The Canterbury Tales

The Canterbury Tales (Middle English: Tales of Caunterbury) are an anthology of twenty-four short stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer between 1387 and 1400. They are mostly in verse, and are presented as part of a fictional storytelling contest held by a group of pilgrims travelling from London to Canterbury in order to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral.

The Canterbury Tales are widely regarded as Chaucer's magnum opus, and they are revered as one of the paramount works of English literature. The Tales had a major effect upon the development of English literature itself. They may have been responsible for the popularisation of the English vernacular in mainstream English literature, as opposed to French or Latin.