Investigating the full range of the meanings of a text’s vocabulary can illuminate any passage of literature, but all the more so for one written in Middle English. In order to understand better what the author was trying to communicate and how his audience would have responded to the text we must take into account the (sometimes dramatic) semantic shifts that take place over time. In the table above I have listed the derivations and major contemporary meanings of selected words from the Ancrene Wisse, that is, meanings for which citations exist between 1200 and 1250 in the Oxford English Dictionary or the Middle English Dictionary. I shall in this essay show how this knowledge affects our reading of the extract on the seven deadly sins.

‘Prud’ comes ultimately from the Latin verb ‘prodesse’ which means ‘to be of value’. The original sense of the adjective, via French, was therefore positive - ‘brave, valiant’ or ‘noble, excellent, lordly’- and has been in the language since circa 1000. The OED suggests that the unfavourable sense may be due to the way a Norman ‘prud baron’ presented himself to the English peasant: as haughty and arrogant as well as socially superior. These resonances would have been particularly acute for the sisters for whom the Ancrene Wisse was written, as the three anchoresses must have been of fairly high status if they could read and afford their upkeep. If they were aristocratic their mother tongue would have been Norman French and words such as ‘prud’ that were the same in Norman and English would have stood out. In this extract ‘prud’ is used first as a noun meaning ‘proud people’: ‘ e prude beo his bemeres’ (l. 1). As an adjective it describes a trumpeter (l. 7), a heart (l. 51) and a lecher (l. 78). The latter is the most interesting use, since it links Pride, which is normally condemned as the root of all the sins, with Lechery, which this author singles out as the most deadly sin. Promiscuity would have been strictly prohibited amongst the upper classes where the need to maintain purity of descent was much greater, so an ironic connection can be seen between ‘prud’ meaning ‘of exalted station’ and lechery.

This extract is an allegory, in which sinners are depicted in Hell, performing for the Devil’s amusement; the author describes them as being in his ‘servise’. This word and the related verb ‘serven’ come, again via Old French, from the Latin noun ‘servus’ which means ‘slave’. This is an apt derivation as the sinners, once in Hell, are slaves: they have no choice in their service of the Devil and they receive no reward. ‘Serven’ could also mean ‘to provide or supply’; the sinners are providing entertainment for their master. By the time of the writing of the Ancrene Wisse ‘servise’ and ‘serven’ had acquired religious meanings in addition to those of personal employment. The MED lists senses of ‘serven’ including ‘to perform holy rites’ and ‘to officiate at religious rites, hold priestly office’ while the OED gives one meaning for ‘servise’ of ‘worship, especially public worship according to form and order’. Besides these legitimate interpretations, however, the words also carried meanings of ‘ceremony of pagan ritual’ or ‘sinful conduct in accordance with the will of the Devil, an idol or a pagan god’. The combination of the official religious sense and the pagan sense makes a powerful impact in the context of the allegory. The meanings of domestic service are also appropriate to the hierarchical court conceit and would be familiar to the anchoresses, who had servants to attend them.

The envious are forced to be the Devil’s clowns, his ‘juglurs’ (l. 12), pulling grotesque faces for his amusement. The English word comes through French and Italian from the Latin verb ‘joculari’, ‘to jest’; the English verb ‘to juggle’ comes from the agent noun, ‘juggler’. The Ancrene Wisse is the earliest citation in the MED for the sense, ‘itinerant entertainer: actor, jester, clown, tumbler, dancer’. The OED adds to this definition that it implied contempt or reprobation; there is a separate sense of ‘a parasite, deceiver or rascal’. The Latinate origins of the word associate it with the courts of the Norman rulers, and its negative connotations may come from both the aristocracy, who would have looked down on those employed to entertain them, and from the Anglo-Saxon peoples, who would have been contemptuous of any of their number who degraded themselves for the invading rulers. In either case, the use of the word ‘juglurs’ brings with it disdainful associations that increase the implied condemnation of the sinners. From around 1100 the word also had a sense of ‘someone who performs with the aid of magic or witchcraft, a magician, wizard or sorcerer’. This sinister meaning augments the reader’s dislike of the Devil’s clowns, although the sin of witchcraft is in accordance with Satan’s wickedness. The Ancrene Wisse’s definition of envy includes happiness at others’ sorrow, and there may be an implication of the envious ‘juglurs’ turning to sorcery in order to bring about misfortune for others.

‘Chere’ meaning ‘face’ or ‘countenance’ comes from Old French ‘chiere’ and Latin ‘cara’ which is itself a borrowing from Greek, ‘kara’, which means ‘head’. Both references in this extract are in the phrase ‘makien chere(s)’ which means ‘to make faces, grimace’; the envious are said to pull faces for the Devil’s amusement. The sense of ‘to grimace’ and the detail of ‘to makien grim chere’ (l. 27) convey the plight of these sinners, however: they are not enjoying themselves and may be in pain. The OED has a contemporary meaning of ‘chere’ as ‘disposition, frame of mind or mood, especially as showing itself through external demeanour’. This is particularly appropriate in the case of the envious, whose unnatural reactions to their fellow humans are expressed in their twisted faces: ‘makien cheres, wrenche e mu mis, schulen wi ehnen’ (l. 13). Ironically, the word had also begun to take on the sense of its modern form, ‘cheer’, meaning ‘kindness, hospitality, sympathy or friendliness’. Although the context makes it clear that this is not the meaning intended, the sinners’ lack of sympathy and kindness is stressed by the association.

The Latin noun ‘ministerium’ meaning ‘office or functions, use or employment’ was corrupted in medieval to ‘misterium’, whence it came through French ‘mestier’ to the Middle English word ‘meoster’. In the early thirteenth century it had the meanings of ‘duty, business or function’, ‘employment or occupation’ and ‘skill or art’. It is this last sense that is used in the Ancrene Wisse’s passage on the seven deadly sins, which is interesting since it is the meaning furthest from the Latin and thus its Old French roots. The implications of more formal duty must have been obvious to the contemporary reader, emphasising the sinners’ coercion in entertaining their master. The idea of a ‘skill’ brings the implication that these transgressors have been practising and refining their monstrous performances, which the author makes explicit in lines 26 and 27: ‘ha bivorenhond leorni hare meoster to makien grim chere.’ Their punishments are all fitted to their sins in life, so in a way they have mastered these bizarre tricks and made them ‘arts’.

‘Curt’ and its plural ‘curz’ come from Old French ‘curt’ or ‘cort’ which derives from the Latin third declension noun ‘cors, cortis’ which had a range of meanings, from ‘poultry-yard, yard or enclosure’, ‘a company of soldiers’ to ‘court or retinue’. The French origin is natural since it was the Norman invaders who established courts in the form that they existed for centuries afterwards. The first major sense of ‘curt’ is of ‘the dwelling place or residence of a sovereign or other high dignitary'; this shows how Satan is sovereign over Hell and that the sinners are definitely in his dominion. It can also mean ‘the dwelling place of God’, an irony that, as with ‘servise’, stresses their deviation from the path of righteousness. The OED has a second definition of ‘the establishment and surroundings of a sovereign with his councillors and retinue’. This places the wrong-doers firmly within the Devil’s entourage, owing allegiance to him and reliant on him for their existence. Finally, ‘curt’ has a sense of ‘a formal assembly held for purposes of administration or justice’, which is particularly appropriate in the context of the allegory, where men are receiving punishment for their sins: justice is in the process of being carried out. One of references, in line 72, is not to ‘ e deofles curt’ (l. 14) but to ‘ es muchele curz’, the ‘great courts’ of the real world. This forms an interesting parallel, as earthly courts are portrayed as containing just as much wickedness but less condemnation:

(ll. 71-73)

Looking closely at the meanings and origins of the selected words enhances our understanding of the text. The Latinate derivations demonstrate the erudition of the author and the intended readers and emphasise the courtly aspects and earthly parallels of the allegory, while the range of definitions illustrates the grotesque subservience of the sinners to the Devil. This sort of study helps us to understand the dramatic impact of Ancrene Wisse to a contemporary audience.

Burrow, J.A. & Thorlac Turville-Petre, A Book of Middle English, 2nd ed., (Oxford: Blackwell) 1996

Kurath, H. (ed.), Middle English Dictionary, (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press) 1952

Hanks, P. (ed.), Oxford English Dictionary, (Oxford: Oxford University Press) 1989

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