Chapter 4 Remembering the Past in Early Modern England: Oral and Written Tradition
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Abstract
This paper examines memories of the past and popular traditions in England between the early sixteenth and later eighteenth centuries. It explores interactions between the oral, scribal and printed transmission of legendary tales and historical narratives at all social levels. Some accounts of former times were the province of parochial memory and the spoken word; others the fruits of learned authors and manuscript circulation; and still others the products of the press and their mass dissemination. These different media infused one another in reciprocal and mutually enriching ways. The written word, in both script and print, is shown to be less the nemesis of oral culture and more the midwife of novel ‘charter myths’, new stories and fresh interpretations of the past.