Anglo-Saxon Humour--Rhyme--Satires against the Church--The
Brunellus--Walter Mapes--Goliardi--Piers the Ploughman--Letters of
Obscure Men--Erasmus--The Praise of Folly--Skelton--The Ship of
Fools--Doctour Doubble Ale--The Sak full of Nuez--Church
Ornamentation--Representations of the Devil.

The rude character of the Anglo-Saxon humour may be gathered from our
having derived from it the word _fun_. This term which we often apply to
romping and boisterous games, refers principally to the sense of
feeling, and always implies some low kind of amusement connected with
the senses. We also discover among the Anglo-Saxons an unamiable
tendency to give nicknames to people from their personal peculiarities.
But if we look for anything better, we can find only a translation of
the Latin riddles of Symposius by Aldhelm, Bishop of Shirburn. This
prelate, who was a relation of Ina, King of the West Saxons, was in
attainments far superior to his age. He was celebrated as a harper,
poet, and theologian, and wrote several works, especially one in praise
of Virginity. His translations from Symposius were probably intended
for the post-prandial delectation of the monks.

Aristophanes seems to have made the first approach to rhyming, for he
introduced some repetitions of the same word at the end of lines. He
probably thought the device had an absurd effect and used it as a kind
of humour. Aulus Gellius blames Isocrates, who lived about 400
B.C., for introducing jingles into his orations, and as he also
refers to Lucilius' condemnation of them, he would probably have
objected to them in poetry.

Classic Latin versification is supposed to have died out with
Fortunatus, Bishop of Poitiers in the sixth century, but an advance was
made towards playing with words by the introduction of rhymes in the
church hymns. Some trace of them is found in the verses of Hilary in the
fourth century, but we find them first regularly adopted in a Latin
panegyric written for Clotaire II. in France at the commencement of the
seventh. Some suppose that "Leonine verses" were invented shortly
afterwards by Pope Leo II. As in the days of Greece and Rome, the
development of poetry was accompanied by a considerable activity in the
fabrication of metres. This did not limit itself to a distich or
alternate rhyme called "tailed" or "interlaced," but included the
"horned," "crested," and "squared" verses--the last forming double
acrostics. Sometimes half