| Old English | |
|---|---|
| Englisċ Ænglisċ | |
 | |
| Pronunciation | [ˈeŋɡliʃ] |
| Region | England (except Cornwall and the extreme north-west), southern and eastern Scotland, and some localities in the eastern fringes of modern Wales |
| Ethnicity | Anglo-Saxons |
| Era | Mostly developed into Middle English and Early Scots by the 12th century |
Early forms | |
| Dialects | |
| Runic, later Latin (Old English Latin alphabet) | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | ang |
| ISO 639-3 | ang |
| ISO 639-6 | ango |
| Glottolog | olde1238 |
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| Part of a series on |
| Old English |
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Old English (Englisċ or Ænglisc, pronounced [ˈeŋɡliʃ]), or Anglo-Saxon,[1] was the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th century, and the first Old English literary works date from the mid-7th century. After the Norman Conquest of 1066, English was replaced for several centuries by Anglo-Norman (a type of French) as the language of the upper classes. This is regarded as marking the end of the Old English era, since during the subsequent period the English language was heavily influenced by Anglo-Norman, developing into what is now known as Middle English in England and Early Scots in Scotland.
Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or Ingvaeonic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as the Angles, Saxons and Jutes. As the Germanic settlers became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain: Common Brittonic, a Celtic language; and Latin, brought to Britain by the Roman conquest. Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms: Kentish, Mercian, Northumbrian, and West Saxon. It was West Saxon that formed the basis for the literary standard of the later Old English period,[2] although the dominant forms of Middle and Modern English would develop mainly from Mercian,[citation needed] and Scots from Northumbrian. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule and settlement beginning in the 9th century.
Old English is one of the West Germanic languages, and its closest relatives are Old Frisian and Old Saxon. Like other old Germanic languages, it is very different from Modern English and Modern Scots, and largely incomprehensible for Modern English or Modern Scots speakers without study.[3] Within Old English grammar nouns, adjectives, pronouns and verbs have many inflectional endings and forms, and word order is much freer.[2] The oldest Old English inscriptions were written using a runic system, but from about the 8th century this was replaced by a version of the Latin alphabet.
- ^ By the 16th century the term Anglo-Saxon came to refer to all things of the early English period, including language, culture, and people. While it remains the normal term for the latter two aspects, the language began to be called Old English towards the end of the 19th century, as a result of the increasingly strong anti-German nationalism in English society of the 1890s and early 1900s. However, many authors still also use the term Anglo-Saxon to refer to the language.
Crystal, David (2003). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-53033-4. - ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
:2was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ "Why is the English spelling system so weird and inconsistent? | Aeon Essays". Aeon. Retrieved 11 August 2021.