English civil war use of English

This article discusses some of the problems that arise with the use of English when writing the dialogue for a short story or novel that is set in the English civil war period of the 1640s, or is set in the British-America colonial period of history, which also encompasses the 1640s.

In the interests of historical accuracy, because this is the way that people spoke during this period, the writer might feel compelled to write words such as ‘do’ as ‘doth’, ‘have’ as ‘hath’, ‘you’ as ‘thee’, etc.
However, this might be irritating to the modern reader, who will have to constantly ‘translate’ these words from 1640s English into modern English.
It might also be pretty tedious for the writer, who will have to constantly translate them from modern English into 1640s English.
Here’s an example, probably a pretty extreme example, of what I believe to be 1640s English, ie. of my interpretation of 1640s English. It has to be an interpretation rather than a strictly accurate interpretation because there are no oral records of 1640s English, no-one can be exactly sure how people spoke during this period.
It’s probably pretty extreme because it’s so intense, I’ve used 1640s English – or rather my interpretation of it, wherever possible. However, this is just a draft version of this piece of dialogue, and obviously I can if necessary edit some or all of the words into modern English.
It’s an extract from a story about the English civil war of 1641-1651 that I’m currently writing, and it’s a conversation between two Royalist intelligence agency officers, who are discussing what to do about an officer in the Parliamentary army who is proving to be a thorn in the side of the Royalist cause.
I’m assuming that both the Royalist army and the Parliamentary army had intelligence agencies, although they did not describe them like this, of course.

Possible use of English between intelligence agency operatives during the English civil war

Senior intelligence officer: “Seeketh this captain Munden, and when thou hast found him…”
Intelligence officer: “My Lord?”
Senior intelligence officer: “Weaveth a friendship with him, feign allegiance to the Parliamentary cause.”
Intelligence officer: “Kill him not?”
Senior intelligence officer: “Kill him not. There will be enough of Englishmen killing Englishmen, of grieving English widows, of fatherless English children, before this madness – this mad war twixt King and Parliament, passeth over.”
This article probably takes a pretty negative view of English usage in an historical context, it probably takes the view that it isn’t a good idea to inflict 1640s use of English on modern readers.
However, it’s possible to take a positive view of this, and I hope to look at this in a future article.