<P> Layamon 's Brut ( ca . 1190 - 1215 ) , also known as The Chronicle of Britain , is a Middle English poem compiled and recast by the English priest Layamon . The Brut is 16,095 lines long and narrates the history of Britain : it is the first historiography written in English since the Anglo - Saxon Chronicle . Named for Britain 's mythical founder , Brutus of Troy , the poem is largely based on the Anglo - Norman Roman de Brut by Wace , which is in turn a version of Geoffrey of Monmouth 's Latin Historia Regum Britanniae . Layamon 's poem , however , is longer than both and includes an enlarged section on the life and exploits of King Arthur . It is written in the alliterative verse style commonly used in Middle English poetry by rhyming chroniclers , the two halves of the alliterative lines being often linked by rhyme as well as by alliteration . </P>
who wrote brut and what is the poem about
English priest Layamon narrates the history of Britain