History of the English language: from its origins to the present day. Origin of the English language
Some linguists boldly point to the Old English, Middle English and New English periods, but the language began to exist much earlier. So, today we will find out how, when and under what circumstances the English language appeared.
Let’s not bore readers for long and say that the history of the English language began in the distant 8th century BC. on the territory of modern Great Britain, when the migration of Celtic tribes from the continent to the territory of the British Isles began. The “settlers” were given the name “Britons”, which they inherited from the local tribes of the Picts - Pryden. Interestingly, one theory associated with the Celts about the origin of the name "Britain" is that the Celtic root "brith" means "painted", and past records indicate that Indo-European peoples painted their faces before going into battle. Despite such an ancient period of existence, the Celts had a developed culture. Time passed, and in the 1st century BC. Caesar came to Britain, declaring it part of the Roman Empire. It was in the 1st century BC. Ancient Roman authors have the earliest mention of a term related to the official name of the country Britain (Britannia, Brittania). This name comes from Latin and means "land of the Britons". The migration of the Romans and their communication with the Celts was reflected in the language: thanks to this, words of Latin origin are present in English today. This interaction of peoples continued until the 5th century AD, after which the Germanic tribes of the Saxons, Jutes, Angles and Frisians invaded the territory, bringing with them the local dialect. Thus began a new branch of the development of the English language, which was filled with Germanic words.
Then there was a period of Christianization, which was reflected in the language. Many “settled” words from Latin were mixed with Germanic dialects, as a result of which new vocabulary units appeared. During this period, the language became richer by 600 words.
With the onset of Viking attacks and the arrival of the Danes in the 9th century, Old Icelandic words began to appear in the language, which were mixed with local dialects. This is how words of the Scandinavian group appeared in English, having characteristic combinations “sc”, “sk”.
In connection with the accession of the Norman house in England in the 11th - 16th centuries. were marked by the appearance of French words in English, but Latin and Anglo-Saxon also dominated. It was at this time that the English we speak today was born. The mixing of languages has led to an increase in the number of words. A pronounced division of the language became noticeable between the low classes (words derived from Germanic) and the higher classes (from French).
The Middle Ages represent the flowering of literature. This was facilitated by the first printed book, published in English. Its translation was undertaken by William Caxton, who became a significant figure in the field of linguistics. To translate and publish the book, he needed to choose an adverb that would be understandable to most readers, which contributed to the development of English spelling. As literature began to develop, the foundations of the grammatical structure and changes in the morphological system began to appear: verb endings disappeared, the degree of comparison of adjectives and the first outlines of normative phonetics appeared. London pronunciation came into fashion.
How did English appear? Mass immigration of people from England to North America became the starting point in this direction. By that time, there were already French, Spanish, Italians, Germans and Danes in America. The Spaniards settled in the southern part of the continent, and the French in the northern, but the British were the majority, so it was English that began to spread in these territories, taking on the shape of American English.
And, of course, we cannot fail to mention the great William Shakespeare, thanks to whom the literary English language was formed and strengthened in many aspects. One of the few writers to have a vocabulary of 20,000 words, Shakespeare invented more than 1,700 words that we still use today.
Written by linguistics professor Claire Bowern. The video was animated by Patrick Smith. Below is a transcript of the lecture.
“When we talk about English, we often think of it as a distinct language, but what do the dialects spoken in many countries around the world have in common with each other or with the works of Chaucer? And how do they relate to the strange words from Beowulf?
The answer is: like most languages, English has evolved with generations of its speakers, undergoing significant changes over time. By eliminating these changes, we can trace the development of language from our days to its most ancient roots.
Although many words in modern English are similar to Latin-derived Romance languages such as French and Spanish, many of them were not originally part of it. On the contrary, they began to come into the language during the Norman Conquest of England in 1066.
When the French-speaking Normans conquered England and became ruling class, they brought with them their speech and added a huge number of French and Latin words to the English language that was formerly spoken in these lands. Now we call this language Old English. This is the language of Beowulf. It may look unusual, but it may seem familiar to those who speak German. This is because Old English is one of the Germanic languages first brought to the British Isles in the 5th and 6th centuries by the Angles, Saxons and Jutes. The Germanic dialects they used would become known as Anglo-Saxon. Viking invaders from the 8th to 11th centuries added borrowings from the Old Norse language.
It can be difficult to see the roots of modern English under all the words borrowed from French, Old Norse, Latin and other languages. But comparative linguistics helps us by focusing on grammatical structure, patterns of phonetic change, and certain basic vocabulary.
For example, after the 6th century, German words beginning with "p" gradually changed to "pf", while their Old English equivalents retained "p".
In another similar case, Swedish words starting with "sk" became "sh" in English. English still has words with "sk", such as "skirt" and "skull", but these are direct borrowings from Old Norse, which appeared after the transition from "sk" to "sh".
These examples show that just as various Romance languages evolved from Latin, English, Swedish, German and many other languages evolved from their common ancestor known as Proto-Germanic, which was spoken around 500 BC. Since this historical language was never written, we can only reconstruct it by comparing its descendants, which is possible due to a sequence of changes.
Using this process, we can go even further and trace the origins of Proto-Germanic to a Proto-Indo-European language spoken about 6,000 years ago on the Pontic steppes in what is now Ukraine and Russia.
It is the restored progenitor of the Indo-European family, comprising virtually all the languages historically spoken in Europe and much of South and West Asia. Although it requires a little more work, we can find the same systematic similarities or correspondences between related words in different Indo-European branches.
Comparing English with Latin, we see that the English “t” corresponds to the Latin “d”, and “f” to the Latin “p” at the beginning of words. Some distant relatives: Hindi, Persian and Celtic languages, English supplanted into the language now called British.
Proto-Indo-European itself comes from even more ancient language, but, unfortunately, that one is beyond the limits of our historical and archaeological evidence.
Many mysteries remain out of reach, such as the possible connection between Indo-European and other major language families, and the nature of the languages spoken in pre-European Europe.
But it remains an amazing fact that about 3 billion people around the world, many of whom do not understand each other, speak the same words, shaped by 6,000 years of history."
The history of the English language is inextricably linked with the history of England. It began in the 5th century, when Britain, at that time inhabited by Celts and partly by Romans, was invaded by three Germanic tribes. The German influence turned out to be so strong that soon almost nothing remained of the Celtic and Latin languages in almost the entire country. Only in remote and inaccessible areas of Britain that remained unoccupied by the Germans (Cornwall, Wells, Ireland, Highland Scotland) were the local Welsh and Gaulish languages preserved. These languages survive today: they are called Celtic languages, as opposed to Germanic
who speaks English.
Then the Vikings came to Britain from Scandinavia with their Old Icelandic language. Then in 1066 England was captured by the French. Because of this, French was the language of the English aristocracy for two centuries, and Old English was used by the common people. This historical fact had a very significant impact on the English language: many new words appeared in it, the vocabulary almost doubled. Therefore, it is in the vocabulary that the split into two variants of English - high and low, respectively of French and German origin - can be quite clearly felt today.
Thanks to the doubling of the vocabulary, the English language today still has many words with the same meaning - synonyms that arose as a result of the simultaneous use of two different languages, who came from Saxon peasants and from Norman masters. A clear example of this social division is the difference in the name of livestock, which comes from Germanic roots:
- cow - cow
- calf - calf
- sheep - sheep
- swine - pig
Despite all external influences, the core of the language remained Anglo-Saxon. Already in the 14th century, English became literary language, as well as the language of law and school. And when mass emigration from Britain to America began, the language brought there by the settlers continued to change in new directions, often maintaining its roots in British English, and sometimes changing quite significantly.
The beginning of the globalization of English
By the beginning of the 20th century
Nowadays, English is increasingly becoming the language of international communication. English language, along with other languages of international communication, was used in international conferences, in the League of Nations, for negotiations. Even then, the need to improve its teaching and develop objective criteria that would allow learning the language more effectively became obvious. This need stimulated the search and research of linguists from different countries, which has not dried up to this day.
It is clear that one of the most important components of studying any foreign language is accumulation vocabulary. Only after acquiring some vocabulary can you begin to study the relationships between words - grammar, stylistics, etc. But what words should you learn first? And how many words should you know? There are a lot of words in the English language. According to linguists, the complete vocabulary of the English language contains at least one million words.
Early English grammars (the first of which was written in 1586) were written either to help foreigners become proficient in English or to prepare English-speaking students to learn Latin. In general, these books were not intended to teach native English speakers. It was not until about 1750 that attempts were made to teach the language to the English.
It's a shame this didn't happen a few generations later. Eighteenth-century linguists based their study of the English language on incorrect theories. For example, they believed that grammatical rules are the same for all languages, and, claiming that Latin is the ideal, they often tried to remake English expressions in the Latin manner. Moreover, they believed that the death of endings in words was a sign of degradation, not progress. They could not bring back the endings that had already disappeared, but they successfully preserved all the others. If not for their influence, there would be much fewer irregular verbs in modern English. Their theories were consolidated and brought to ordinary people thanks to a wave of widespread education in England. A huge number of irregular verbs and carefully preserved endings have not given the opportunity to the English language to completely transform from a synthetic language to an analytical one.
With the spread of literacy, the English language slowed its change, but it continues to change to this day. The ease of use of the rules, as well as the richness of the vocabulary, which continues to expand, has allowed English to become an international language of communication over the past half century.
Latin is considered the founder of all languages. Therefore, it is not surprising that many modern words so similar to Latin ones. And many languages are similar to each other, since they originated from the same base. Eg:
1. German occurred as a result of a mixture of Latin and the language of the Gothic tribes;
2. The French language appeared as a result of a mixture of Latin and the language of the Gaul tribe;
3. The English language appeared as a result of mixing Latin and the language of the Celtic peoples.
Don't forget about Italian, Portuguese and spanish languages. They all come from Latin, and therefore are incredibly similar to each other. When communicating, Italians, Spaniards and Portuguese can speak their native languages and will understand each other.
A little history
The emergence of the English language dates back to the 8th century BC. At that time, modern Britain was inhabited by Celtic people. Even the name of the country itself comes from their language, because in Celtic “brith” was translated as “colored”. In addition, several other words came from the Celtic language that are still used today. After 7 centuries, Caesar declared the territory of Britain part of the great Roman Empire and began to populate these lands with the Romans. Willy-nilly, the Celts had to communicate closely with the Romans, so Latin was added to the Celtic language, which greatly influenced it in the future. Many modern words were borrowed from the Latin language. Both peoples communicated with each other until the 5th century AD, creating new words for the future English language. In the 5th century, Germanic tribes invaded Britain, so a completely new stage began in the development of the English language.
Formation and development of the English language. Three periods of formation.
The emergence of the English language took quite a long time. Its formation was created by mixing several languages and dialects and went through three stages:
1. Old English period. This stage lasted from 449 to 1066. At this time, the invasion of Germanic tribes led to the fact that the number of Celts was exaggerated by the invading tribes. Over time, the dialect of the Anglo-Saxons began to displace the dialect of the Celts, transforming already established words into their own language. Many areas of Britain, which are located in inaccessible places, were not subject to the Germanic tribes, so the Celtic language was perfectly preserved there. These areas are considered to be Ireland, Cornwall, Wells and Scotland. If you want to feel the atmosphere of the development of the English language, then you should visit this country. Thanks to the invading tribes, many words with common Germanic-Latin roots remained in the language.
In 597, Rome began to Christianize all the countries under its control, including Britain. This had a great impact on the language, since many lexemes (Latin words assimilated by Germanic dialects) appeared. In those days, the English language was replenished with about 600 new words that had both Germanic and Latin roots.
In the 9th century, the Danes began to seize the lands of the Saxons. As a result, the English language was replenished with the dialect of the Scandinavian Vikings.
2. Middle English period. It lasted from 1066 to 1500 AD. In the 11th century, England was invaded by the French. This led to the so-called era of “three languages” beginning in the development and formation of the language:
1) French, which was used for communication between aristocrats and the judicial system;
2) Anglo-Saxon, which was spoken by ordinary people;
3) Latin, which was used by doctors.
The beginning of this era led to the final formation of the English language exactly as we know and teach it today. Due to the fact that several languages participated in its formation, its vocabulary has almost doubled. There is no doubt that traces of the past division remain in the language. For example, you can notice that animals are translated into English as “cow”, “calf”, “sheep” - these are words from the dialect of the “common people”. The name of the meat of these animals has already come to us from the aristocracy, so it sounds differently - “beef”, “veal”, “mutton”.
At the beginning of the 14th century, the language acquired literary features, and therefore became the main language of education of people and the formation of law. Also, at this time the first English book appeared. At this time, the English language acquired the first rules in grammar and phonetics, adjectives acquired degrees of comparison, and the endings of verbs disappeared.
Later, when the mass migration of the British to America began, the language underwent a change towards the British and American dialect.
3. New England period. It dates back to 1500 and continues to the present day. Many consider W. Shakespeare to be its founder. Thanks to him, the English language was “cleansed” of impurities and acquired its own form and vocabulary.
It is believed that the English language appeared by mixing different languages, and even in our time it does not stand still, constantly developing and modernizing. English is the official language in many countries. These include India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Jamaica, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Rwanda, Ghana, etc. As you understand, in all these countries people communicate in their “own English”. There are many phrases from other languages, the accent changes, and sometimes even the rules of grammar. England and America still have a huge influence on the formation and development of the language. Of course, it is Britain that is the example of pure English, but “American English” is still considered international. The USA has greatly influenced modern world, and if we teach English in schools and universities, then it is the American dialect. Of course, England and America strongly influence each other. They exchange their vocabulary, as a result of which the language is constantly updated with new expressions and names. Bottom line: English became the main means of communication during the formation of the world, so it is generally accepted that it international language. It can be used to communicate with people from different countries and continents. Therefore, without him modern society there's no way around it.
The article was prepared by the website of the company I-Polyglot -
The history of the English language, like its appearance, is eventful. The territory of modern Great Britain was inhabited by different peoples, it was captured and liberated more than once, and each invader wanted to “invent” for Great Britain new language. This was also reflected in the diversity of the English language. Each period of English history has contributed to the origins and overall formation of the English language as we know it. We have prepared for you a short tour of what each period of its formation left in the English language.
Celtic period
Emergence and The history of the English language began in the 8th century BC., when the Celts settled in the territory of modern Britain. The emergence of English is directly related to them. They communicated in the Celtic language from which the word brith came, which meant “colored”. The appearance of this word is due to the fact that the Celts painted their bodies blue to intimidate the enemy. The first seizure of British territory by the Romans is associated with the same period.
The Celtic languages of later times gave modern English such well-known words as:
whiskey- whiskey (from Irish uisce beathadh “living water”)Many borrowings from Latin have also been preserved in modern English, remaining after the Roman conquest 44 years ago. So, for example, the names are English settlements such as Lancaster, Leicester and Manchester were able to form, based on the Latin word castra - “camp”.
slogan- slogan (from Scottish sluagh-ghairm “battle cry”)
plaid- plaid
street- street (from Latin via strata “paved road”)
wall- wall (from Latin vallum “shaft”)
Old English period
The Old English period is associated with the time of the Germanic conquests, when the Anglo-Saxons (Germanic tribes) - the ancestors of modern Englishmen - penetrated into Britain. The Anglo-Saxon dialect quickly replaced the Celtic language from widespread use and prevented the emergence of something new. The Germans themselves brought many Latin words that they managed to borrow from the Romans. Among these words in our short dictionary there are those that are still used today:
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wine- wine (from Latin vinum “wine”)
pear- pear (from Latin pirum “pear”)
pepper- pepper (from Latin piper "pepper")
butter — butter(from Latin butyrum “cow butter”)
cheese- cheese (from Latin caseus “cheese”)
mile- mile (from Latin milia passuum “thousand steps”)
Saturday- Saturday (from Latin Saturni dies “day of Saturn”)
The Christianization of Britain and the appearance in the language of many more borrowings from Latin are also associated with the Old English period, including:
school- school (from Latin schola “school”)
master- teacher (from Latin magister “teacher”)
pea- peas; pea (from Latin pisum “pea”)
priest- priest" (from Latin presbyter "presbyter")
In 876 AD. The Battle of Wedmore took place, as a result of which a peace treaty was concluded with the Danes, who had long ravaged British lands. This world also affected the English language, which allowed the formation of many Danish words.
auk- auk
aye- yes/always
axle- axis
sky- sky
skull- scull
skin- leather
Middle English period
The Middle English period is known for the conquest of Britain by the Normans. The Normans (French-speaking Vikings) defeated the Anglo-Saxons and seized power in Britain. Connected with this is the emergence of trilingual English everyday life of that time: the language of the courts, administration, royal court and aristocracy was French, the language of the common people continued to be Anglo-Saxon, and the language of education was Latin. This is what allowed the so-called “New English” language to emerge. Influence French very noticeable in modern English:
pork- pork (from the French porc "pig")
tennis— tennis (from the French tenez “hold”)
New England period
Printing appeared in the New England period. In 1474 (1475), the pioneer printer William Caxton printed the first book in English. He translated this book himself from French. When translating, he relied on the spelling of the manuscript tradition, which allowed the formation of the first canon - this led to a slowdown in spelling changes in the English language, because a written example of “how it should be” appeared.
The work of William Shakespeare left a huge mark on the history of the English language.(well, who else?), who was able not only to “invent” modern English, but also to introduce many new words - where he got them from is not always clear. Many words found in Shakespeare's works can also be found in modern English.
swagger— swaggering around → swag- be “in style”
At the end of the 18th century, the Englishman William Jones spoke about the need to study the ancient Indian language more deeply in order to more competently build a science of language. In modern English there are many words related to words in the ancient Indian language.
path- path, path (from pathin “road”)
bandana- bandana (from bandhana “bandage”)
Modern English
Modern English is called mixed - many words that have a common meaning do not have a common root. This is a consequence of the trilingualism characteristic of the Middle English period.
The English language is constantly evolving, expanding and acquiring dialects; each new concept gives people the opportunity to come up with many new words around it. Some words, on the contrary, are consigned to history as unnecessary.
