The Inglis language and the emergence of the Lowland Scotland literary tradition

Abstract

The paper studies the social history of the idiom spoken by the indigenous population of Lowland Scotland and the Borders of the late 12th – third quarter of the 14th centuries, as well as the first written poetic monuments of Early Middle Scots (Inglis). The aim of this study is to consider the factors that contributed to the spread of the Inglis language, giving a description of its ethnic and social base, the areas of use and the study of the first important poetic monuments written in this language, preceding the epic poem “Bruce” (1375) by J. Barbour, associated by most scholars with the emergence of the literary tradition of the Lowland Scotland regional language. The article gives a brief overview of the literary heritage of Thomas the Rhymer, the poetic work “Song on the Death of Alexander III”, as well as other written monuments of the Scottish pre-literary period. We describe the history of the creation of the “Auchinleck Manuscript”, which includes texts written in various dialects of Middle English, and points out the special scientific value of the Manuscript. As a result of the research, we have come to the conclusion that the isolation of the Scots language and the emergence of its own literary tradition was caused by both external factors, related to the independence of the Scottish state, and internal ones, related to the growth of the Inglis idiom prestige on the territory of Lowland Scotland during the period in question of the Scots language history.