MEDIEVAL FINAL KEY TERMS

Norman conquest

1066

Hadrian’s wall

divided the north of england that had not been taken by the romans, became a pressure point along with the germanic tribes

Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy

Essex, Wessex, Sussex, East Anglia, Northumbria, Mercia, Kent.

Treaty of Wedmore

King Alfred to stop the vikings. It was not respected.

Old English vocabulary characteristics

hapax legomena, low-frequency lexical items, archaic terms, appositions, and compounding and kennings

Speculum vitae

14th century translation that said that a few knew french and Latin but everyone knew english

Latin production example

Historia Regum Britannie, by George of Monmouth.

Anglo-French production

La Folie of Oxford

English production

Anglo-Saxon chronicle

Exeter Book

in the Cottonian fire 1731

surviving copy of The Battle of Maldon transcripted by

ofermod

overconfidence in winning the battle, from the warriors

lytegian

psychological tricks played in the enemy to cause fear and anxiety. Inflicted by talking and manipulating the enemy emotionally, in the case of The Battle of Maldon

Cottonian fire

1731

John Elphiston

made a copy of TBOM 5 years before the Cottonian fire.

David Calsey

The person who actually transcripted TBOM, who was John Elphiston succesor and copied its ortographic features

First printed edition of TBOM by

Thomas Hearne

1834 TBOM verse rendition

Benjamin Thrope

Horne’s edition rediscovered by

Neil Ker.

Traits of elegy according to Klinck

conventional introduction to the speaker (gnomic statement/ self introduction)

monologue

repetition of leitmotifs and lines

rhyme (occasionally)

elegy

song of lament, froma personal point of view, focusing on feelings of melancholy and grief.

Characteristics of the Gawain poet found in the Cotton Nero

• concerned with curtisie

• clerical background

• customs of aristocratic society

• familiarised with educated texts in french and Latin

• shared dialect and stylistic features

features of Sir Gawain and The Green Knight

• Alliterative line (first half line has two stressed syllables that stress one in the second half line

• topographical descriptions

• Northern Western dialect

• Intertextual features: Historia Regum Britannie

• Bob and Wheel

Bob and wheel

stressed line + wheel + three stressed lines

SGGK intertextual features

George of Monmouth’s Historia Regum Britannie

Terms to describe the wanderer in its exile

wrecca , anhaga, snoffor