Brut
a poetical version of the legendary history of Great Britain by Layamon. This work is, in reality, a translation and enlargement of Wace's Norman French poem, Brut. Layamon's poem contains 32,000 lines. It was written about 1200, and gives in alliterative verse the history of Britain from the fall of Troy to the year 689. Brut, or Brutus, was supposed to have been the grandson of Ascanius. The story runs that he landed at Totniss in Devonshire, slew the Albion giants, and reigned as king in the island. At his death the kingdom was divided among his three sons. In the opening lines Layamon gives a brief account of himself and his purpose:
Layamon wes ihoten.
He was Leouenathe's sone:
Lithe him beo drihte!
He wonede at Ernleye,
At aethelen are chirechen,
Uppon Seuarne stathe:
Sel thar him thuhte,
On fest Radestone,
Ther he bock radde.
Hit com him on mode
And on his mern thonke, etc.
Of the above original we give the following free translation:
Layamon was he hight.
He was Leovenath's son:
Gracious to him be the Lord!
He dwelt at Earnley,
Where are noble churches,
On the Severn's bank:
Well there he thought,
Not far from Radestone,
Where he read books.
It came in mind to him,
And in his chief thought,
That he would of the English
The noble deeds tell:
What they were called,
And whence they came,
Who the English land
First possessed.
The first Englishman who attempts it (turning the Norman French chronicles into English), is Layamon, a monk of Ernely, still fettered in the old idiom, who sometimes happens to rhyme, sometimes fails, altogether barbarous and childish, unable to develop a continuous idea, babbling in little confused and incomplete phrases, after the fashion of the ancient Saxons.--Taine.