HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Period Inhabitants

Prehistory5000 -2000BC

The Iberians ORIGIN: South Europe SETTLEMENT: e.g. Stonehenge FEATURES: not very tall and dark haired ACTIVITIES: hunting, waving…then farmers and shepherds

700 BC300BC

Scottish Gaelic, Irish Gaelic,Welsh,Cornish

The Celts: 1st wave of Celtic tribes The Gaels

The Celts: 2nd wave of Celtic tribes The Brythons ORIGIN: North and East Europe SETTLEMENT: The Gaels settled in the North The Brythons in the South-west FEATURES: tall and fair haired ACTIVITIES: hunting, waving…production and use of metal and weapons. RELIGION: DRUIDS -> Runes… WORSHIP OF NATURE/ belief in magic

Period Inhabitants

55BC(I-V AD)

Latin

The Romans (Julius Caesar 55BC; Emperor Claudius 43 A.D.) 121 AD Hadrian’s wall

ORIGIN: Italy SETTLEMENT: South and central England FEATURES: not very tall and dark haired ACTIVITIES:organization of streets towns, trade Latin language and culture

449 AD

OLD English a Germanic language

(Bede, 700)

ORIGIN

SETTLEMENT

ACTIVITIES

The Angles The Saxons The Jutes

Denmark

Mercia, East Anglia,Nothumbria

Farmers

North West Germany

Essex, Sussex,

Farmers

Jutland

Kent, Wessex

Farmers

V- VI cent. A.D.

• Penetration of various uncoordinated bands of adventurers in different parts of the country

• Britain => “A/Engla Land”

7 kingdoms ( Heptarchy) and dialect differentiation (Germanic origin languages)

• TRIBE/CLAN system (Thane): fishing, hunting, agriculture, art -beauty

gambling, fighting, drinking (mead) + courage, loyalty, generosity

Old English dialects

The Seven Kingdoms

• Political union comes slowly

• Shift southwards of the centres of power and civilization:

7th 8th 9thCENTURY

Northumbria Mercia Wessex

.King Alfred saved the southwest of England from the invasion of the DANES

10th

Unification of England under the west saxon kings till 1066

• The unification of England under the west saxon kings leads to the recognition of the WEST SAXON dialect as a literary standard language

Viking Raids (750-1050)

Viking raids:

Invasion and

settlement

9th century

Old Norse

Vikings were:

Swedes, Norwegians and Danes

Danish Invasion:

The second

wave after

980 AD

The Normans1066 : Battle of Hastings

William the Conqueror from Northern France

=> Norman French

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

• OLD ENGLISH

• MIDDLE ENGLISH

• MODERN ENGLISH

Language

• Old English surviving texts are in 4 dialects:

West Saxon, Kentish, Mercian, Northumbrian

• Writing began after conversion (600-700AD) and Clerics used a Celtic version of the Latin alphabet called the FUTHORC.

E.g. they used the letter “þ” for the phoneme /δ/

• Earlier manuscripts were destroyed during the Viking conquest (9th, 10th)

• Most records are in West Saxon, which was the literary standard language

Old English dialects

Ex. Of OE PRONUNCIATION and PHONOLOGY

• 7 vowels: a, e, i, o, u, y, æ (“ash”)

• Consonants: no letter <V> only <F>; sound /f/ before voiced sounds ex: wulf/ wulfas, hlaf/hlafas

no letter <Z> only <S>; sound /f/ before voiced sounds ex: nosu/hus

<đ>, <Þ> for sounds /θ, δ/; sound /δ/before voiced sounds ex: baÞian/ Þes….

• Palatization of velar consonants /k, g/ near /i, æ/ vowels and /J/ half-vowel: E.g.

germ./k/ ags./ts/ ex. Kirike kirche

germ./g/ ags./dξ/ ex. Bryggjabrycg

Ex. Of OE MORPHOLOGY

• 4 cases declension: Nominative, genitive, accusative, dative

Ex. –um for dat. Plu

-e for dat. Sing.

• verbal system with present and past: Imperative

Indicative

Subjunctive

• Present perfect: verb HABBAN for transitive verbs

verb BEON/WESAN for intransitive verbs

Ex. Of OE SYNTAX

• Freedom of sentence order but often used:SOV in subordinate clauses; VSO in questions

• Negation: particle NE before the verb

• No auxiliary Do/Does

Scandinavian influences on OE

• Scandinavian influx left its mark on place names ending in:

-by; -thorp

• No palatization:

Ex. Old Norse form Old English form

Lancaster /k/

egges /g/

Winchester /ts/

æyren /ej/ (See: Chaucher)

N.B. Most Scandinavian influences in lexis (loans), morphology, syntax first appeared in writing in the ME period because there was no literary tradition in the Danelaw area