Scribal Networks and the Language of Urban Administration

Abstract

This paper considers Early Modern English urban administration in light of the developing supralocal/standard variety. Previously, research scrutinising the language of administration has focused on Middle English rather than on Early Modern English, where studies have thus far mostly focused on private correspondence and printed texts. To shed more light on the language of this under-investigated text type for this period, in this paper I investigate a collection of indentured texts written in Coventry between 1499 and 1600 and explore its language. More specifically, I analyse the use of periphrastic DO, which I subsequently contextualise both in Coventry’s local civic history – focusing on the people involved in creating the documents, e.g. the town clerk and his team of scribes – as well as in the general development of periphrastic DO with regard to the emerging supralocal/standard variety of English. The analysis reveals that periphrastic DO was used to a different extent compared to other text types from the period, most notably that it did not show a decline in the second half of the sixteenth century after what can be described as a ‘slow start’ in the first half. This change in use can be tentatively attributed to a variety of factors in Coventry’s civic history, particularly in the 1570s, but more data from other urban centres is needed to better contextualise this.

Keywords

• Early Modern English
• urban administration
• Standard English
• Coventry
• legal language