BASIS OF LANGUAGE THEORY

The domain of English language history.

Major historic events of ancient period.

Lecture №1
 PLAN:
• Chronological divisions in the history of the English
language.

• Historical background. Pre-Germanic Britain. Germanic

Settlement of Britain.

• Old English dialects

• The English language has a long and eventful history. Its
development began in the 5th century of our era, when
groups of West Germanic tribes settled in the British Isles.
During the sixteen hundred years of its history the English
language has been undergoing constant change and it is
changing still. It is customary to divide the history of the
English language into three main periods:
• Old English which lasts from the 5th century to the end of
the 11th; the dates of its end as suggested by various
authorities range from 1066, which is the year of the Norman
Conquest, to 1150. Middle English - from the 12th to the 15th
century; the period is believed to have ended in 1475, the year
of the introduction of printing.
• New English, which means the English of the last six
centuries. Within it, historians usually distinguish the early
new English period-from the 15th century to the 17th, up to the
age of Shakespeare. It must be understood that any kind of
a precise chronological division in the history of a language
is contrary to the very character of its development and is
therefore more or less arbitrary. The transition from one
stage to another is always slow and gradual.
 The history of the English language begins with the invasion of
the British Isles by Germanic tribes in the 5th century of our era.
Prior to the Germanic invasion the British Isles must have been
inhabited for at least fifty thousand years. The earliest inhabitants
were the Celts. Economically and socially they were a tribal
society made up of kinship groups, tribes and clans; they were
engaged in agriculture and carried on trade with Celtic Gaul. In
the first century B.C. Gaul was conquered by the Romans. Having
occupied Gaul Julius Caesar made two raids on Britain, in 55 and
54 B.C. The British Isles had long been known to the Romans as a
source of valuable tin ore; Caesar attacked Britain for economic
reasons – to obtain tin, pearls and corn, - and also for strategic
reasons, since rebels and refugees from Gaul found support
among their British kinsmen. The Roman occupation of Britain
lasted nearly 400 years; it came to an end in the early 5th c. In A.D.
410, the Roman troops were officially withdrawn to Rome by
Constantine. This temporary withdrawal turned out to be final,
for the Empire was breaking up due to internal and external
causes.
 Reliable evidence of that period is extremely scarce. The story of the
invasion is told by Bede (673-735), a monastic scholar who wrote the
first history of England, HISTORIA ECCLESIASTICA GENTIS
ANGLORUM. According to Bede the invaders came to Britain in A.D.
449 under the leadership of two Germanic kings. The invaders came in
multitude, in families and clans, to settle in the occupied territories. The
first wave of invaders, the Jutes or the Frisians, occupied the extreme
south-east: Kent and the Isle of Wight. The second wave of immigrants
was largely made up of the Saxons, who had been expanding westwards.
The Saxons consolidated into a number of petty kingdoms, the largest
and the most powerful of them was Wessex. Last came the Angles from
the lower valley of the Elbe and southern Denmark. They made their
landing on the east coast and moved up the rivers to the central part of
the island. Angles founded large kingdoms which had absorbed their
weaker neighbors: East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria. The invaders
certainly prevailed over the natives so far as language was concerned.
After the settlement West Germanic languages came to be spoken all
over Britain with the exception of a few distant regions where Celts
were in the majority: Scotland, Wales and Cornwall.
 The period from the 5th till the 11th centuries was a transitional period from the tribal and slave-
owning system to feudalism. The basic economic unit was the feudal manor, which grew its own food
and carried on some small industries to cover its needs. Tribal and clan division was gradually
superseded by townships and shires, which were local entities having no connection with kinship.
These conditions were reflected in the development of the West Germanic languages brought to
Britain. Four of the kingdoms at various times secured superiority in the country: Kent, Northumbria
and Mercia – during the Early old English, pre-written period, and Wessex – all through the period of
Written old English. In the 8th c. raiders from Scandinavia (the “Danes”) made their first plundering
attacks on England. The Struggle of the English against the Scandinavians lasted over 300 years, in
the course of which period more than half of England was occupied by the invaders and reconquered
again. The Scandinavians subdued Northumbria and East Anglia, ravaged the eastern part of Mercia,
and advanced on Wessex.
The ultimate effect of the Scandinavian invasions on the English language
became manifest at a later date, in the 12 th and 13th c., when the Scandinavian
element was incorporated in the central English dialects. Wessex stood at the
head of the resistance. Under King Alfred of Wessex, one of the greatest figures
in English history, by the peace treaty of 878 England was divided into two
halves: the north-eastern half under Danish control called Danelaw and the
south-western half united under the leadership of Wessex. The reconquest of
Danish territories was carried on successfully by Alfred’s successors, but then the
Danish raids were renewed again headed by Sweyn and Canute. The attacks were
followed by demands for regular payments of large sums of money. In 1017
Canute was acknowledged as king, and England became part of a great northern
empire, comprising Denmark and Norway. On Canute’s death (1035) his
kingdom broke up and England regained political independence; by that time it
was a single state divided into six earldoms. A most important role in the history
of the English language was played by the introduction of Christianity. It gave a
strong impulse to the growth of culture and learning. Monasteries were founded
all over the country with monastic schools attached. Religious services and
teaching were conducted in Latin. Thus due to the introduction of Christianity
the English language acquired much influence from Latin.
 The old English language is distinctly different from the
Englishlanguage of later ages. In terms of the general history of
Germanic languages old English represents the stage of old
Germanic dialects in the history of English, that is the initial
period of its separate history, when common Germanic features,
still prevailed over its newly-developed individual
characteristics.
Old English should not be regarded as a single monolithic entity
just as Modern English is also not monolithic. Within Old English,
there were language variations.
Old English has variation along regional lines as well as
variation across different times.
The four main dialectal forms of Old English were Northumbrian,
spoken north of the river Humber; Mercian, spoken in the
midlands; Kentish, spoken in Kent (the southeastern part);
and West Saxon, spoken in the southwest. Each of those dialects
was associated with an independent kingdom on the island. Of
these, all of Northumbria and most of Mercia were overrun
by the Vikings during the 9th century. The portion of Mercia and
all of Kent that were successfully defended were then integrated
into Wessex.
After the process of unification of the diverse Anglo-Saxon
kingdoms in 878 by Alfred the Great, there is a marked decline in the
importance of regional dialects. This is not because they stopped
existing; regional dialects continued even after that time to this day.
The bulk of the surviving documents from the Anglo-Saxon period
are written in the dialect of Wessex, Alfred's kingdom. It became
necessary to standardize the language of government to reduce the
difficulty of administering the more remote areas of the kingdom. As
a result, documents were written in the West Saxon dialect.
The Church was affected likewise, especially since Alfred initiated an
ambitious program to translate religious materials into English.
Because of the centralization of power and the Viking invasions,
there is little or no written evidence for the development of non-
Wessex dialects after Alfred's unification. Late West Saxon was still
used after the Norman Conquest but Latin and Norman French then
became the languages of the nobility and administration.
Modern-day Received Pronunciation is not a direct descendant of
the best-attested dialect, Late West Saxon. It is rather a descendant
of a Mercian dialect, since that was the dialect of London.
 QUESTIONS:

1. Speak on chronological divisions of English language

history.

2. Major historic events of ancient period.

3. Types of old English dialects and their peculiarities.

 LITERATURE:
1. Аракин В.Д. История английского языка. М., 2003
2. Иванова И.П., Чахоян Л.П., Беляева Т.М. История
английского языка. СПб., 1999.
3. Ильиш Б.А. История английского языка. Л., 1973.
4. Смирницкий А.И. Древнеанглийский язык. М.,
1998
 THANK YOU
FOR ATTENTION!