Foreword from the Canterbury Tales

This is an Anglish of the opening lines of The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, first written in Middle English. This reading is made only of Old English-sprung words.

Foreword
1 When 1 with its sweet showers

2 The drought of 2 has to

3 And bathed every 3 in such

4 which  the  is  so

5 When eke its sweet

6 Has every holt and

7 The, and the young sun

8 In the Ram has half its run,

9 And small fowls with arise,

10 sleep all night with open eyes

11 (So has pricked 'em in their10 hearts' worth),

12 Then folk longingly go on a-4

13 And for to seek  strands

14 To farn5 hallows,6 couth7 in sundry lands

15 And from every shires end

16 Of England to Canterbury they10 wend,8

17 The holy blissful 9 for to seek

18 Who 'em had helped when they were sick.

Footmarks

 * 1) Eastermonth as an NE shape of OE Ēaster-mōnaþ, the Old English word for April. http://bosworthtoller.com/023108
 * 2) Lide as an obsolete dialectal word for March from OE Hlȳda. http://bosworthtoller.com/019313
 * 3) adder as an NE shape of ME edre. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/middle-english-dictionary/dictionary/MED13001/track?counter=1&search_id=3654000
 * 4) southforth as an NE shape of OE sūþ-forþ, meaning to fare south, to Rome. http://bosworthtoller.com/058755
 * 5) farn as an NE shape of OE fern, meaning far-away. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/middle-english-dictionary/dictionary/MED15744/track?counter=1&search_id=3658154
 * 6) hallows as in saints. https://www.etymonline.com/word/hallow#etymonline_v_50991
 * 7) couth as in well-known. https://www.etymonline.com/word/couth#etymonline_v_19188
 * 8) wend as in to go/fare. https://www.etymonline.com/word/wend#etymonline_v_7919
 * 9) throer from OE þrowere, meaning martyr. http://bosworthtoller.com/032145
 * 10) they/them/their(s) may be from northern Old English dialect, backed up by Old Norse inflow, rather than straight from ON, so they have been kept as they were in Chaucer's writing.