What was the English Language like in Medieval times?
Read this interesting summary about the history of English in those times and listen to this joyful song, "Sumer Is Icumen In" (also called the Summer Canon and the Cuckoo Song).
It is a medieval English round or rota of
the mid-13th century.
The title translates approximately to "Summer Has
Come In" or "Summer Has Arrived" (Roscow 1999]).
The song is composed in the Wessex dialect of Middle English.
Although the composer's identity is unknown today, it may
have been W. de Wycombe.
The manuscript in which it is preserved was copied between 1261 and 1264 (Wulstan 2000, 8).
This rota is the oldest known musical composition featuring
six-part polyphony
