Progressive Updates: An Explanation

Greetings,

You will have noticed, if you read the earliest articles on this blog that my aim was not merely an intellectual pursuit with regard to discovering Elizabethan English. My research has always been pointed toward a more practical end. The purpose of this study has always been to learn this language in order that I would be able to produce, or re-produce as the case may be, articles using the language which has been the focus of the discovery.

From this point forward the articles for this blog will be less of the formal nature which has been presented thus far, and more an accounting of my own research into Elizabethan English and notes toward the projects which I am engaged in. The intellectual investigation lays the foundation for the further pursuit of actually producing the language in order that it can be used and brought to the light. With regard to this I have my own particular focus in achieving this end as the earlier blogs would have indicated.

For anyone who has not read my profile, I have a deep and involved interest in Historical European Martial Arts and it is for the better understanding of the manuals of the Elizabethan period that I have embarked upon this particular rather long project. My particular favourite manual is on which was written in 1595 and published in England by a fellow by the name of Vincentio Saviolo. The shortened name of this manual is His Practice in Two Books. This manual investigates the use of the rapier alone and also the rapier and dagger in a combative situation, and also contains a second part of the manual dealing with duelling, or as he would put it "honor and honorable quarrels".

While the modern reader can read this manual and get and idea of what  Saviolo is discussing, certain expressions and explanations in the text are lost on the modern reader. This is compounded by unfamiliar words and technical jargon which are an integral part of this particular art. The investigation which is presented here is designed to allow me to better understand the language in which this manual was written in order that I can reproduce the actions which are presented and gain a better understanding of the social concepts which are described.

Further to this particular project, there is another of equal, in some instances greater, significance. In this I will be taking a manual which I have written and translating this into Elizabethan English. This manual is  based on my own experiences of the use of the rapier over the past approximately twenty years, and the social conventions with regard to its use, based on various historical research into the concepts along with my own understandings of it. These manuals will be presented side-by-side in order that the reader is able to see both the Present Day English and Elizabethan English presented. This is in order that they may understand the  language better and thus have less fear of and greater access to the manuals of the period.

The updates which are presented will be of varying length, and only with the regularity of the points of significance actually found in the process of the research. This serves a two-part function in that it allows me to see how my progress is going and also allows the reader to understand the processes which I am going through in order to achieve my end.

Cheers,

Henry.