The Development of the Early English Language

The History of Old English and Its Change into Middle English

Jul 21, 2009

Learning how Old English became Middle English sets the foundation for understanding many of the words and phrases in the English language used today.

The story of the English language reads like an epic saga. It is a tale of kings and conquerors, invasion and assimilation, religious faith and class struggles. Spanning a history of over 1500 years, English has influenced almost the entire world in one way or another, an influence that continues to this day.

The Origins of English

The tale began when Germanic tribes first settled Britain in the 5th century. Each tribe had its own dialect of Old German, the language from which English descended. Arriving from the area that is now the Netherlands, Denmark, and Germany, these peoples crossed the North Sea, where each tribe invaded and settled a different part of Britain. The language they brought with them would develop into Old English and replace the native Celtic dialects spoken by Britain's previous inhabitants.

By the 6th century, English had become the common tongue in Southern England, but not in Wales or Scotland, which still retained their Celtic languages. As Old English continued to develop, four different dialects appeared:

Northumbrian and Mercia were the prominent dialects before Viking invasions destroyed those kingdoms in 9th century. After this, West Saxon became the standard since only Wessex remained as an independent kingdom.

English Borrowed from Other Languages

As all languages do, Old English changed over the years, adapting words and roots to changing situations and borrowing from other languages, most commonly Latin, Celtic and Scandinavian.

Latin borrowings tended to be technical words or words about religion. The Latin "winum" became "win" in Old English, which later became our modern word "wine", while Latin "pondo" became "pund", our modern "pound." Other words derived from Latin include the words: street, cup, cheese, bishop, martyr, and candle.

Scandinavian words in English primarily entered English when Norwegian kings ruled York, during the Viking invasions of the 9th century. Skirt, them, cake, skill, give, and die are a few that still exist today. Old English and Scandinavian often offered dual forms of the same word, which became modern synonyms. The English "sick" and Norse "ill", English "wrath" and Norse "anger", and English "rear" and Norse "raise" are all examples of this.

There are fewer Celtic borrowings, since the Celts were a conquered people in most of Britain. The Celtic words we do retain are mostly words dealing with place names. Thames, Devon, Dover, Kent, and Avon are all of Celtic origin.

The Norman Invasion's Effect on English

Everything changed in 1066, the year of the Norman invasion of Britain. When Edward the confessor died without an heir, William, the Duke of Normandy, and Harold, the Earl of West Saxon, both claimed the English throne. The English distrusted William as a foreigner, and supported Harold, but in the end William won, becoming forever after known as William the Conqueror.

When William took the throne, he and his nobles from Normandy all spoke French, so that became the official language of the law and of the court, while English was relegated to the peasants and became the language of the working class.

Because of this dichotomy, dual versions of words formed from each class, some of which we still use today. The English speaking farmers and servants called the animal they tended "pigs" and "cows" while the aristocrats called the food brought to their table "pork" and "beef" from the French "porc" and "boeuf". Other examples of these dual versions are English-derived "answer" and French "reply", English "yearly" and French "annual", and English "smell" and French "odor".

French remained the official language of England from 1066 until the 14th century and English was officially sanctioned only for religious instruction of the peasants. Between 1250 and 1350, English literature as entertainment became legitimate once again, with Chaucer being one of the first authors in the language. By 1362, English had become the official language of legal proceedings in Britain, and between 1350 and 1380 it became the language used in schools. In 1399 King Henry IV became first English-speaking king since the Norman conquest. His language, the dialect of English spoken in London, became known as standard Middle English, which is recognizable as the predecessor to the Modern English language used today.

Charles Barber, The English Language: A Historical Introduction. Cambridge University Press, 2000.

The copyright of the article The Development of the Early English Language in UK/Irish History is owned by Bridget Coila. Permission to republish The Development of the Early English Language in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.