An Introduction to Middle English

Download or read book An Introduction to Middle English written by R.D. Fulk and published by Broadview Press. This book was released on 2012-04-17 with total page 533 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An Introduction to Middle English combines an elementary grammar of the English language from about 1100 to about 1500 with a selection of texts for reading, ranging in date from 1154 to 1500. The grammar includes the fundamentals of orthography, phonology, morphology, syntax, regional dialectology, and prosody. In the thirty-eight texts for reading are represented a wide range of Middle English dialects, and the commentary on each text includes, in addition to explanatory notes, extensive linguistic analysis. The book includes many useful figures and illustrations, including images of Middle English manuscripts as an aid to learning to decipher medieval handwriting and maps indicating the geographical extent of dialect features. This introduction to Middle English is based on the latest research, and it provides up-to-date bibliographical guidance to the study of the language.