stylistic:tone, linguistic:voice_change
Name

The instrument has been known by its modern English name at least since the fourteenth century. David Lasocki reports the earliest use of "recorder" in the household accounts of the Earl of Derby (later King Henry IV) in 1388, which register i. fistula nomine Recordour (one pipe called 'Recordour').

By the fifteenth century, the name had appeared in English literature. The earliest references are in John Lydgate's Temple of Glas (c. 1430): These lytylle herdegromys Floutyn al the longe day..In here smale recorderys, In floutys. ('These little shepherds fluting all day long... on these small recorders, on flutes.') and in Lydgate's Fall of Princes (c. 1431–1438): Pan, god off Kynde, with his pipes seuene, / Off recorderis fond first the melodies. ('Pan, god of Nature, with his pipes seven, / of recorders found first the melodies.')