Medieval children lived in a rich oral culture of poetry: lullabies, nursery rhymes, songs, riddles, tongue-twisters, nonsensical verses and insults. They read or listened to stories in verse: ballads of Robin Hood, romances, and comic tales. Poems were written to teach them how to behave, eat at meals, hunt game, and even to learn Latin and French.

Much of this poetry is unknown and lies beyond the interests of literary scholars. Nicholas Orme’s selection is the first attempt to make the whole scope of it accessibleto general readers. From a wide knowledge of literary and historical sources, he has brought together an astonishing variety of verses that might have been known to children by about the year 1500, from sayings and songs to stories and school texts. The pieces in Latin and French have been translated, and those in medieval English modernised, while keeping as much as possible of their original character. The book provides a delightful way for modern readers of all ages to experience the medieval world through the eyes of the children and teenagers who made up nearly half of its population.