Old English language: history, grammar and short vocabulary.

Modern English differs significantly from its original form - Old English, or Anglo-Saxon. A vivid example is the ancient monuments of literature. They are unlikely to be understood by a person who is far from studying ancient literature. The picture below shows the changes in the 23 Psalms per 1000 years.

What contributed to such obvious changes in the language? What is the modern version different from the original one?

For what periods is the English language divided?

The history of the Old English language began in the fifth century, together with the first German settlements on the territory of modern Britain. Over time, under the influence of socio-political situation, the language underwent various changes and was divided into:

• The Old English period of the English language was extended from the 5th to the 7th century, marked by the arrival of Germanic tribes and the appearance of writing;
• Middle English period of the English language - from the 5th to the 15th century. At this time Britain was conquered by the Normans, and in 1475 the era of book printing began;
• Modern English - the 15th century - to the present day.

The Old English language is characterized by the presence of dialects, which appeared after the conquest of Britain by the Angles, Saxons and Utes. There were 4 dialects in all: Northumbrian, Mercian, Wessex and Kent. The first two spoke Angles, but due to the fact that their territories of residence were far from each other, each of them had a number of distinctive features. In the Wessex, the Saxons spoke, and in Kent, the Utahs.

How was the vocabulary formed?

Scientists suggest that the dictionary of the Old English language consisted of 30,000 to 100,000 words. They are divided into 3 groups:

• Specific Old English words are found only in this language;
• Indo-European - the oldest words denoting the names of plants, animals and parts of the body, action verbs and a wide number of numerals;
• Germanic - words that occur only in this group and are distributed only in the languages of their group.

In Old English there were about 600 borrowings from the Celtic and Latin languages, which appeared under the influence of the following historical events.

• I century AD. E. The Roman Empire under Emperor Claudia captured Britain and made it her colony. Divided into military camps, the territories later became English cities: Lancaster, Manchester, Lincoln. The endings "caster" and "chester" in translation from Latin meant "camp", and the ending "koln" - "settlement."
• V century. Britain was captured by the Germanic tribes by the Saxons, Angles and Utes, whose dialect supplanted the Celtic language. Germanic tribes brought in Old English not only their own vocabulary, but also borrowings from Latin: silk, cheese, wine, pound, butter and others.
• 597 year. The spread of Christianity led to the need to borrow words for religious concepts: bishop, candle, angel, devil, idol, anthem, monk and others. Also from Latin were borrowed the names of plants, diseases, medical preparations, animals, clothes, household items, dishes and products: pine, plant, lily, fever, cancer, elephant, camel, cap, raddish and others. In addition to direct borrowing, it was widely used for calculating - literally translated words. For example, Monday is a short for Monadie - a literal translation of Lunae Dies ("Moon Day").
• 878 year. Anglo-Saxons and the Danes sign a peace treaty, as a result of which the latter receive part of the British lands. This fact had an effect on the language in which words such as axle, anger and combinations of sc- and sk- appeared. Examples: skin, skull, sky.
• 790 year. Viking raids led to the borrowing of the words cast, call, take, die. Ill, ugly, they, their. Both. By this period, the dying of inflections also applies.

Grammar of Old English

Old English had a more complex grammar, compared to modern English.

• At writing used runic, Gothic and Latin alphabets.
• The pronoun, the noun and the adjective changed by birth.
• Except for the singular and the plural, there was also a dual plural: ic (i) / we (we) / wit (we are two).
• 5 cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative and instrumental.

1. Glaed - joyful;
2. Glades - joyful;
3. Gladum - joyful;
4. Glaedne - joyful;
5. Glade - joyful.

• Nouns, adjectives and pronouns were inclined depending on the ending.

What is the difference between the verbal system?

The verbs in Old English were a complex grammatical system.

1. Verbs were divided into strong, weak and other. Strong had 7 conjugations, weak - 3, and others - 2.
2. There was no future, only the present and the past.
3. The verb changed in persons and numbers.

What is the difference between modern English and Old English?

Due to historical events, the Old English language underwent a number of changes before it acquired a modern form. What is the difference between the modern form of language and the original one?

• From 5 cases there were only 2 - it is common and possessive.

• In the modern verb system there are no conjugations, instead of them there were irregular verbs.

• There appeared a future time, which differs from the past and present by the absence of its verbal form. This means that in this form the verb does not change, and the verb-helper is the word will.

• There was a gerund - an impersonal form of a verb with the properties of a noun and a verb.

What words were included in the Old English dictionary?

The British lands at different times belonged to the Romans, Scandinavians and Germanic tribes. What words were included in the dictionary?

• Mona - moon - the moon;
• Brodor - brother - brother;
• Modor - mother - mother;
• Sunu - son - son;
• Beon - be - to be;
• Do-do-do;
• Ic - I - I;
• Twa - two - two;
• Pet - that - that;
• Handus - hand-hand;
• Clipian - call - call;
• Brid - bird - the bird.

Despite the fact that the Old English and modern English languages are radically different from each other, yet the former had a great influence on the formation of the second.