The English Language A Short History

English is a Germanic Language of the Indo-European Family. It is the second most spoken language in the world.

It is estimated that there are 300 million native speakers and 300 million who use English as a second language and a further 100 million use it as a foreign language. It is the language of science, aviation, computing, diplomacy, and tourism. It is listed as the official or co-official language of 45 countries:

This spectacular domination is without parallel in history. Although French, Spanish and Arabic speakers may disagree, English is well on its way to becoming the unofficial international language of the world. Mandarin (Chinese) may be spoken by more people, but English is by far the most widespread of the world's languages.

The history of the language can be traced back to the arrival of three Germanic tribes to the British Isles during the 5th Century AD. Angles, Saxons and Jutes crossed the North Sea from what is the present day Denmark and northern Germany. The inhabitants of Britain previously spoke a Celtic language which was quickly displaced. Most of the Celtic speakers were pushed into Wales and Scotland. One group migrated to the Brittany Coast of France where their descendants still speak a Celtic Language (Breton) today. The Angles were named from Engle, their land of origin. Their language was called Englisc which gave us the word, English.

During the next few centuries four dialects of English developed:

• Northumbrian in Northumbria, north of the Humber
• Mercian in the Kingdom of Mercia
• West Saxon in the Kingdom of Wessex
• Kentish in Kent

At this time the vocabulary of Old English consisted of an Anglo Saxon base with borrowed words from the Scandinavian languages and Latin. Latin gave English words like street, kitchen, kettle, cup, cheese, wine, angel, bishop, martyr, candle. The Vikings added many Norse words: sky, egg, cake, skin, leg, window (wind eye), husband, fellow, skill, anger, flat, odd, ugly, get, give, take, raise, call, die, they, their, them. Celtic words also survived mainly in place and river names (Devon, Dover, Kent, Trent, Severn, Avon, Thames).

Many pairs of English and Norse words coexisted giving us two words with the same or slightly differing meanings. Examples below.

In 1066 the Normans conquered Britain. French became the language of the Norman aristocracy and added more vocabulary to English. More pairs of similar words arose.

Because the English underclass cooked for the Norman upper class, the words for most domestic animals are English (ox, cow, calf, sheep, swine, deer) while the words for the meats derived from them are French (beef, veal, mutton, pork, bacon, venison).

It wasn't till the 14th Century that English became dominant in Britain again. In 1399, King Henry IV ascended the throne. He was the first king of England since the Norman Conquest whose mother tongue was English. By the end of the 14th Century, the dialect of London had emerged as the standard dialect of what we now call Middle English. Chaucer wrote in this language. Modern English began around the 17th Century and, like all languages, is still changing.

The historical influence of language in the British Isles can best be seen in place names and their derivations.

Examples of place names can be found on the London page.

Since the 16th Century, because of the contact that the British had with many peoples from around the world, and the Renaissance of Classical learning, many words have entered the language either directly or indirectly. As the language of learning, the vocabulary of English is the largest in the world. The list of borrowed words is enormous.

Even with all these borrowings the heart of the language remains the Anglo-Saxon of Old English. Only about 5000 or so words from this period have remained unchanged but they include the basic building blocks of the language: household words, parts of the body, most pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions and auxiliary verbs. Grafted onto this basic stock was a wealth of contributions to produce, what many people believe, is the richest of the world's languages.

© 1997 Kryss Katsiavriades

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