The earliest English prose work, the law code of King Aethelberht I of Kent, was written within a few years of the arrival in England (597) of St.
Augustine of Canterbury.
Other 7th- and 8th-century prose, similarly practical in character, includes more laws, wills, and charters.
The Middle English Period consists of the literature produced in the four and a half centuries between the Norman Conquest of 1066 and about 1500, when the standard literary language, derived from the dialect of the London area, became recognizable as "modern English." The most widely known of these writings are
The fifteenth century was called the “Century of the Ballad” as Chaucerians (or followers of Chaucer's work) both in England and Scotland composed some beautiful ballads including the “Ballad of Chevy Chase” and the Robin Hood Ballads.