'IN LONDON AND OPELOND': THE DIALECT AND CIRCULATION OF THE C VERSION OF "PIERS PLOWMAN"

Horobin examines the dialect and circulation of the C version of William Langland's Piers Plowman. He notes that in an article on Langland's dialect M. L. Samuel identified the majority of the manuscripts of the C version as belonging to a regionally coherent group whose production and dissemination were focused on the south-west Midlands. It is of course possible that the dialects of these manuscripts indicate only the dialects of their scribes and not their places of production. A scribe's dialect is a reflection of where he acquired his literacy, rather than an indication of where he copied a particular manuscript.