The Marches: A Borderland Journey between England and Scotland by Stewart Rory

Author:Stewart, Rory [Stewart, Rory]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 2016-11-22T05:00:00+00:00

Meint beau penon en lance mis

Meint banier deploie

Se eftoit la noife loign oie

De heniffemens de chevaus

As my father would have translated it (‘You know more Norman French than you think’): ‘Many bonny pennons in lances, many banners deployed, the noise long off of harrumphing of horses.’

The chronicle continues its account of their Solway ride with a description of knights whose minds were filled with heraldry, who used silks imported from China, enjoyed references to King Arthur and unicorns, and rode with companions who included Aymer, the nephew of the emperor of Constantinople, and a descendant of the rulers of Kiev.

But the Scottish account of the same war by John Barbour does not focus on coats of arms. Instead it uses rough Northumbrian words to describe the solitary wanderings of Bruce. And while the chroniclers and poets of the English campaign were writing in French, he—a Scot—wrote in what even today we can almost understand as English:

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