Dialects in the Harley Miscellany: The Song of the Husbandman and The Poet’s Repentance

Abstract

This essay reappraises the provenance of two richly alliterative lyrics in London, British Library, MS Harley 2253, The Song of the Husbandman and The Poet’s Repentance. It examines the earlier findings by G. L. Brook in his study of the original dialects of the Harley lyrics, and it argues that Brook’s conclusion, that these poems were composed in the south-east or South-East Midlands, is unsound. The evidence provided by rhymes, vocabulary, and verse form in fact suggests that both of these poems came from a region close to the Harley scribe’s own dialect area on the border of north Herefordshire.