“Ne voil pas emmi dire,
    Ici diverse la matyere,
    Entre ceus qui solent cunter,
    E de le cunte Tristran parler.”

    “I will not say too much about it,
    So diverse is the matter,
    Among those who are in the habit of telling
    And relating the story of Tristran.”

This is a specimen of the language which was in use among the nobility of England, in the ages immediately after the Norman conquest.  The following is a specimen of the English that existed at the same time, among the common people.  Robert de Brunne, speaking of his Latin and French authorities, says: 

    “Als thai haf wryten and sayd
    Haf I alle in myn Inglis layd,
    In symple speche as I couthe,
    That is lightest in manne’s mouthe. 
    Alle for the luf of symple men,
    That strange Inglis cannot ken.”

The “strange Inglis” being the language of the previous specimen.

It was not till toward the end of the thirteenth century that the prose romances began to appear.  These works generally began with disowning and discrediting the sources from which in reality they drew their sole information.  As every romance was supposed to be a real history, the compilers of those in prose would have forfeited all credit if they had announced themselves as mere copyists of the minstrels.  On the contrary, they usually state that, as the popular poems upon the matter in question contain many “lesings,” they had been induced to translate the real and true history of such or such a knight from the original Latin or Greek, or from the ancient British or Armorican authorities, which authorities existed only in their own assertion.

A specimen of the style of the prose romances may be found in the following extract from one of the most celebrated and latest of them, the “Morte d’Arthur” of Sir Thomas Mallory, of the date of 1485.  From this work much of the contents of this volume has been drawn, with as close an adherence to the original style as was thought consistent with our plan of adapting our narrative to the taste of modern readers.

“It is notoyrly knowen thorugh the vnyuersal world that there been ix worthy and the best that ever were.  That is to wete thre paynyms, three Jewes, and three crysten men.  As for the paynyms, they were tofore the Incarnacyon of Cryst whiche were named, the fyrst Hector of Troye; the second Alysaunder the grete, and the thyrd Julyus Cezar, Emperour of Rome, of whome thystoryes ben wel kno and had.  And as for the thre Jewes whyche also were tofore thyncarnacyon of our Lord, of whome the fyrst was Duc Josue, whyche brought the chyldren of Israhel into the londe of beheste; the second Dauyd, kyng of Jherusalem, and the thyrd Judas Machabeus; of these thre the byble reherceth al theyr noble hystoryes and actes.  And sythe the sayd Incarnacyon haue ben the noble crysten men stalled and admytted thorugh the vnyuersal world to the nombre of the ix beste and worthy, of whome was fyrst the noble Arthur, whose noble actes I purpose to wryte in this person book here folowyng.  The second was Charlemayn, or Charles the grete, of whome thystorye is had in many places both in frensshe and englysshe, and the thyrd and last was Godefray of boloyn.”