Brief History of English Language

The English language is a West Germanic language, which first developed during the 5th century A.D. when three Germanic tribes settled onto Great Britain, these tribes being the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes. With them, they brought a series of Anglo-Frisian dialects, which developed into the earliest form of English known as “Old English.” Even though “Old English” has no resemblance to English today, nearly half of the common words we use today derive from “Old English.” Examples include “Strong,” “Beam,” and “Water.

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“Middle English” is often believed to have begun after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 A.D., but it was actually developed between 1100-1450 A.D. Early Middle English had a largely Anglo-Saxon vocabulary but with a simplified inflectional system. Some of the complications of “Old English” have been replaced during this time and some of these included the introduction of prepositions. However, this replacement is incomplete as we still have some “Old English” genitive in many words.

“Early Modern English” was used from the beginning of the Tudor period in the 15th century until English Interregnum and Restoration. Most readers of Modern English are generally able to understand works written in the late phase of “Early Modern English” with the works of William Shakespeare being a prime example, while works written during the earlier stages, ex. Le Morte d’Arthur, may prove to be a greater challenge The modern day English language is written in a Latin alphabet, which consists of 26 letters. Although it was first written in the Anglo-Saxon futhorc runic alphabet.

The Anglo-Saxon settlers brought this over to England during the 5th century A.D. After the 6th century, Christian monks began translating this alphabet into Latin characters. However, this alphabet contained a few sounds that Roman letters could not accommodate. So the monks borrowed three letters from the runic alphabet: eth, wynn, and thorn. Which resulted in these 24 letters.

In 1011 A.D., a monk by the name of Byrhtferth recorded the order of the old English alphabet for numerological purposes. He listed the 24 Latin characters first (which included the ampersand symbol) and then added five additonal letters which resulted in these 29 letters total.

Over time, the characters thorn, eth, wynn, yogh, ash, and ethel were rendered obsolete. The letter wynn was removed from the alphabet during the 14th century and was replaced with “uu” which then evolved into the modern day letter “w.” The letters “” and “u” were introduced during the 16’h century and “w” gained the status of an independent letter so now, our alphabet as we know now consists of these 26 letters.

As of this year, the English language is an official language of 67 sovereign and 27 non sovereign countries. Examples include Barbados, Bermuda, Canada, Ghana, Ireland, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, South Africa, the U.S. Virgin Islands and of course, the United Kingdom. The English language has many dialects throughout the countries it is spoken, but because I am researching the United Kingdom, I will be primarily focusing on the dialects that are spoken in the different regions of the United Kingdom. These include Cheshire, Mancunian, Scouse, Brummie, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cockney, Sussex, Highland English, Welsh English, and Ulster English.