"In fourme of speche is chaunge": Final -e in Troilus and Criseyde, Book II, Lines 22-28.

This article posits that the fourth stanza of the proem to Book Two of Troilus and Criseyde, a passage that reflects on linguistic change, calls attention to such change by deploying the already-antiquated but still-recognized final -e. The discussion considers first how Chaucer positions language change in Troilus, including the envoy (V, 1793-98), before addressing the careful construction of II, 22-28. Chaucer thus highlights discrepancies between written and oral forms of language as well as geographic and temporal differences. A consideration of the extant manuscripts of the poem demonstrates the attention Chaucer's early copyists paid to his deliberate use of written, but silent, final -e. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]