22. Feudalism. Magna Carta

Feudalism was based on the exchange of land for military service. Feudalism was introduced in England as a “legacy” of the Norman Conquest. The Norman yoke were the oppressive aspects of feudalism in England, attributed to the impositions of William the Conqueror, his retainers and their descendants. Feudalism in England was based on a pyramid of power. The Normans split up the English land and retained and maintained their power by building castles as power bases to control the English population.

Magna Carta, meaning ‘The Great Charter ’, is one of the most famous documents in the world. Originally issued by King John of England (one of the worst kings in history) as a practical solution to the political crisis he faced in 1215, Magna Carta established for the first time the principle that everybody, including the king, was subject to the law.

23. The Great Famine and Black Death. Consequences

The Great Famine of 1315–1317 was the first of a series of large-scale crises that struck Europe early in the 14th century. Most of Europe was affected.

The Great Famine started with bad and unusually rainy weather in spring 1315. Throughout the spring and the summer, it continued to rain, and the temperature remained cool. Under such conditions, grain could not ripen, leading to widespread crop failures. The price of food began to rise;

People began to harvest wild edible roots, plants, grasses, nuts, and bark in the forests. The famine was so bad, that even the King Edward II had difficulty finding bread for himself; it was a rare occasion in which the King of England was unable to eat.

To survive people were have to slaughter the working animals, eat the seed grain. The chroniclers of the time noted many incidents of cannibalism and even infanticide.

Finally, in the summer of 1317, the weather returned to its normal patterns. By then people were so weakened by diseases such as pneumonia, bronchitis, and tuberculosis, and so much of the seed stock had been eaten.

Consequences:

Church lost its influence

The famine led to a stark increase in crime

The Great Famine put an end to a period of high population

The Great Famine would later have consequences for future events in the fourteenth century, such as the Black Death, when an already weakened population would be struck again.

Black Death

The Black Death seems to have arisen somewhere in Asia and was brought to Europe from the Genoese trading station of Kaffa in the Crimea (in the Black Sea).

The disease was transmitted primarily by fleas (блохи) and rats. The plague lasted in each area only about a year, but a third of a district's population would die during that period. People tried to protect themselves by carrying little bags filled with crushed herbs and flowers over their noses

Consequences of both:

•there were not enough workers to work the land. As a result, wages and prices rose

•The standard of living for labourers rose accordingly.

•Society became more mobile

•40% of England's priests died in the epidemic

24. Characteristics of the Anglo-Saxon poetry

Anglo-saxon poetry was written in a blank verse (no rhymes). There was no end rhyme occurring from line to line. Anglo-saxon poetry typically depicts the problems which arise as the theology of the Church and the theology of the Pagan world were played off and against each other. The idea of courtly idealised love

Stylistic elements:

rhythm, caesura, the poetry was sung by scops (bards), the caesura was placed after the second foot in the line of poetry, alliteration(repetition of the same consonant sound), formulae

25. Genres of Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman Literature

Anglo-Saxon literature (or Old English literature) encompasses literature written in Old English from the mid-5th century to the Norman Conquest of 1066. These works include genres such as epic poetry epic, hagiography (from Greek ἅγιος, "holy" or "saint“ and γραφή "writing"), Bible translations, legal works, chronicles, riddles, and others. In all there are about 400 surviving manuscripts (Latin manu scriptus "written by hand“) from the period.

Most Old English poets are anonymous; twelve are known by name from Medieval sources, but only four of those are known by their vernacular works: Caedmon, Bede, Alfred and Cynewulf. Of these, only Caedmon, Bede, Alfred have known biographies.

Caedmon is considered the father of Old English poetry. He lived at the abbey of Whitby in Northumbria in the 7th century. Only a single nine line poem remains, called Hymn.

26. Geoffrey Chaucer. Biography and heritage

Father of English poetry – revolutionized it with introduction of a ten-syllable line.

Geoffrey Chaucer was born between 1340 and 1345, probably in London. His father was a prosperous wine merchant. We do not know any details of his early life and education.

In 1357, he was a page to Elizabeth, Countess of Ulster, wife of Edward III's third son. Chaucer joined the campaign in France in 1359 and he was captured, but was ransomed by the king. Edward III later sent him on diplomatic missions to France, Genoa and Florence. His travels exposed him to the work of authors such as Dante, Boccaccio and Froissart.

Around 1366, Chaucer married Philippa Roet, a lady-in-waiting in the queen's household. They are thought to have had three or four children.

Meanwhile his reputation as a poet was growing. Sometime in the 1380s Chaucer wrote the poem Troilus and Criseyde. He also wrote The Legend of Good Women. However Geoffrey Chaucer is most famous for his work, The Canterbury Tales. . However Chaucer also wrote a technical book called Treatise on the Astrolabe. (An astrolabe was an instrument used in astronomy).

Meanwhile Chaucer held other posts. From 1389 to 1391 he was clerk of the king's works, responsible for overseeing royal building projects. Then in 1391 Chaucer became Deputy Forester in the royal forest of Petherton Park in North Petherton in Somerset. Finally in 1394 the king granted him a pension of 20 pounds a year (a considerable amount of money in those days).

Geoffrey Chaucer died in 1400. (The traditional date of his death is 25 October). The cause of his death is unknown. Chaucer was buried in Westminster Abbey.

Literary Works

•The Italian Period (up to c. 1387) – influenced by Boccaccio and Dante

•The Parlement of Foules – beast fable;

•The House of Fame – influenced by Dante’s Divine Comedy;

•Troilus and Criseyde – one of the great love poems;

•The Legend of Good Women – used the heroic couplet, iambic pentameter

Literary Terms

•Heroic couplet – a pair of rhyming lines written in iambic pentameter:

A dog starved at his Master’s Gate

Predicts the ruin of the State

•Iambic pentameter – line of poetry consisting of five iambic feet:

| When all| the oth | ers were | away | at Mass |

•Iamb – a foot composed of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable