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Major financial boost for the Anglo-Norman Dictionary

June 24, 2004

Work on revising the Anglo-Norman Dictionary, first published between 1977-1992 by the Modern Humanities Research Association, is continuing apace, funded by a major research grant by the Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB).

Anglo-Norman is a form of medieval French which arrived in England with the Norman Conquest in 1066 and continued in use until the mid 15th Century.

Considered the 'bridge' between France and England (and Britain more generally) during the Middle Ages, it was an important administrative, literary, scientific, legal, and diplomatic language both nationally and internationally.

Such is its influence that at least 50% of the vocabulary of modern English derives directly from Anglo-Norman. It has also had a significant although largely unexplored impact on Welsh.

The award of a £426,112 grant by the AHRB to Professor David Trotter of the Department of European Languages at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth (UWA) means that work on revising letters F, G (which also includes many words beginning with W) and H is now proceeding. Two highly-qualified editorial assistants, Dr Virginie Derrien (from Poitiers) and Dr Geert De Wilde (formerly at Leuven Belgium, and Leeds) have been working since October on the revision, under Professor Trotter's direction.

Letters A - E have already been revised and it is possible to view this section of the dictionary on-line at www.anglo-norman.net. The web site features full search facilities and links to an extensive database of related texts and scholarly articles.

According to Professor Trotter the revised version is expected to be at least three times the size of the original dictionary. "One of the principal reasons for undertaking this substantial piece of work is to provide the basic research materials for a proper assessment of the contribution of Anglo-Norman to the vocabulary of English. Of equal importance is the fact that is will provide a comprehensive account of both a variety of medieval French and a range of documentary sources of a type traditional French lexicography has neglected. For example, areas of Anglo-Norman previously unresearched include shipping vocabulary," he said.

"This work has been made possible by the fact that the Dictionary is online - the cost of producing a printed version would be prohibitive. As a consequence it is enormously flexible and can be linked to a whole range of other texts and source material. It can be continually updated, a feature that overcomes the problems associated with having to follow a strict alphabetical sequence, for instance words like stranger and estranger which can appear with two different initial letters," he added.

Researchers working on the project will have access to the immensely important archive compiled by the distinguished Anglo-Norman scholar, the late Professor J. P. Collas. During his career Professor Collas developed an index-card archive which features over 1,000,000 references and quotations from Anglo-Norman texts. As part of the project, Professor Trotter has moved this valuable archive from Manchester, where it was previously housed, to Aberystwyth, so that it is available to the project and for that matter, to visiting scholars.

The grant awarded to Professor Trotter was amongst the largest awarded to date by the AHRB in Wales.

This grant success also confirms a well-established collaboration between the Department of European Languages in Aberystwyth and the Department of French in Swansea. (Other developments have included the creation of a Centre for Translation and Multilingualism in Swansea, in which Aberystwyth is involved.) As far as the Anglo-Norman Dictionary is concerned, the digitization and online non-dictionary resources are now directed from Swansea, with the Dictionary proper based in Aberystwyth.

The Anglo-Norman Dictionary has close links with major projects in English, Latin, and French, in France, Germany, England, and the United States and is thus part of a long-term, international recording, assessment and re-evaluation of the status and function of the different languages of medieval Britain. Current personnel are: Professor D.A. Trotter, Aberystwyth; Professor W. Rothwell, Manchester; Professor A. Rothwell, Swansea; Ms S. Pilborough and Mr T. Richens, Technical Support Officers, Swansea; Professor M. Beddow, Leeds (Technical Consultant).

Aberystwyth, University of Wales