The group had known as the Scottish Chaucerian’s gives us
the most memorable writing between Chaucer’s death in 1400 and the Renaissance,
begun in England
Style
These Scottish
poets are quite different in style, tone and subject matter from their English
contemporaries.
King James 1
King James 1 of
Scotland, who reigned from 1394 to 1437, was influenced by English writing
while a prisoner of the English and his Kingis
Quair (The King’s Book) owes a lot to Chaucer.
Kingis Quair
This is a love
poem, one of the first what was to become a popular form. The verse form used,
is called ‘rhyme-royal’ because of King James’s use of it, but it was already
known, and had, indeed, been used by Chaucer.
Earliest Scottish work
One of the
earliest Scottish texts in English was a celebration of the hero, Robert the
Bruce. This was The Bruce (1375-76), a chronicle usually attributed to John Barbour and written in
octosyllabic couplets, intended to keep Bruce’s exploits and memory alive:
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