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1997

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Quoted in Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities (revised edn, 1991), 67–8Google Scholar.

2 Stubbs, William, The Constitutional History of England (1906 edn), I, 7Google Scholar.

3 Hobsbawm, E.J., Nations and Nationalism since 1780 (Cambridge, 1990), 58Google Scholar.

4 Cf. Bartlett, Robert, The Making of Europe. Conquest, Colonization and Cultural Change 950–1350 (1993), 201Google Scholar; Watt, J. A. in A New History of Ireland, II: Medieval Ireland 1169–1534, ed. Cosgrove, Art (Oxford, 1987), 346Google Scholar.

5 Chartularies of St. Mary's Abbey, Dublin, ed. Gilbert, J.T., Rolls Series (1884–1886), 11, 21–2Google Scholar.

6 ‘gens…haec Kambrica, aliave lingua’, Cambrensis, Giraldus, Opera, ed. Brewer, J. S. et al. , Rolls Series (1861–1891), VI, 227Google Scholar (Description of Wales, Book II, chap. 10).

7 Royal and Other Historical Letters…of the Reign of Henry III, ed. Shirley, W. W., Rolls Series (1862–1866), II 230Google Scholar (1262). Many other examples could be cited.

8 Stubbs, W., Select Charters of English Constitutional History (9th edn, 1913), 480Google Scholar.

9 Short, Ian, ‘On Bilingualism in Anglo-Norman England’, Romance Philology, 33 (1979–1980), 467–80Google Scholar.

10 Turville-Petre, T., ‘Politics and Poetry in the Early Fourteenth Century: The Case of Robert Manning's Chronicle’, Review of English Studies, new series 39 (1988), 1–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, ‘The “Nation” in English Writings in the Early Fourteenth Century’, in England in the Fourteenth Century, ed. N. Rogers (1993), 128–39; idem England the Nation. Language, Literature and National Identity 1290–1340 (1996)

11 Higden, Ranulph, Polychronicon, ed. Babington, C. and Lumby, J. R., Rolls Series (1865–1886), I, 160–3Google Scholar. Cf. the distinction between the speech of south-country Englishmen, north-country Englishmen and English-speaking Scots referred to in a lawsuit of 1360: Owen, D. M., ‘White Annays and Others’, in Medieval Women, ed. Baker, D. (1978), 332, 343–4Google Scholar. (I owe this reference originally to Barrow, G. W. S., Kingship and Unity. Scotland 1000–1306 (1981), 145Google Scholar.)

12 Cf. Byrne, F.J., Irish Kings and High Kings (1973), 8Google Scholar.

13 Williams, J. E. Caerwyn et al. , eds., Gwaith Meilyr Brydydd a'i Ddisgynyddion (Cardiff, 1994), 29, I. 5 and 30, I. 30Google Scholar; Jones, Nerys A. and Owen, Ann P., Gwaith Cynddelw Brydydd Mawr, I (Cardiff, 1991), 85, I. 31Google Scholar. Owen, Morfydd et al. , eds., Gwaith Llywelyn Fardd ac Eraill (Cardiff, 1994), 444, II. 136, 139Google Scholar.

14 Quoted in Beaune, Colette, Naissance de la nation France (Paris, 1985), 297Google Scholar.

15 The passage is published at length in Crowder, C.M.D., Unity, Heresy and Reform 1378–1460 (1977), 121Google Scholar; for a recent comment, Genet, J.-P., ‘English Nationalism: Thomas Polton at the Council of Constance’, Nottingham Medieval Studies, 28 (1984), 60–78Google Scholar.

16 Short, Ian, ‘Patrons and Polyglots: French Literature in Twelfth-Century England’, Anglo-Norman Studies, 14 (1992), 229–49 at 244Google Scholar. See also Lodge, R. A., ‘Language Attitudes and Linguistic Norms in France and England in the Thirteenth Century’, Thirteenth-Century England, 4 (1992), 73–85Google Scholar.

17 For Wales see in general Smith, Llinos Beverley, ‘Pwnc yr iaith yng Nghymru, 1282–1536’, in Cof Cenedl I, ed. Jenkins, G. H. (Llandysul, 1986), 3–33Google Scholar; idem, ‘Yr Iaith yng Nghymru'r Oesoedd Canol’, Liên Cymru, 18 (1994–5), 179–91.

18 Cambrensis, Giraldus, Opera, VI, 14Google Scholar, 55, 67 (Itinerary through Wales Book 1, chaps. 1, 5. 7).

19 Charles, B. G., ‘The Welsh, their Language and Placenames in Archenfield and Oswestry’, Angles and Britons. O'Donnell Lectures (Cardiff, 1963), 85–110Google Scholar; Richards, M., ‘The Population of the Welsh Border’, Trans. Cymmrodorion Society (1970), part I, 77–100Google Scholar.

20 Cambrensis, Giraldus, Opera, VI, 64–5Google Scholar (Itinerary, Book I, chap. 6). Gerald, repeated the story in Expugnatio Hibernica, ed. Scott, A. B. and Martin, F. X. (Dublin, 1978), 108–11Google Scholar.

21 Flemish: Cambrensis, Giraldus, Speculum Duorum, ed. Richter, M. et al. (Cardiff, 1974), 37Google Scholar; Toorians, Lauran, ‘Wizo Flandrensis and the Flemish Settlement in Pembrokeshire’, Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies, 20 (1990), 99–118Google Scholar; the Irish: see comments of Evans, D. Simon, Historia Gruffud vab Kenan (Cardiff, 1977), cix–cxiiiGoogle Scholar.

22 Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous 1219–1207, no. 1870.

23 In the southern half of the Principality the interpreter was called walstottus: Griffiths, R. A., ed., The Principality of Wales in the Later Middle Ages, I: South Wales 1277–1536, 72Google Scholar. Examples of interpreters on Marcher pay-rolls: Public Record Office SC6/1234/2, 5 (Chirk, Bromfield and Yale); Shrewsbury Public library 9777 (Oswestry); Clark, G. T., ed., Cartae…de Glamorgan (Cardiff, 1910)Google Scholar, III, no. 920 (Kilvey). For employment of interpreters in Ireland see, for example, ‘The Irish Pipe Roll of 14 John, 1211–12’, ed. Davies, O. and Quinn, D. B., Ulster Journal of Archaeology, 3rd series, 4, supplement (1941), 44–5Google Scholar.

24 Philipston/Trephilip: National Library of Wales, Tredegar Park 137/91–2 (1446–53); Rheinallt ab Ieuan ap Thomlyn, : Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, VI, C.6935Google Scholar.

25 Matthews, J. H., ed., Records of the County Borough of Cardiff (Cardiff, 1898–1911), IV, 57–8Google Scholar; Smith, , ‘Pwnc yr iaith yng Nghymru’, 13Google Scholar.

26 Bannerman, John, ‘The King's Poet and the Inauguration of Alexander III’, Scottish Historical Review, 68 (1989), 120–49Google Scholar.

27 Quoted in Murison, D., ‘Linguistic Relationships in Medieval Scotland’, in The Scottish Tradition, ed. Barrow, G. W. S. (1974), 71–83 at 80Google Scholar.

28 Barrow, G. W. S., ‘The Anglo-Scottish Border: Growth and Structure in the Middle Ages’, in Grenzen und Grenzregionen, ed. Haubrichs, W. and Schneider, R. (Saarbrücken, 1994), 197–212Google Scholar, esp. 202–3; Brooke, Daphne, ‘Gall-Gaidhil in Galloway’, in Galloway. Land nd Lordship, ed. Oram, R. D. and Stell, G. P. (Edinburgh, 1991), 97–116Google Scholar.

29 See briefly Nicholson, Ranald, Scotland. The Later Middle Ages (Edinburgh, 1974), 24–5, 73–4, 274–5 and Map AGoogle Scholar; Barrow, G. W. S., Scotland and its Neighbours (1992), 106–8Google Scholar.

30 Barrow, G. W. S., Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland (3rd edn, Edinburgh, 1988), 69Google Scholar; Hector, L. C. and Harvey, B. F., eds., The Westminster Chronicle 1381–94 (Oxford, 1982), 348–9Google Scholar; Royal and Historical Letters during the Reign of Henry IV, ed. Hingeston, F. C., Rolls Series (1860–1965), I, 24Google Scholar.

31 Quoted in Wormald, Jenny, ‘The Creation of Britain: Multiple Kingdoms or Core and Colonies?’, ante, 6th ser., II (1992), 175–94 at 177Google Scholar.

32 John, of Fordun, , Chronica Scottorum, ed. Skene, W. F. (Edinburgh, 1971–1972), I, 42Google Scholar. Cf. Calendar of Papal Registers. Papal Letters, IV, 1362–1404, 56; Acts of the Lords of the Isles 1336–1493, ed. , J. and Munro, R. W., Scottish History Society (1986), lviiiGoogle Scholar.

33 Barrow, G. W. S., The Anglo-Norman Era in Scottish History (Oxford, 1980), 147Google Scholar.

34 Borst, A., Der Turmbau von Babel (Stuttgart, 1957–1963)Google Scholar; and for an English summary of some of his views, idem, Medieval Worlds, Barbarians, Heretics and Artists in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1991), esp. chap. 2.

35 Isidore of Seville, , Etymologia…libri xx, ed. Lindsay, W. M. (Oxford, 1911)Google Scholar, 9. I. I. (Quia ex linguis gentes, non de gentibus linguae exortae sunt.)

36 Victor, Claudius Marius, quoted in Bartlett, , The Making of Europe, 198Google Scholar.

37 William, of Malmesbury, Gesta Region, ed. Stubbs, W., Rolls Series (1887–1889), I, 31Google Scholar.

38 Regesta Regum Scottorum v. The Acts of Robert I, 1306–23, ed. Duncan, A. A. M. (Edinburgh, 1988), no. 364Google Scholar.

39 The Book of Leinster, ed. Best, R.I. et al. (Dublin 1954–1983), III, 573Google Scholar, quoted in Corráin, D. Ó., ‘Nationality and Kingship in Pre-Norman Ireland’, Historical Studies, II (1978), 1–35 at 6Google Scholar. One early Irish tract, Auraicept na nÉces, emphasised that the common origin of the Irish lay in their language rather than in an eponymous ancestor.

40 Quoted in Borst, , Der Turmbau, 785Google Scholar.

41 Quoted in Bartlett, , The Making of Europe, 202Google Scholar.

42 Spenser, Edmund, A View of the Present State of Ireland (1596), ed. Renwick, W. L. (Oxford, 1970), 67Google Scholar.

43 See generally Short, ‘Patrons and Polyglots’.

44 Jordan Fantosme's Chronicle, ed. Johnston, R. C. (Oxford, 1981), II, 631Google Scholar.

45 Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, ed. Stubbs, W., Rolls Series (1867), II, 219Google Scholar.

46 Flores Historiarum, ed. Luard, H. R., Rolls Series (1890), II, 481Google Scholar.

47 The first quotation is from ‘Of Arthur and of Merlin’, cited in Turville-Petre, , ‘Politics and Poetry’ 27Google Scholar; the second is from Historical Mss. Commission. Manuscripts of Lord Middleton (1911), 239.

48 For a recent review of the chronology of the adoption of the vernacular in Scottish documents, see MacQueen, Hector, Common Law and Feudal Society in Medieval Scotland (Edinburgh, 1993), 93–5Google Scholar.

49 Historia Gruffud vab Kenan, 25, 30–1; Wade-Evans, A. W., ed., Vitae Sanctorum Britanniae et Genealogiae (Cardiff, 1944), 17Google Scholar.

50 Llawysgrif Hendregadredd, ed. Morris-Jones, J. and Parry-Williams, T. H. (Cardiff, 1933), 218Google Scholar; Morgan, Gerald, ‘Nodiadau ar destun Barddoniaeth y Tywysogion yn Llsg. NLW 4993’, Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies, 21 (1964–1966), 149–50Google Scholar.

51 Stephen, of Lexington, , Letters from Ireland 1228–9, ed. O'Dwyer, B.W. (Kalamazoo, 1982), 68, 91, 162Google Scholar.

52 Watt, J. A., ‘English Law and the Irish Church: The Reign of Edward I’, in Medieval Studies to Aubrey Gwynm ed. Watt, J. A. et al. (Dublin, 1961), 137–67 at 150–1Google Scholar; Sayles, G. O., ed., Documents of the Affairs of Ireland before the King's Council (Dublin, 1979), 28Google Scholar (Cum igitur Hybernica lingua vobis et vestra sit inimica), 72 (Irish and Scots described ‘come ceux qi heont lange engleise’).

53 HMC 10th Report, App. V, 260–1.

54 Statutes…of Ireland, John to Henry V, ed. Berry, H. F. (Dublin), 434–5Google Scholar.

55 Caithréim Thoirdhealbhaigh, ed. Grady, S. H., Irish Texts Society (1929), 26–7, 30–1Google Scholar.

56 Quoted in Quinn, D.B., The Elizabethans and the Irish (Ithaca, 1966), 88Google Scholar.

57 ‘Annales Londonienses’, Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, ed. Stubbs, W., Rolls Series (1882), I, 41Google Scholar.

58 Examples: Public Record Office, Chester 25/25 m. lv; Chester 30/17 m. 23; Proceedings and Ordinances of the Privy Council, ed. Nicolas, N. H. (Record Commission, 1834–1837), II, 55Google Scholar; Select Cases in the Court of King's Bench, ed. Sayles, G. O. (Selden Society, 1936–1971), VII, 114–17Google Scholar.

59 Chronicon Adae de Usk, ed. Thompson, E. Maunde (1904), 71Google Scholar.

60 Jones, M. C., The Feudal Barons of Powys (1865), 49Google Scholar; British Library Additional Charter, 5498.

61 Perroy, E., L'Angleterre el le grand schisme d'occident (Paris, 1933), 395, 403Google Scholar.

62 Spenser, Edmund, A View of the Present State of Ireland, 67–8Google Scholar.

63 27 Henry VIII. c. 26; Ellis, Steven G., Tudor Ireland 1470–1603 (1985), 138Google Scholar. It was in the same spirit that an Act was introduced in 1536–7 enjoining clerks in Holy Orders in Ireland to do their best ‘to learn the English tongue and language and use English order and fashions’, Quinn, D. B., ‘The Bills and Statutes of the Irish Parliament of Henry VII and Henry VIII’, Analecta Hibernica, 10 (1941), 71–169 at 156Google Scholar. It was for the same reason that the SPCK two centuries later advised against preaching in Irish, because it would ‘keep up the distinction of their people from ours to make us one people and of one religion, which would have but one language’, ‘Rawlinson Manuscripts (Class C)’, Analecta Hibernica, 2 (1931), 1–44 at 27Google Scholar.

64 Smith, Anthony D., The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford, 1986), 25Google Scholar.

65 Sims-Williams, P. P., ‘Some Functions of Origin Stories in Early Medieval Wales’, in History and Heroic Tale. A Symposium, ed. Nyberg, T. et al. (Odense, 1988), 97–131 at 98Google Scholar.

66 Corráin, D. Ó, ‘Irish Origin Legends and Genealogy: Recurrent Aetiologies’, in History and Heroic Tale ed. Nyberg, et al. , 51–96Google Scholar; Cowan, E. J., ‘Myth and Identity in Early Medieval Scotland’, Scottish Historical Review, 63 (1984), 111–35Google Scholar. The quotation is from O'Rahilly, T. F., Irish History and Mythology (Dublin, 1946), 194Google Scholar.

67 Documents of the Affairs of Ireland, 99–100. For comment, Frame, Robin, ‘England and Ireland, 1171–1399’, in England and her Neighbours 1066–1453. Essays in Honour of Pierre Chaplais, ed. Jones, M. and Vale, M. (1989), 139–57 at 152–3Google Scholar; idem, ‘Overlordship and Reaction, c. 1200–C.1450’, in Uniting the Kingdom? The Making of British History, ed. A. Grant and K.J. Stringer (1995), esp. 78–9.

68 See in general Hughes, Kathleen, The Early Celtic Idea of History and the Modern Historian (Cambridge, 1976)Google Scholar; Byrne, F.J., ‘Senchas: The Nature of the Gaelic Historical Tradition’, Historical Studies, 9 (1970), 137–59Google Scholar; Carey, John, The Irish National Origin-Legend. Synthetic Pseudohistory (Cambridge, 1994)Google Scholar.

69 Hughes, Kathleen, Early Christian Ireland. Introduction to the Sources (1972), 282–3Google Scholar; Corráin, D. Ó, ‘Nationality and Kingship in pre-Norman Ireland’, Historical Studies, 11 (1978), 1–35Google Scholar, esp. 5–7.

70 Roberts, B. F., ‘Geoffrey of Monmouth and Welsh Historical Tradition’, Nottingham Medieval Studies 20 (1976), 29–40Google Scholar; Smith, J. B., The Sense of History in Medieval Wales (Aberystwyth, 1989)Google Scholar.

71 For differing emphases on the antiquity or otherwise of Scottish historical traditions, see, on the one hand, Bannerman, ‘The King's Poet’, and Broun, D., ‘The Origin of Scottish Identity’, in Bjørn, C. et al. , Nations, Nationalism and Patriotism in the European Past (Copenhagen, 1994), 35–56Google Scholar, and, on the other, Goldstein, R.James, The Matter of Scotland. Historical Narrative in Medieval Scotland (Nebraska, 1993)Google Scholar. Cf. also Duncan's, A. A. M. trenchant comment (Cedpath 90, 8)Google Scholar: ‘Scotland was a political creation without any attested early mythical history to service the kingship.’

72 Stones, E. L. G., ed., Anglo-Scottish Relations 1174–1382. Some Selected Documents (2nd edn, Oxford, 1970), 284–5Google Scholar.

73 Bannerman, J., Studies in the History of Dalriada (Edinburgh, 1974), 27–157Google Scholar.

74 Quoted in Cowdrey, H. E. J., ‘Bede and the “English People”’, Journal of Religious History, 11 (1981), 523Google Scholar; William, of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum, I, 1, 30, 56, 67, 260Google Scholar, etc.

75 See in particular Campbell's, James seminal study, ‘Some Twelfth-Century Views of the Anglo-Saxon Past’, Peritia, 3 (1984), 131–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar, reprinted in his Essays in Anglo-Saxon History (1986), chap. 13.

76 William, of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum, II, 518Google Scholar; Henry, of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, ed. Arnold, Thomas, Rolls Series (1879), 3, 47–8, 52, 134, 163, 172Google Scholar; ed. D. Greenway (Oxford, 1996), 4, 96–8, 106, 264, 317, 334–6; William, of Newburgh, ‘Historia Rerum Anglicarum’, Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I, ed. Howlett, R., Rolls Series (1884–1889), I. 28Google Scholar.

77 I have explored the theme of this paragraph more fully in The Matter of Britain and The Matter of England. An Inaugural Lecture (Oxford, 1996)Google Scholar.

78 Remonstrance: Bower, Walter, Scotichronicon, ed. Watt, D. E. R. et al. (Aberdeen, 1987), VI, 384–403Google Scholar; Declaration of Arbroath: Duncan, A. A. M., The Nation of Scots and the Declaration of Arbroath 1320, Historical Association (1970)Google Scholar.

79 See in general Reynolds, Susan, ‘Medieval Origines Gentium and the Community of the Realm’, History, 68 (1983), 375–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80 Lapidge, M., ‘Welsh Latin Poetry of Sulien's Family’, Studia Celtica, 8– 9 (1973–1974), 68–106 at 83Google Scholar.

81 See in general Connerton, Paul, How Societies Remember (Cambridge, 1989)Google Scholar; Fentress, James and Wickham, Chris, Social Memory (Oxford, 1992)Google Scholar.

82 Davies, J. Conway, ed., The Welsh Assize Roll 1277–84 (Cardiff, 1940), 161–2Google Scholar.

83 Faith, Rosamond, ‘The “Great Rumour” of 1377 and Peasant Ideology’, in The English Rising 0f 1381, ed. Hilton, R. H. and Aston, T. H. (Cambridge, 1984), 43–74Google Scholar.

84 Ó Corráin, ‘Irish Origin Legends’, at 55.

85 Cambrensis, Giraldus, Opera, VI, 200 (Description of Wales, Book 1, chap. 17)Google Scholar; Jones, F., ‘An Approach to Welsh Genealogy’, Transactions of Cymmrodorion Society, (1948), 303–466Google Scholar; Brown, M. H., ‘Kinship, Land and Law in Fourteenth-Century Wales: The Kindred of Iorwerth ap Cadwgan’, Welsh History Review, 17 (1995), 495–519Google Scholar; Barrell, A. D. M. and Davies, R. R., ‘Land, Lineage and Revolt in North-East Wales, 1243–1441: A Case Study’, Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies, 29 (1995), 27–51Google Scholar.

86 For ‘rhymers and wasters’ etc. in Wales, , see Davies, R. R., The Revolt of Owain Glyn Dŵr (Oxford, 1995), 92–3Google Scholar and sources cited there; for similar assemblies in Ireland, see Simms, Katherine, From Kings to Warlords. The Changing Political Structure of Gaelic Ireland in the Later Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 1987), 72–5Google Scholar.

87 Owen, Edward, ed., A Catalogue of Manuscripts relating to Wales in the British Museum, Cymmrodorion Record Series (1900–1922), I, 72Google Scholar.

88 Defoe, Daniel, A Tour through England and Wales (1724–6) (Everyman edn, 1928), II, 54, 67–8Google Scholar.

89 Quoted in Wormald, Jenny, ‘The Creation of Britain: Multiple Kingdoms of Core and Colonies’, ante 6th series, II (1992), 175–95 at 179Google Scholar.