Fisher et al. (6--7) に，1419年のとある日に発行された Henry V の玉璽書簡が，書簡のテンプレートの説明のために掲げられている (Letter no. 60) ．Robert Shiryngton という役人の署名が入っている書簡だ．こちらを再現してみよう．
1. Author By þe king
2. Salutation Worshipful fader yn god oure right trusty and welbeloued
3. Greeting We grete yow wel /
4. Exposition And for asmuche as we haue ordeined oure trusty and welbeloued knyght Iohn of Radclif. to be oure Conestable of Bourdeux And also to be Captaine of our Castel of fronsac for þe grete trust þat we haue to his trewthe and discrecion.
5. Disposition we wol and charge yow þat by þauis of our broþer of Bedford and oþer of oure conseil þere in Englande. ye trete and accorde wiþ þe said Ihon for his abidyng þere. And so þat he may do vs good seruice. as hit semeþ best to youre discrecions for oure auantage and proffit of þe cuntree And þat ye spede him in al þe haste þat ye may. And se þat he tarye not þere: as oure trust is to yow
6. Valediction And god haue yow in his keping
7. Attestation Yeuen vnder oure signet in oure Castel of Rouen þe [xvi day of May]
8. Signature of the clerk Shiryngton
まず書簡の送り主が王であることが示される (1) ．次に神に言及しつつ挨拶がなされる (2, 3) ．続いて主題の背景が述べられ (4) ，その上で依頼内容が明らかにされる (5) ．最後に，末筆の挨拶 (6) ，文書証明の辞 (7) ，そして役人のサインと続く．
玉璽書簡は官僚の扱う事務書類であるから，このようなテンプレートが必要とされるし，重宝されるだろう．同様に，このような文書作成に当たる役人にとっては，標準的な綴字が定まっていれば，仕事もそれだけ効率よくこなすことができるだろう．ここに綴字標準化の機運が生じたというのは，きわめて自然なことである．
・ Fisher, John H., Malcolm Richardson, and Jane L. Fisher, comps. An Anthology of Chancery English. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1984. 392.
標題については，すでに直接・間接に関係する記事を書いてきた．
・ 「#3225. ランカスター朝の英語国語化のもくろみと Chancery Standard」 ([2018-02-24-1])
・ 「#3241. 1422年，ロンドン醸造組合の英語化」 ([2018-03-12-1])
・ 「#3242. ランカスター朝の英語国語化のもくろみと Chancery Standard (2)」 ([2018-03-13-1])
今回は Fisher et al. (xv--xvi) より，もう1つの関連する議論を紹介したい．
The earliest group of official documents in English in uniform style and language are the English Signet letters of Henry V. Until his second invasion of France in August 1417, Henry's correspondence had been in French, but from August 1417 until his death in August 1422 nearly all of it is in English. The reasons for the change can only be inferred. No document has come to light expressing his views or prescribing the use of English, but there is evidence of his sensitivity to linguistic nationalism. One of the first acts of his reign was an assent, in English, to a petition by the Commons that statutes be made without altering the words of the petitions on which they were based. In treating with the French and Burgundians, his ambassadors insisted on using Latin rather than French. At the Council of Constance, Henry's ambassadors demanded to know "whether nation be understood as a people marked off from others by blood relationships and habit of unity or by peculiarities of language (the most sure and positive sign and essence of a nation in divine and human law)." Hence, it may be inferred that upon his invasion of France in 1417, he found it expedient to adopt English to secure popular support for his military expedition.
たとえ政治的な含みがあったにせよ，Henry V が，国家あるいは民族とは血縁によってではなく言語によって結びついた集団であるという考えを押し出そうとしていたことは注目に値する．イングランドにおける近代的な国家観や民族観の走りというべきだろう．
・ Fisher, John H., Malcolm Richardson, and Jane L. Fisher, comps. An Anthology of Chancery English. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1984. 392.
中英語期のイングランドはマルチリンガルな社会だった．ポリグロシアな社会といってもよい．この全時代を通じて，イングランドの民衆の話し言葉は常に英語だったが，書き言葉は，書き手やレジスターや時期により，ラテン語，フランス語，英語のいずれもあり得た．しかし，書き言葉としての英語は，中英語後期にかけてゆっくりとではあるが，着実に存在感を示すようになってきた．
Fisher et al. (xiii) は，イングランドにおけるこの3世紀半の言語事情を，1段落の文章で要領よくまとめている．以下に引用する．
Until the 14th century there was little association between Chancery and Westminster. Like the rest of his household, Chancery followed the King in his peregrinations about the country, and correspondence up to the time may be dated from York, Winchester, Hereford, or wherever the court happened to pause (as the King's personal correspondence---the Signet correspondence---continued to be throughout the 15th century). It is important to observe that in its movement about the country, the court as a whole must have reinforced the impression of an official class dialect , in contrast to the regional dialects with which it came in contact. For two centuries this court dialect was spoken French and written Latin; after 1300 it gradually became spoken English and written French. The English spoken in court then and for a long time afterward was quite varied in pronunciation and structure. But written Latin had been standardized in classical times, and by the 13th century written French had begun to be standardized in form and to achieve the lucid idiom that English prose was not to achieve until the 16th century. Increasingly as the 14th century progressed, this Latin and French was written by clerks whose first language was English. Latin was the essential subject in school, but the acquisition of French was more informal, and by the end of the century we have Chaucer's satire on the French of the Prioress, Gower's apologies for his own (quite acceptable) French, and the errors in legal briefs which betoken Englishmen trying to compose in a foreign language. By 1400 the use of English in speaking Latin and French in administrative writing had established a clear dichotomy between colloquial speech and the official written language, which must have made it easier to create an artificial written standard independent of the spoken dialects when the royal clerks began to use English for their official writing after 1417.
なお，最後に挙げられている1417年とは，「#3214. 1410年代から30年代にかけての Chancery English の萌芽」 ([2018-02-13-1]) で触れられている通り，Henry V の書簡が玉璽局 (Signet Office) により英語で発行され始めた年のことである．
・ Fisher, John H., Malcolm Richardson, and Jane L. Fisher, comps. An Anthology of Chancery English. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1984. 392.
現代標準英語の歴史的基盤はどこにあるか．この問題は英語史でも第一級の重要課題である．正書法に関する限り，それは中英語後期の Chancer English に求められる，とするのが Samuels (1963) 以来の有力な説である，これについては「#306. Samuels の中英語後期に発達した書きことば標準の4タイプ」 ([2010-02-27-1])，「#1228. 英語史における標準英語の発展と確立を巡って」 ([2012-09-06-1])）や「#3214. 1410年代から30年代にかけての Chancery English の萌芽」 ([2018-02-13-1]) をはじめとする chancery_standard の記事を参照されたい．
この Chancery とは「大法官庁」のことで，いわゆる国家の官僚組織を指す．では，その名前にあやかって後に Chancer English や Chancery Standard と呼ばれることになった英語変種とは，具体的には何のことなのだろうか．Fisher et al. (xii) より，当面の定義を与えておこう．
We follow M. L. Samuels, in calling the official written English of the first half of the 15th century "Chancery English" although it emanated from at least four offices, Signet, Privy Seal, Parliament, and the emerging Court of Chancery itself. The generalized term is valid in an historical sense. By the end of the 15th century the term "Chancery" had come to be restricted to the royal courts of law, but until the departmentalization of the national bureaucracy into various offices, which began in the reign of Henry VII, Chancery comprised virtually all of the national bureaucracy except for the closely allied Exchequer. Thomas Frederick Tout, who made a life-time study of the workings of Chancery and its affiliated offices, begins his Chapters in The Administrative History of Mediaeval England by quoting Palgrave's observation that "Chancery was the Secretariat of State in all departments of late medieval government."
Chancery とは，玉璽局 (Signet），王璽尚書局 (Privy Seal)，議会 (Parliament)，大法官裁判所 (Court of Chancery) を中心とし， 王室会計局 (Exchequer) を除いたほぼすべての国家事務局を指したということだ．そこで用いられた比較的一様な綴字によって表わされる英語変種が，Chancery English ということになる．完全な定義ではないとはいえ，当面はこの理解で十分だろう．
・ Samuels, Michael Louis. "Some Applications of Middle English Dialectology." English Studies 44 (1963): 81--94. Revised in Middle English Dialectology: Essays on Some Principles and Problems. Ed. Margaret Laing. Aberdeen: Aberdeen UP, 1989.
・ Fisher, John H., Malcolm Richardson, and Jane L. Fisher, comps. An Anthology of Chancery English. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1984. 392.
Powered by WinChalow1.0rc4 based on chalow