Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye

It is English heavily influenced by French. The verb recuellir means to collect, and i strongly suspect an error here somewhere. Is this a Caxton title? Do you have a link?

O.K., Oristar, i went out and did a little work. William Caxton's first published book, 1474, The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye is apparently based upon a work by a French gentleman named Le Fèvre, Recueil des histoires de Troye, which means Collection of the stories (or histories) of Troy. It appears that Mr. Caxton rather mangled the French, although his spelling of the word recueil may represent an English usage which was current in the 15th century.

I think the term is "Middle English". At the time publishing in "Middle English" was quite shocking since Latin was the universal language of Scholars.

Hi Setanta and Noddy,

Regarding the word Recuyell, here some Chinese translators said it is "review". There is no clue why they thought so.

But you have indicated the weird word is from French. So I incline to accept your idea -- the word means collection.

Noddy said that is ME. I wonder if a high school or college student should learn it.

Mr Caxton didn't just mangle English/French - he also set a precedent for purloining intellectual property and 're-badging' it that continues today.

No Oristar, there is no reason to learn the word. It is an interesting bit of literary trivia, but no of much use.

Mr. Ponquility, a very apt and just evaluation of Mr. Caxton's career.

The book is rather famous, since it is the first one printed in English (1474/5 in Brugge:



[The first book printed in English AND in England - " Dictes or Sayengis of the Philosophres´" was printed by the same printer (William Caxton) in 1477 in Westminster.]

Middle English is very useful for reading works in Middle English. Chaucer is well worth reading, but learning ME is a great deal of work for one dead, white poet who can be read in translation.

I nice and easy to understand tutorial, which partly uses William Caxton's printings, is to be found HERE.

OristarA, don't be daft.
Do not bother with mediaeval (my sp.) language.
It is enough just to know about it.
It's hard enough learning the modern tongue.

McT

Precisely what does Caxton being dead and white have to do with anything? Sounds like the feminist DWEM's crap.