History of English PDF (2020/2021)

History of English 1st year education (2020/2021) Chapter One THE BIRTH OF ENGLISH: CLUES IN PLACENAME S  A Surprisin g fact ENGLISH DOES NOT ORIGINATE IN BRITAIN!!! How did English become the English that we speak today? Celts are the original inhabitants and they spoke Celtic language not...

History of English 1st year education (2020/2021) Chapter One THE BIRTH OF ENGLISH: CLUES IN PLACENAME S  A Surprisin g fact ENGLISH DOES NOT ORIGINATE IN BRITAIN!!! How did English become the English that we speak today? Celts are the original inhabitants and they spoke Celtic language not English language  The history of placenames in Britain is closely connected to the dominance of various languages at The most important factor in the various points development of English has been the arrival in time. of successive waves of invaders and settlers speaking different languages. Where does English come from? Long before the Germanic tribes that became the English people arrived Britain was inhabited by various Celtic tribes, of which the Britons were one. The history of the Celtic tribes stretches back more than a couple of thousand years. However, the impact of the Celtic languages on English has been rather minimal. Celtic placenames in English The predominant legacy is in placenames. The placenames below all have some Celtic origin: Cities: Belfast, Cardiff, Dublin, Glasgow, London, York Rivers: Avon, Clyde, Dee, Don, Forth, Severn, Thames, Usk Regions: Argyll, Cumbria, Devon, Dyfed, Glamorgan, Kent, Lothian  Celtic placename elements We cannot be sure what these placenames might have originally meant. With Celtic placenames we can compare words in surviving Celtic languages, such as Welsh, or consider the geography of the places in question. Thus, we can be fairly certain about the meaning of the following Celtic placename elements: Pen (Welsh pen) = top, hill (e.g. Pendle) Etymology To study the history of words, whether placenames or any other type of word, is to study their ETYMOLOGY. Placenames in Britain reflect the invasions that took place there...how????? The first invaders of Britain were the Romans, who arrived in AD 43 and occupied much of Britain for roughly the next 400 years. The Romans spoke what language???? Latin and they often Latinised existing Celtic placenames, rather than inventing completely new names. Placenames in Britain reflect the invasions that took place there London is a Celtic placename, supposedly based on the personal name Londinos, meaning 'the bold one'. The Romans seem to have simply made this more like Latin by changing it to Londinium. Few placenames surviving today are straightforwardly based on single Latin words. One example is Catterick, which is derived from Latin cataracta There are a few important castra = a Latin placename elements camp, walled town (e.g. Lancaster) portus = port (e.g. Portsmouth) via strata = paved way, a 'street' in a town (e.g. Stratford)  The English language has its roots in the language of the second wave of invaders: the Germanic dialects of the tribes of northwestern Europe who invaded Britain in the 5th century, after the Romans had withdrawn. The year AD 449 saw the arrival of three tribes - Angle, Saxon and Jutish Collectively, these Germanic settlers are usually referred to as the Anglo-Saxons writers of these Anglo-Saxon tribes referred to their language as Englisc (derived from the name of the Angles) What happened to the native Celtic-speaking tribes of Britain? There was certainly no dramatic conquest by the Anglo-Saxons, but a rather slow movement from the east of Britain to the west, taking place over some 250 years. The Anglo-Saxons settlement there is evident through their integration with the local population. However, the Anglo-Saxons never got as far as the northern and western extremes of Britain. Are Celtic languages still living???? The Celtic languages notably such as ………….., ……………..&………….. Cornish, Welsh and Scottish, Gaelic which all proceeded relatively independently of English in what are today Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. Excepting Cornish, which died out in the 18th century, are living languages today.  Thousands of English placenames were coined by the Anglo-Saxons in this early period. Common placename elements include: burh = fort (e.g. Canterbury) dun = hill (e.g. Swindon) feld = open land (e.g. Macclesfield) ford = river crossing (e.g. Ox ford) tun = farm, village (later developing into 'town') (e.g. Eton) ing = place of (e.g. Clavering) ingas = followers of (e.g. Hastings, Heading) ham = settlement, homestead (e.g. Northam) hamm = enclosure, land in a river bend (e.g. Chippenham) Compounding Let's consider how placename elements combine to form placenames. Swindon, for example, is created by combining the words: swine (= pigs) + dun (= hill). This process of joining words to form other words is called COMPOUNDING Placenames tell us about the story of the place Note that by investigating placenames we can learn about the culture and economy of the time. E.g. Swindon is a hill where, presumably, pig farming used to take place. A dominant trend in Anglo-Saxon placenames is that they take on the name of the tribal leader. For example, the first elements of the placenames Macclesfield, Hastings and Chippenham come from the personal male names Maeccel, Haesta and Cippa. This trend highlights the fact that Anglo-Saxon society was patriarchal??? The power was concentrated in the hands of the leader, who, judging by placenames, was usually male. 3 wave of rd invaders (Scandinav ians Vikings)  In the 9th century, Britain saw the beginning of a third wave of invaders - the Scandinavian Vikings…where did they come from???? The arrived from Denmark, Norway and Sweden, They soon took over the east of England and were only stopped when King AElfred, the king of Wessex won a decisive victory over the Danish King Guthrum in 878. The following year a treaty was drawn up whereby the Danes retreated to the east of a line running roughly from Chester to London, an area which became known as Danelaw The significance of this boundary is that it had the effect of increasing dialectal differences between the north and The Danelaw Scandinavian influencing English placenames These differences between north and south are still apparent today. One can also see the effect this boundary had on placenames. Words derived from Scandinavian languages (Old Norse and Old Danish) frequently appear in northern and north- eastern placenames Common Scandinavian placename elements include: by = village (e.g. Kirkby or Kirby, Crosby) thorp = village (e.g. Milnthorpe) thwaite = glade, clearing (an open space in a forest) (e.g. Hawthornthwaite)  Aspects of Scandinavian society are sometimes reflected in placenames. The following placenames all contain words indicating a particular rank in Scandinavian society. Holderness = hold's or yeoman's headland (an attendant or officer in a royal or noble household) Dringhoe = dreng's or free tenant's mound Lazonby (Lazenby) = leysingi's or freedman's village As with Anglo-Saxon placenames, a number of Scandinavian placenames were formed by adding the name of the tribal leader Corby = Kori's village; Formby = Forni's village  Hybrid forms (Anglo- Saxon+Scandinavian) In some cases, an Anglo-Saxon tribal leader's name was simply replaced by a Scandinavian one. Sometimes this led to a situation where within one placename there was a word of Scandinavian origin as well as one of Anglo-Saxon origin. The classic example is Grimston, which combines (Grim (Scandinavian)+tun(Anglo Saxon) the Scandinavian personal name Grimr with the Anglo- Saxon word tun (= village). Such words of mixed origin are called HYBRID FORMS The 4th wave of invasion  The 4th wave of invasion (Norman French) The fourth wave of invaders were the Norman French who arrived in 1066. Norman French became a prestige language spoken by the upper classes and used for administration. As with Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian placenames, sometimes the personal name of the local lord of the manor or powerful family became part of the placename. For example: Melton Mowbray (Roger de Moubray) Leighton Buzzard (the Busard family) Stanstead Mountfitchet (the Montifiquet family)  French placenames in England However, note that French personal names often stand alone, usually as the second word in a placename……..why???? Because, unlike the other languages we have considered, French did not greatly interfere with the basic traditional placename. In some cases, the pronunciation of the traditional placename was slightly changed so that it would be easier for a French speaker to say. For example; Nottingham instead of Snotingeham French placenames in England Possibly the most common French words to be incorporated into placenames are …………… &………………….. beau and bel which mean beautiful or fine Beaulieu = beautiful place; Beaumont = beautiful mountain; Belvoir- beautiful view.  more recent developments in placenames in Britain? Very few new placenames have been coined. According to one source, about 98 per cent of current English placenames originated before 1500. The few placenames which have been recently created tend to commemorate famous events and people. For example: Battles: Waterloo, Maida Vale, Peacehaven People: Nelson, Telford, Peterlee  However, for plentiful examples of placename transference it is best to look outside Britain and in particular at areas of the world which were subjected to British colonisation. In the United States, for example, we find the transferred British placenames Birmingh Bristol Norwich am New Cambridg Swansea Castle e Canterbur Lancaster y