Doggerel Doggerel Doggerel is poetry that is irregular in rhythm and in rhyme, often deliberately for burlesque or comic effect. Alternatively, it can mean verse which has a monotonous rhythm, easy rhyme, and cheap or trivial meaning. The word is derived from the Middle English "dogerel", probably a derivative of "dog". In English it has been used as an adjective since the 14th century and a noun since at least 1630. Appearing since ancient times in the literatures of many cultures, it is characteristic of nursery rhymes and children's song. The Scottish poet William McGonagall (1825-1902) has become famous for his
Scotland in the Middle Ages Norman period the Scottish church underwent a series of reforms and transformations. With royal and lay patronage, a clearer parochial structure based around local churches was developed. Large numbers of new foundations, which followed continental forms of reformed monasticism, began to predominate and the Scottish church established its independence from England, developed a clearer diocesan structure, becoming a "special daughter of the see of Rome", but lacking leadership in the form of archbishops. In the Late Middle Ages the problems of schism in the Catholic Church allowed the Scottish Crown to gain greater influence over senior appointments and two archbishoprics