What’s the Black Death got to do with business writing?
Business words
The Black Death’s march across fourteenth century England was responsible for the birth of business writing in English. Without it, we could be writing our copy in French or Latin. And we'd also be denied some of the greatest literature of the medieval era.
The death of Wat Tyler. Photo: Wikipedia
When up to one third of the country’s population was wiped out by one of the most deadly pandemics in history, England lost many of the well-educated clerks it needed to conduct government business in French or Latin. With things getting increasingly chaotic, Parliament passed a statute decreeing that all court cases be heard in English. For the first time, English was to be the official language of England.
The Black Death forced the educated elite to abandon its linguistic control on the country. Like people who talk in jargon at work, they had used French and Latin to create a monopoly on communication that prevented people from challenging their thinking. But increased use of English enabled more people to engage with the ideas of the time and less to some revolutionary results.
Poetry for the people
Writers began to embrace English too. Poets such as John Gower started to use the language. Geoffrey Chaucer and William Langland used English to give voice to social change happening in the country. Indeed, the structure of society characterised by Chaucer's pilgrims in the Canterbury Tales is partly a result of the Black Death.
When it arrived on England's shores in 1348, the disease immediately wiped out a large proportion of the country’s skilled labour force. Those who survived were able to profit from the increased demand for their skills; some saw their wages rise by 200 to 300 per cent.
As people like Chaucer’s Haberdasher and Carpenter became upwardly mobile, English helped spread some new ideas amongst them. For an indication of the power of everyday language, you don't have to look much further than the religious upheaval and revolt that happened at the end of the fourteenth century.
Revolutionary language
People in the rising middle classes were receptive to radical new ideas being preached by John Wycliffe, who translated the Bible into English so that everyone could read it. Amongst his followers (known as Lollards) was an itinerant preacher called John Ball. The language of Ball's sermon to the men of Kent was almost socialist in its tone:
Ah ye good people, the matter goes not well to pass in England, nor shall not do so till everything be common, and that we be all united together and the lords be no greater master than we. What have we deserved or why should we be kept in serfdom? We be all come from one father and mother, Adam and Eve. How can they claim to prove that they be lords more than us, save by making us produce and grow the wealth that they do spend?
If that isn’t a call to action, I don't know what is. Fired by Ball’s words (and by the government’s attempt to impose a poll tax of one shilling on every man in the land), the people of Kent rose up. Under the leadership of Wat Tyler, they marched on London during the failed Peasant’s Revolt of 1381.
Over six hundred years ago, the power of everyday language helped to spark an uprising. Just imagine what it could do for your business. In a world where jargon still abounds, it’s a good reminder about the power of everyday English to engage people.
Why not start a plain-speaking revolution in your organisation? We’ll even give you some tips.