Introduction to the History of the English Language

Posted on Apr 30, 2024 in Social sciences

Part 1: Key Aspects of the History of English

Introducing the History of English

Why Study the History of English?

Studying the history of the English language is crucial for understanding its current state. There is a strong link between society and language, with language serving as a central instrument of organization. This connection is reflected in language change, which hinges on the community of speakers. Without a community that agrees upon the norms of usage, there is no language.

Many current features of English require an etymological explanation. Here are some examples:

1) Island:

• The pronunciation of the first “i” as /aI/ instead of /I/ as suggested by its spelling can be traced back to a significant change that affected long vowels and diphthongs during the establishment of orthographical conventions in the 15th-17th centuries.
• The presence of “s” in the spelling but not in the pronunciation is due to an etymologically erroneous association with Old French in the 16th century. In Old English, the word was spelled without “s” and was a compound of īe3 (watery) and land.

2) Sound:

• The spelling of “sound” has influenced its pronunciation over time.

Synchrony and Diachrony

Synchronic study examines a specific state of a word without considering its history, while diachronic study investigates the different stages of a word’s development, taking into account its past.

Internal and External Factors

Both internal (structural changes) and external (social, historical, and cultural factors) influences affect language. For example, vowel changes due to surrounding vowels are internal changes, while the extension of the word “mouse” to refer to computer devices is an external cause. While internal influences were once considered more important, the distinction between internal and external factors is now blurred.

Contact situations, where bilingual speakers interact, also play a role in language change.

Variation and Change

Variation is an inherent property of language systems, even in the earliest stages of English. Differences between West Saxon and Northumbrian dialects demonstrate that variation has existed since the earliest recorded times. Dialects, which have not always been the focus of linguistic study, are distinct from languages. Examples of dialectal variation include the voicing or unvoicing of the plural “s” in words like “bath” and the past tense forms “dreamt” and “dreamed.”

Spoken and Written English

Studying spoken language from the past is challenging due to the lack of direct references. Our knowledge of spoken language before the advent of recording technology is more speculative than objective. We can only apply the comparative method and examine clues like rhyme schemes in poems to gain insights.

Cataloguing Change: Examples

Changes in language can be attributed to both internal and external causes.

Phonological Change:

• Unconditioned changes affect a particular sound or group of sounds regardless of the phonological environment.
• Assimilation (conditioned change) occurs when a sound becomes similar to an adjacent sound in voicing, manner of articulation, or place of articulation.

Morphological Simplification:

• Levelling/syncretism refers to the reduction of inflections, as seen in the loss of declensions in Present-Day English compared to the complex declensions of Old English.
• Analogy leads to simplification. For example, the plural form “books” was created analogically by conforming to the most common plural marker “s.” However, some cases like “foot” and “feet” have escaped this analogy.

Reanalysis (folk etymology) involves the incorrect reshaping of words. This process affected loanwords with a singular form in “s,” causing the “s” to disappear and be replaced with the regular plural “s” (e.g., pea, sherry, cherry).

Grammaticalization is a historical process that affects the morphology and syntax of languages. It is an internal process driven by analogical and metonymic forces. Words like “will” have transitioned from being lexical items to purely grammatical elements (auxiliary verbs) through a process called bleaching.

Convergent structural features occur when languages in a particular region develop similar characteristics. This phenomenon is known as a linguistic area or Sprachbund. For example, finite verbs often occupy the second position in sentences in many European languages, and there has been a shift from SOV (subject-object-verb) to SVO (subject-verb-object) word order.

Part 2: Periods in the History of English

The history of English is typically divided into three main periods: Old, Middle, and Modern English.

Old English (450/700 – 1150)

• Primitive Old English (pOE) (450-700): Characterized by complex declensions.
• Early Old English (eOE) (700-900):
• Late Old English (lOE) (900-1150):

Middle English (1150 – 1500)

• Early Middle English (eME) (1150-1300): Marked by the loss of inflections, French and Scandinavian influence (due to the Norman Conquest), and the rise of French as the language of the ruling class.
• Late Middle English (lME) (1300-1500):

Modern English (1500 >>)

• Early Modern English (eModE) (1500-1700): Influenced by the printing press, commercial routes to Africa and Asia, and the rise of the Tudors to power.
• Late Modern English (lModE) (1700-1900):
• Present-Day English (PDE) (1900-present):

Explanation of Periodization

The division of English history into these periods is based on significant linguistic and historical events:

• Old English: Known for its complex inflections and declensions.
• Middle English: Associated with the Norman Conquest and the subsequent influence of French.
• Early Middle English: Characterized by the loss of inflections.
• Late Middle English to Early Modern English: The Great Vowel Shift, a major change in the pronunciation of long vowels and diphthongs, occurred during this period.
• Modern English: Coincides with major developments in European history, such as the rise of the Tudors, the printing press, and commercial expansion.

Unit 3: Pre-Old English: From Indo-European to Old English

General Linguistic Features of the Indo-European Family

The division of English history into three periods can create the false impression that English emerged out of nowhere. However, a large number of European and some Asian languages share a common ancestry within the Indo-European family. This family tree includes branches such as Hellenic, Indo-Iranian, Italic, Slavic, Albanian, Anatolian, Armenian, Baltic, Celtic, and Germanic. These languages diverged from a common ancestor, Proto-Indo-European (PIE), through isolation, migration, and loss of contact.

• Proto-Italic: The direct ancestor of Latin and other related languages, which later gave rise to the Romance languages (Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, etc.).
• Germanic: Proto-Germanic is the common ancestor of modern Germanic languages, including English, Dutch, German, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Swedish, Faroese, Afrikaans, and Yiddish.

The structural similarities among these languages are not accidental but rather evidence of their shared Indo-European origin.

Germanic Languages, Tribes, and Culture

A) Germanic Languages: Common Features

1. Distinctive vocabulary: Words like “rain,” “wife,” and “sea” are shared among Germanic languages.
2. Common changes in the Indo-European vocalic inventory: Germanic languages underwent specific vowel shifts.
3. Specific consonant shifts: Grimm’s Law and Verner’s Law describe these shifts, which differentiate Germanic languages from other Indo-European languages.
4. “Weak” and “strong” declensions of adjectives: Germanic languages have different forms of adjectives depending on whether they are preceded by a pronoun or pronominal adjective.
5. A two-tense verbal system: Germanic languages have a present tense and a preterite tense.
6. Strong and weak verbs: Germanic languages have two main classes of verbs with different conjugation patterns.
7. “Free” conceptual system: Stress typically falls on the first syllable of a word, unless the first syllable is a prefix.

B) Germanic Tribes

The Germanic tribes originally inhabited a vast region called Germania, spanning from the Lowlands in the West to the East, from the Scandinavian Peninsula to the North, and from the Rhine-Danube limes to the South. They were divided into three main groups: Northern, Eastern, and Hermiones.

Sociological Organization:

• Small groups of farmers: Germanic society was organized around the concept of the gens, a group of families with a common ancestor.
• Four social classes: Aristocracy, free men with political rights, half-free laeti, and slaves.
• The sippa: A group of men from the same lineage, serving as an ideological unit that protected its members and maintained their honor.
• The army: Composed of all men capable of bearing arms, with ties of loyalty forming a close-fighting and stable military band.
• The legislative system: Most Germanic tribes had a thing, an assembly where proposals were put to a vote. The thing also passed sentences for crimes and resolved disputes.
• Religion: Germanic tribes practiced an idolatrous and animistic religion, worshipping fertility gods and major deities like Wotan/Odin, Thor, and Tiwaz.

Glossary of Terms

The document concludes with a glossary of terms relevant to the history of the English language, including ablaut, Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, Bede, Bell, Beowulf, British, charter, clitic, Cursor Mundi, Danelaw, diacritics, diglossia, facsimile, Germanic tribes, Grimm’s Law, isogloss, language contact, language convergence, language shift, legitimisation, levelling, Mandeville’s Travels, Middle English, Modern English, New Englishes, Old English, open-syllable lengthening, Ormulum, phonotactics, Piers Plowman, Pure Saxon, rune, script, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Standard English, synchretism, The Bestiary, The Bruce, The Fox and the Wolf, The Lay of Havelok the Dane, The Owl and the Nightingale, The Pearl, variation, variety, Wealas, West Saxon, and York Mystery Plays.