"Dead! And never called me Mother!"

The line is from East Lynne, a hugely popular play based on Mrs Henry Wood's novel of the same name, published in 1861. It does not appear in the novel.

But what did children call their parents at different periods in history? Mother and Father?  Mama and Papa? Mum and Dad? Mater and Pater? Madam and Sir? Ma and Pa? Mummy and Daddy?

The best known - and most tear-jerking - fictional use of  'Daddy' is probably the one at the end of The Railway Children by E. Nesbit. And that line does appear in the book. It has a greater impact because Bobbie, Peter and Phylllis had mostly referred to their parents as 'Mother' and 'Father' to that point.

So when did Mummy and Daddy become commonly used by children?

A search of the records of the  Old Bailey reveals the use of Mammy and Daddy from about 1730:

"Thomas Greneway, of St Giles's Cripplegate, was indicted for feloniously stealing a silver Tankard, the Property of Thomas Fletcher, the 26th of August last [1729].
Mr Fletcher depos'd, That the Tankard being missing was search'd for, but not being found, his Wife and self went into the Children's Room, who were in Bed, a Child in Bed, about 7 Years of Age, cry'd out, Mammy, don't 'fright your self,  I can tell you of your Tankard, I saw Greneway put it under his Coat."

"Thomas Robinson was indicted for stealing 33 pounds weight of bacon, value 20s, the property of John English Feb 17 [1768]
John English: I keep a chandler's shop in Wapping; last Wednesday was  week, between seven and eight at night, I was gone into the back kitchen, my little girl that is about eight years old screamed out; I came into the shop; she said O daddy, daddy, the bacon is gone; I went to the hatch, and a boy told me he saw a  man go with something from the window; I pursued as he directed; I saw a man under a lamp with something bulky; when I came under it, he, by looking back, had a full view of me; he made a sort of a run, I ran and catched hold of him; he dropped the bacon; I collared him; there were other people came; I left him to them, and took up my hat and wig, and bacon from the dirt."

The Oxford English Dictionary has an even earlier usage. From a poem by John Skelton, dated to 1523:

To Mistress Isabell Pennell

By Saint Mary, my lady,
Your mammy and your dady
Brought forth a goodly baby

So a writer may have a child character saying Mammy or Daddy at any date from the early sixteenth century.

'Mentioned in Domesday'

Many people take pride in the fact that their town or village is mentioned in the Domesday Book, compiled in 1086. However, that is not necessarily a sign of exceptional  antiquity, and neither does the lack of a mention in Domesday mean that a place did not exist then. Many, if not most, English settlements had been established before 1066; many had been established centuries before. The earliest written records of English settlements date from the seventh century. Some of the settlements themselves might have originated, and been given their names, in the late fifth or sixth centuries.

Celtic, Latin, Anglo Saxon, Danish or Norwegian and Norman French have all contributed to the making of English place names.  Thames, Derwent and Avon are all of Celtic origin. Chester, caster and cester all derive from the Latin castra, meaning a military camp.

Ham, ton, ley, stead, wich and wold are a few of the elements used by the Anglo Saxons in naming their settlements. They had many words to describe hills, woods, valleys and farmland.    

In the regions settled by Vikings - the East Midlands and the north of England - many place names are of Scandinavian origin. There - and nowhere else - are the bys, the thorpes and the thwaites. A gate is a street, not an entry way, in areas where Danes settled. Old Norse words for features in the landscape such as beck, fell and gill are found in the north west.  

All place names have meanings, even if some of those meanings have been lost over time. They can tell us who the original settlers were, about the landscape or what the land was used for.  A writer creating a fictional town or village as a setting for a novel might want to check the origin and meaning of the name he or she invents for it. That way the writer can avoid making the mistake the BBC made. While they are quite right to use Wyvern as the name of a fictional county in the south west of England, they are hopelessly wrong in using Holby as the name of a fictional city there.
  

'God bless us, every one!'

I was trying to think of some English writing about Christmas that is not Dickens. Then I remembered that I haven't yet posted about the fact that this year is the four hundredth anniversary of the publication of the King James Version of the Bible.

The King James Bible was a translation into English of the original Greek texts. There could not have been a better time to commission it. The English language was experiencing its greatest flowering; Shakespeare's The Tempest was first performed in 1611.

The Bible translation was not the work of one man; there was a committee of about fifty scholars. It was not a new translation; it drew heavily on earlier work such as that of  Wycliff and Tyndale.

It is the most widely published text in the English language. It has given us a great number of phrases and sayings. Until quite recently, almost every English person would have had some familiarity with it.

And it has the greatest piece of writing about Christmas in English.

Gospel of St Luke, Chapter Two

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.
([And] this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)
And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.
And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:)
To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.
And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.
And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.
And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.
And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.
And this [shall be] a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,
Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.　

Well, of course she did!

Prof. Kathryn Sutherland of the University of Oxford has been working on a project to digitise and make available online the surviving manuscripts of Jane Austen's novels.

According to Prof. Sutherland, Jane Austen had a regional accent, ‘She wrote "tomatoes" as "tomatas" and "arraroot" for "arrowroot" - peculiarities of spelling that reflect Austen's regional accent …. In some of her writing, her Hampshire accent is very strong. She had an Archers-like voice with a definite Hampshire burr.’

 Well, of course she had a regional accent. Everyone must have had a regional accent, back then. There was no BBC around two hundred years ago to show people how they were ‘supposed’ to speak. Other than, perhaps, the Welsh or Scottish accents of transient drovers or harvest workers, most people outside London and other big cities would only hear speech similar to their own.

Fifty years before Jane Austen was born, Daniel Defoe wrote of Somerset ‘when we are come this length from London, the dialect of the English tongue, or the country way of expressing themselves, is not easily understood, it is so strangely altered. It is true, that it is so in many parts of England besides, but in none in so gross a degree as in this part.… Tho' the tongue be all meer natural English, yet those that are but a little acquainted with  them, cannot understand one half of what they say.’

Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel (1788-1850) spoke with a Lancashire accent, despite having been educated at Harrow and Oxford.

So Miss Deborah and Miss Matty probably did not sound like Dame Eileen and Dame Judi. Jane Eyre probably had a Yorkshire accent (her creator apparently had an Irish accent, picked up from her Irish father). And historical novelists should not necessarily imagine that anyone who wasn’t a servant or a labourer spoke standard BBC English.

The continuous history of England begins in 455 AD, when the first of the English kingdoms was founded. The history of English as a written language, and of English law, begin in about 600 AD. The English language and English legal system have gone on to have a worldwide impact.


Of course the histories of the other nations of the United Kingdom are worth studying. But I don't know enough to do them justice, so I'll leave them for people who are more expert in those areas than I am.