May 20, 2025 10:24 PM
(This post was last modified: May 20, 2025 10:31 PM by C C.)
Parody Alcove: We exist because of a meandering trail of both good and bad things. Eliminate the latter and we're gone. Remember that the next time we're wailing about the imperfections, horrors, and injustices of life. Or launch another futile project to establish utopia.
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https://youtu.be/uxn-32McBbU
VIDEO EXCERPTS: It was the deadliest plague in history, wiping out a quarter of the world's population. What you might not know is how it reshaped the economies of Europe.
If we look beyond the horror, we see that for the survivors as it was the beginning of a golden age with higher wages and more freedom. In England, the Black Death not only had a profound impact on society, it had linguistic consequences too.
It was one of the main reasons we speak English today and not French. [...] Let's start with a look at England in 1347, on the eve of the plague.
[...] If you know your history, you'll know that the Normans invaded in 1066. And almost 300 years later, French, or rather Anglo-Norman French, as the linguists call it, was still the language of the aristocracy.
King Edward's native language was French, so was that of the high nobility, for French was the language of power. The laws were written in French. The administration was in French, although some documents were written in Latin. The clergy spoke French, but they would have known Latin.
[...] Medieval schooling at that time was mostly in the hands of the church. Teaching would have been in French, and the pupils would have learnt Latin.
[...] The vast majority of the English population works on the land. The majority of the landlords would be Anglo-Norman or of Anglo-Norman descent. Toiling the fields were two kinds of peasants: the free and the unfree peasants. The free peasants or freemen paid rent for the land they worked on, for which they received a wage.
They could leave if they wished, and moved somewhere else. Also, if there was a dispute with the landlord, they could take their case to the king's court, which was independent and unfree. Peasants, or Villein, on the other hand, were tied to the land under the control of the local lords. Not quite a slave, but definitely not free. They couldn't leave the manor without permission.
[...] If you were a peasant lucky enough to survive the plague, things were pretty good. The plague caused a massive labour shortage. There weren't enough peasants to toil the land, and landlords were desperate to have labor to bring in the harvests and tend the animals. Wages went up. Landlords had to offer better terms to attract or keep workers.
And those rigid feudal bonds, especially for the unfree, started to loosen significantly. They could negotiate their freedom and find a decent wage where they were, or go elsewhere. Landlords couldn't enforce the old rules anymore.
[...] So you have this huge social shake up, empowering the English-speaking majority for the first time. Moreover, it wasn't just the peasants who died. Of course, the landlords, the many minor English landlords, merchants and even successful peasants began rising in status, buying up land or leasing abandoned estates.
Up until the Black Death, the priests were mainly speakers of French and Latin. Now the church had a massive recruitment problem, and they had no choice but to take English speakers and Englishmen to fill the vacancies.
[...] Remember that the church were also the educators. And if you can't find teachers who can teach French, then what are you going to do? So the schools across England were taught in English.
[...] What about the courts? Well, the French-speaking lawyers were not immune from the plague either. So vacancies here were filled by English speakers.
And as we have seen, More of the elite were speaking English than ever before. The nobility were being educated [in] English. There was more social mobility, and the numbers of French speakers were falling...
Saved by the plague ... https://youtu.be/uxn-32McBbU
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/uxn-32McBbU
- - - - - - - - - -
https://youtu.be/uxn-32McBbU
VIDEO EXCERPTS: It was the deadliest plague in history, wiping out a quarter of the world's population. What you might not know is how it reshaped the economies of Europe.
If we look beyond the horror, we see that for the survivors as it was the beginning of a golden age with higher wages and more freedom. In England, the Black Death not only had a profound impact on society, it had linguistic consequences too.
It was one of the main reasons we speak English today and not French. [...] Let's start with a look at England in 1347, on the eve of the plague.
[...] If you know your history, you'll know that the Normans invaded in 1066. And almost 300 years later, French, or rather Anglo-Norman French, as the linguists call it, was still the language of the aristocracy.
King Edward's native language was French, so was that of the high nobility, for French was the language of power. The laws were written in French. The administration was in French, although some documents were written in Latin. The clergy spoke French, but they would have known Latin.
[...] Medieval schooling at that time was mostly in the hands of the church. Teaching would have been in French, and the pupils would have learnt Latin.
[...] The vast majority of the English population works on the land. The majority of the landlords would be Anglo-Norman or of Anglo-Norman descent. Toiling the fields were two kinds of peasants: the free and the unfree peasants. The free peasants or freemen paid rent for the land they worked on, for which they received a wage.
They could leave if they wished, and moved somewhere else. Also, if there was a dispute with the landlord, they could take their case to the king's court, which was independent and unfree. Peasants, or Villein, on the other hand, were tied to the land under the control of the local lords. Not quite a slave, but definitely not free. They couldn't leave the manor without permission.
[...] If you were a peasant lucky enough to survive the plague, things were pretty good. The plague caused a massive labour shortage. There weren't enough peasants to toil the land, and landlords were desperate to have labor to bring in the harvests and tend the animals. Wages went up. Landlords had to offer better terms to attract or keep workers.
And those rigid feudal bonds, especially for the unfree, started to loosen significantly. They could negotiate their freedom and find a decent wage where they were, or go elsewhere. Landlords couldn't enforce the old rules anymore.
[...] So you have this huge social shake up, empowering the English-speaking majority for the first time. Moreover, it wasn't just the peasants who died. Of course, the landlords, the many minor English landlords, merchants and even successful peasants began rising in status, buying up land or leasing abandoned estates.
Up until the Black Death, the priests were mainly speakers of French and Latin. Now the church had a massive recruitment problem, and they had no choice but to take English speakers and Englishmen to fill the vacancies.
[...] Remember that the church were also the educators. And if you can't find teachers who can teach French, then what are you going to do? So the schools across England were taught in English.
[...] What about the courts? Well, the French-speaking lawyers were not immune from the plague either. So vacancies here were filled by English speakers.
And as we have seen, More of the elite were speaking English than ever before. The nobility were being educated [in] English. There was more social mobility, and the numbers of French speakers were falling...
Saved by the plague ... https://youtu.be/uxn-32McBbU