History of the English Language

1. History of the English Language A Brief Overview

2. Periods of English • Old English • Circa 410 – 1100 A.D. • Middle English • 1100A.D. – 1500 A.D. • Early Modern English • 15oo A.D. – 1650 A.D. • Modern English • 1650 A.D. - present

3. English Pre-History The Celts and The Romans

4. The Celts (? – 55 A.D.) • Largest tribe = Brythons, hence Britain. • Religion = Animism (pagan): saw spirit in all things; priests were called Druids. • Very little of their Celtic language influenced the development of English, though place names remained visible: -ton (farmstead, hamlet); -ham (homestead, meadow); -ley(wood); -worth (enclosure); -feld(open country); -ing(people of).

5. The Romans (55 A.D. – 410 B.C.) • Julius Caesar's invasion/occupation begins 55 A.D. • Roman occupation brings peace and infrastructure to clannish island • Celts in Ireland, Wales, and Scotland maintain resistance. • Latin language becomes standard during period. • Christianity is introduced, though will take centuries of fits and starts to dominate.

6. Old English 410 A.D – 1100 A.D.

7. The Anglo-Saxon Invasions (449 – 710)

8. Anglo Saxon period • Romano-Celts resisted Anglo Saxon invaders (One king, Artur, won a key battle at Mont Badon in 450 and entered into legend). Celts = OE wealh, or foreigners. • Saint Augustine converts King Aethelbert (Kent) to Christianity in 597, becomes first Archbishop of Canterbury. • Anglo Saxon England eventually forms into seven dominant kingdoms, the Heptarchy: Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia, Essex, Wessex, Sussex, Kent. • Anglo Saxons came to be called the Engles, or German tribes, becomes the English.

9. The Anglo Saxon Heptarchy:NorthumbriaMerciaEast AngliaEssexKentSussexWessex

10. The Viking Invasions (787 – 1000)

11. The Vikings • Vikings were sea-faring (explorers, traders, and warriors) Scandinavians, most active during the 8th through 11th centuries. • Oddly enough, the Anglo-Saxon (and Jute) heritage was not much different from the Vikings’: they, too, were Northern Germanic invaders. • However, when the Viking raids began around 787, the Anglo-Saxons were different culturally from the Viking invaders

12. Key Elements of the Viking Age • The Anglo Saxon “Heroic Code” develops at this time. • The Old English Language of this time features many dialects competing for dominance (Wessex dialect becomes “literary standard”). • Alfred the Great (ruled from approx. 871-899 A.D.) was one of the first Anglo-Saxon kings to push Vikings back; in fact, he was one of the first kings to begin consolidating power, unifying several of the separate Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and establishing the “Danelaw,” a truce with the Vikings. • By @ 950 Britain is unified under a single king, Edgar.

13. Old English Literature • Caedmon’s Hymn, from the 7th century, is the oldest surviving OE literary work. • Dream of the Rood, among earliest Christian poems in English, inscriptions found on Ruthwell Cross , 7th century. • Beowulf is, of course, best known example: composed orally in 8th century and set in manuscript @1000 A.D. • Majority of Old English ms are historical records, such as The Anglo Saxon Chronicle, which was updated from the 10th through the 12th centuries. • In all, there are only 400 mss comprising perhaps a total of 1000 pages of OE text in existence.

14. Old English Language Influence • Old English language looks more like German than English. • Remnants of Old English remain in the “glue” of Modern English language, our prepositions and pronouns. • Fundamental concept words hold deep OE influence: hus (house), wif (wife), cild (child), etan (eat), drincan (drink), and fater(father). • Compounding of nouns was introduced during OE period: woroldcyning (world-king), doegred (day-red, dawn), huswiffen (house-wife). • Of 1,000 most commonly used English words, 70% of OE origin.

15. Middle English 1100 A.D. – 1500 A.D.

16. Middle English • Middle English is not so much a singular language but rather a transition between Old English and Modern English • Norman Conquest of 1066 put French Kings on throne of England for 200 years; further, French becomes the language of London and the court until Henry V declares English the language of the court in 1415. • During the late 13th and in the 14th century, English was making a comeback. The mood towards France was becoming more and more hostile: it wasn’t seen as a mother country, but as a dangerous rival. Although French and Latin were still languages of prestige, English was becoming the language of communication, even among the nobility. • The Hundred Years’ War with France (mid-14th – mid-15th cent.) marked the definite decline of French and the rise of English as a chief language.

17. Middle English Literature • Geoffrey Chaucer - Chooses to compose the Canterbury Tales “in the vernacular,” ie. English. • John Wycliffe – translation of the New Testament into English. • William Langland – The Vision of Piers Ploughman, a long alliterative verse narrative of Christian virtue. • Sir Thomas Malory – ‘MorteD’Arthur’ (=Arthur’s Death), 8 tales of Arthur and his knights (mid-15th cent.). This work is important because 8 tales are structurally connected and reminiscent of a novel. • “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” is also from this time period.

18. Middle English Language Influence • The Middle English (ME) period saw the introduction of over 9,000 French words into the English language (But new pronunciations didn’t necessarily bring new spellings, witness ghoti, or “fish”). • Word order in sentences (s – v – o) standardized during this period. • This period of borrowing gave English its distinctive (and maddening) flexibility.

19. Early Modern English 1500 A.D. – 1650 A.D.

20. The Great Vowel Shift • Between the ages of Chaucer to the end of the age of Shakespeare, two significant changes occurred. First, inflected endings were dropped; second, the pronunciation of English long vowels changed, the “Great Vowel Shift.” To our ears, the people of the Early Modern English period would be mispronouncing words. • A rough guide to the shift: • A ah > ay Baht the hook / Bait the hook • E ay > ee Lunch mate / Lunch meat • I ee > eye Dogs beet / Dogs bite • O oo > oh Atlanta Boot Show / Atlanta Boat Show • U ou > you Toothpaste toub / Toothpaste tube

21. Early Modern English • More than any other invention, the Printing Press (invented in c.1440 by Johannes Gutenberg) substantively changed the English language. • William Caxton brought a printing press to London in 1476 and printed his first book, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. • The printing press simultaneously accelerated the growth of literacy and necessitated the standardization of spelling and grammar.

22. Modern English 1650 A.D. - present

23. Beastie Boys • It is your responsibility to engage in battle with any who would deny your privilege of merrymaking.

24. Chamillionaire • The masses observe the circumlocution of my conveyance, and myself astride. They express disdain.