1 INTRODUCTION&Norman Blake 1
1.1 Beginnings of the study of Middle English 1
1.2 The study of Middle English since the Second World War 3
1.3 English,French and Latin 5
1.4 Spelling and standardisation 9
1.5 Social and literary developments 15
1.6 Concluding remarks 20
Further reading 21
2 PHONOLOGY AND MORPHOLOGY&Roger Lass 23
2.1 Introduction 23
2.2 Phonology,origins:the Old English input system 39
2.3 The formation of the Middle English vowel system 42
2.4 Consonantal developments 57
2.5 Length and quantity 67
2.6 Accentuation 83
2.7 When did Middle English end? 90
2.8 Morphology:general matters 91
2.9 Morphology:the major syntactic classes 103
Further reading 147
Textual sources 154
3 MIDDLE ENGLISH DIALECTOLOGY&James Milroy 156
3.1 Dialect method and the study of Middle English 156
3.2 The study of geographical variation in Middle English 167
3.3 Variation theory and Middle English dialectology 192
3.4 Concluding remarks 201
Further reading 204
4 SYNTAX&Olga Fischer 207
4.1 Introduction 207
4.2 The noun phrase 210
4.3 The verb phrase 233
4.4 Questions 278
4.5 Negation 280
4.6 Composite sentences 285
4.7 Agreement 364
4.8 Word order 370
4.9 Some grammatical processes 383
Further reading 391
Textual sources 398
5 LEXIS AND SEMANTICS&David Burnley 409
Lexis 409
5.1 Foreign influences 414
5.2 Word formation 439
5.3 The structure of the lexicon 450
Semantics 461
5.4 Meaning,use and structure 461
5.5 Semantic change 485
Further reading 496
6 THE LITERARY LANGUAGE 500
Norman Blake 500
6.1 Introduction 500
6.2 Early Middle English literature 508
6.3 Later Middle English literature 517
6.4 Special features of the literary language 532
Further reading 540
7 ONOMASTICS&Cecily Clark 542
7.1 Sources and methodology 542
7.2 Anthroponymy 551
7.3 Toponymy 587
Further reading 604
Glossary of linguistic terms 607
Bibliography 629
Primary sources 629
Secondary sources 634
Index 677
1 The dialects of Middle English 34
2 a/o forms in Lancashire,West Riding and Lincolnshire 183