Literary query

I'm helping with the cataloging of the library of James Boswell, the biographer of Samuel Johnson. He had many French and Italian books from his travels. This one has me stumped for identification. The complete entry in the sale catalog for his books is:

Envayt une Chanson, &c. printed by Mrs. Cohen

No date or other information is given. Does anyone recognize the reference?

Got it. It turned out to be:

Cy ensuyt une chanson moult pitoyable des grievouses oppressions qe la povre commune de Engletere souffre souvz la cruelte des justices de Trayllbastun : par lesquels justices les pointz de la graunt chartre et des aultres ordinances et estatutz faitz pur profit du comune poeple par noste Seignour le Roy et ses nobles progenitours sunt enblemiz en moltz des maneres, au graunt peril et esclaundre de nostre dist Seignour le Roy et daumage de son foial poeple, by Francis Cohen (later, Sir Francis Palgrave), London: 1818.

this is hardly understandable. This sounds a bit like old-old-old French, definitely not like 1818-French

Or an early form of franglais?

16th - 17th Century French would be my guess.

Yes, or even earlier. The author was a medievalist.

Tough guess... I'd say old French too, possibly as old as late Middle ages (15th century). Looks older than the 17th century anyway. Quite likely to be from the South of France (so called "Langue d'Oc", rather than its northern counterpart "langue d'Oïl").

- 8
This French is Northern French, as in medieval style, rather than Occitan. And it talks about England. And the king.

Yes - early northern French. I wouldn't hazard to guess how early - not my field - but certainly well before the 18th century.

Beside England and King it also speaks of the Magna Carta (graunt chartre) and the cruelty of the justice of "Trayllbastun" - whoever that may have been.

This book contains four thirteenth-century French texts, including two fabliaux, all previously unpublished. Old French (i.e., French as it was written and presumably spoken until about 1300, at which point it was replaced by Middle French) had fallen into oblivion by the time printing was introduced into France, so nobody got around to printing the first Old French text until 1742. A few other texts appeared during the 18th century, but the great rush started in 1819, Roquefort's edition of the works of Marie de France appeared.

It was edited by Sir Francis Palgrave (1788-1861). Very few copies were printed: most authorities put the figure at 30, but in his introduction to the first edition of the Roman de la Violette (Paris, 1834), Francisque Michel says that 20 copies were printed at most.

For a complete description of this book--with exhaustive bibliographical details as well as an account of the contents, see my bibliography:

William Cole.
First and Otherwise Notable Editions of Medieval French Texts Printed from 1742 to 1874: A Bibliographical Catalogue of My Collection.
Sitges: Cole & Contreras, 2005.