page_title: English nationalism
section_title: Medieval
hierarchical_section_title: English nationalism / History / Medieval
caption_attribution_description: King Edward III, by unknown artist from the end of the 16th century. See source website for additional information. This set of images was gathered by User:Dcoetzee from the National Portrait Gallery, London website using a special tool. All images in this batch have an unknown author, but there is strong evidence it was first published before 1923 (based mainly on the NPG's estimated date of the work).
context_page_description: English nationalism is the nationalism that asserts that the English are a nation and promotes the cultural unity of English people. In a general sense, it comprises political and social movements and sentiment inspired by a love for English culture, language and history, and a sense of pride in England and the English people. English nationalists often see themselves as predominantly English rather than British.
  On the political level, some English nationalists have advocated self-government for England such as the English Democrats. This could take the form either of a devolved English parliament within the United Kingdom or the re-establishment of an independent sovereign state of England outside of the United Kingdom.
context_section_description: The Norman conquest introduced a ruling class over England who displaced English land owners and clergy, and who spoke only Anglo-Norman, though it is likely many if not most were conversant in English from the second generation onwards. William of Malmesbury, a chronicler of mixed Anglo-Norman descent writing in the twelfth century, described the Battle of Hastings as: "That fatal day for England, the sad destruction of our dear country [dulcis patrie]". He also lamented: "England has become the habitation of outsiders and the dominion of foreigners. Today, no Englishman is earl, bishop, or abbot, and newcomers gnaw away at the riches and very innards of England; nor is there any hope for an end of this misery". Another chronicler, Robert of Gloucester, speaking in part of earlier centuries, in the mid to late thirteenth century:
  ...the Norman could not speak anything then except their own speech, and they spoke French as they had done at home, and had their children taught it, too, so that important men in this country who come from their stock all keep to that same speech that they derived from them; because, unless a man knows French, he is thought little of. But humble men keep to English and their own speech still. I reckon there are no countries in the whole world that do not keep to their own speech, except England only.
  King Edward I, himself a Norman-French speaker, when issuing writs for summoning Parliament in 1295, claimed that the King of France planned to invade England and extinguish Old English, "a truly detestable plan which may God avert".
  In the Cursor Mundi, an anonymous religious poem in northern Middle English dating from approximately 1300, appears the words: "Of Ingland the nacion". The Prologue starts:
  Efter haly kyrces state
  Þis ilke bok it es translate,
  Into Inglis tong to rede,
  For þe love of Inglis lede,
  Inglis lede of Ingeland,
  For þe commun at understand.
  Frankis rimes here I redd
  Comunlik in ilk a sted;
  Mast es it wroght for Frankis man —
  Quat is for him na Frankis can?
  Of Ingeland þe nacioun,
  Es Inglis man þar in commun.
  Þe speche þat man with mast may spede,
  Mast þarwith to speke war nede.
  Selden was for ani chance
  Praised Inglis tong in France;
  Give we ilk an þar langage,
  Me think we do þam non outrage.
  To lauid Inglis man I spell...
  This can be translated into modern English as:
  This same book is translated, in accordance with the dignity of Holy Church, into the English tongue to be read, for love of the English people, the English people of England, for the common people to understand. I have normally read French verses everywhere here; it is mostly done for the Frenchman – what is there for him who knows no French? As for the nation of England, it is an Englishman who is usually there. It ought to be necessary to speak mostly the speech that one can best get on with. Seldom has the English tongue by any chance been praised in France; if we give everyone their own language, it seems to me we are doing them no injury. I am speaking to the English layman...
  In 1323 Henry Lambard, a cleric, was brought before a court and asked how he wished to clear himself of charges of theft. Lambard said in English that he was a cleric and was then asked if he knew Latin or French. He replied that he was English, and English-born, and that to speak in his mother tongue was proper. He refused to speak any other language except English. Refusing to give any other answer to the court, he was committed to another court to suffer peine forte et dure.
  During the later decades of the fourteenth century English started to come back into official use. The Pleading in English Act 1362 sought to replace French with English for all pleas in courts. The Mercers' Petition to Parliament of 1386 is the oldest piece of parliamentary English; the earliest English wills at the London Court of Probate date from 1387; the earliest English returns of the ordinances, usages, holdings of the gilds are from 1389 and come from London, Norwich and King's Lynn. John Trevisa, writing in 1385, noted that: "...in all the grammar 
caption: King Edward III
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