Linguistic Analysis of a Passage from Both the “Miller’s...

In a linguistic analysis of a passage from both the â€Å"Miller’s Tale† and the â€Å"Man of the Law’s Tale† of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, focus on the lexicon and the word-formation processes utilised, and consider how far it is representative of its period. Introduction: Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales were written in Middle English during the 14th Century, the period after the loss of Old English inflexions and before the standardisation of spelling due to the introduction of the Caxton printing press. Chaucer wrote during the years in which foreign loan words were fully integrated into the English vernacular as a result of invasions such as the Norman Conquest of 1066, the developing trade routes, and the expansion of learning†¦show more content†¦The Miller’s Tale (Fig. 2) only makes use of 34% of foreign loans as opposed to the Lawyer’s Tale who uses 45%. Thus, resembles the character of the Lawyer who has access to specialist terminology involved in justice and court. The Lawyer uses 9% more vocabulary from French origins than the Miller (including 2% ‘French’); perhaps this is Chaucer attempting to place vocabulary so that it portrays the character using it. However, a conventional Miller may n ot be prone to using as many foreign loan words as Chaucer establishes, the concentration of foreign words seems high. An explanation for this is that Chaucer himself was an influential player when it came to the utilisation of foreign loans, and it is considered that he allowed such language and words from other origins to become accepted and part of the natural vernacular having had direct contact with the French language ‘living on the fringes of court and involved in legal and administrative work’. Through this it channelled into the vernacular of the elite, due to them having access to the language; and this explains the Lawyer’s ability. Furthermore, French was regarded as the more prestigious languages and therefore the residents of English emulated this French as aspiring social climbers, thus it infiltrated the language in more prestigious areas where the high class congregated, e.g. in the areas of government, food and fashion. The influx of French loan s is credited to the Norman Conquest which