INDO-EUROPEANS
Indoeuropean languages
The
Indo-European languages are a family of several hundred related languages and
dialects, including most major languages of Europe, the Iranian plateau,
Central Asia and the Indian
subcontinent. It is composed of 449 languages and dialects, according to the
2005 Ethnologue estimate, about half (219) belonging to the Indo-Aryan
sub-branch. "Indo" refers to the Indian subcontinent, as the language group geographically extends
from Europe in the west to India in the east. The languages of the
Indo-European group are spoken by approximately three billion native speakers, the largest number of the
recognised families of languages. (The Sino-Tibetan family has the
second-largest number of speakers.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-European_languages
Indo-European languages family tree
·
Albanian
o
Gheg
o
Tosk
·
Armenian
o
Armenian
·
Baltic
o
Old
Prussian†
o
Latvian
o
Lithuanian
·
Indo-Iranian
o
Indic
§ Sanskrit
§ Assamese
§ Bengali
§ Gujarati
§ Hindi
§ Marathi
§ Nepali
§ Punjabi
§ Romany
§ Sindhi
§ Singhalese
§ Urdu
o
Iranian
§ Avestan†
§ Sogdian†
§ Baluchi
§ Kurdish
§ Pashto
§ Old Persian†
§ Persian
o
Dardic
§ Kashmiri
and Dardic languages
·
Slavic
o
South
Slavic
§ Bulgarian
§ Slovenian
§ Serbian
§ Croatian
§ Bosnian
§ Macedonian
§ Old
Church Slavonic†
o
West
Slavic
§ Polish
§ Czech
§ Slovak
§ Sorbian
o
East
Slavic
§ Russian
§ Belarusian
§ Ukrainian
·
Anatolian†
o
Hittite†
·
Celtic
o
Gaulish†
o
Manx†
o
Irish
Gaelic
o
Scots
Gaelic
o
Cornish
o
Breton
o
Welsh
·
Germanic
o
West
Germanic
§ Old English
§ English
§ Scots
§ High German
§ Yiddish
§ North Frisian
§ West Frisian
§ Low Saxon/Low Franconian
§ East
Frisian
§ Low
German
§ Flemish
§ Dutch
§ Afrikaans
o
East
Germanic
§ Gothic†
o
North
Germanic
§ Old Norse
§ Western Old Norse
§ Icelandic
§ Faroese
§ Norwegian
§ Eastern Old Norse
§ Danish
§ Swedish
·
Hellenic
o
Ancient
Greek
§ Modern
Greek
·
Italic
o
Latin†
§ Catalan
§ French
§ Galician
§ Italian
§ Portuguese
§ Provençal
§ Romansch
§ Romanian
§ Spanish
o Osco-Umbrian†
·
Tocharian†
o Tocharian†
Non-Indoeuropean languages
-
Indo-Chinese: Chinese, Japanese
-
American Indian languages
-
Basque
- Ural-Altaic languages: Fino-Ungrian (Finish, Estonian, Hungarian, . . .) and Altaic (some varieties of Turkish).
© Fernández, Francisco, A History of English, Valencia, Albatros, 1998.
Chronological Division of English
The history of English (as well as the history of other languages) is conventionally divided into periods to facilitate the description of its evolution. With minor variations the generally accepted division is as follows:
0. 0. PRE-OLD ENGLISH (circa 450-700)
1. OLD-ENGLISH
a. Early Old English (700-900)
b. Late Old English (900-1100
2. MIDDLE ENGLISH
a. Early Middle English
(1100-1300)
b. Late Middle English (1300-1500)
3. MODERN ENGLISH
a. Early Modern English
(1500-1600)
b. Late Modern English (1650-1950)
4. CONTEMPORARY (=”Present-day”) ENGLISH (1950-…)
© Fernández, Francisco, A History of English, Valencia, Albatros, 1998.
THE CELTIC SUBSTRATUM
Who were the celts?
The Celts were a group of peoples that occupied lands stretching from the British Isles to Gallatia. The Celts had many dealings with other cultures that bordered the lands occupied by these peoples, and even though there is no written record of the Celts stemming from their own documents, we can piece together a fair picture of them from archeological evidence as well as historical accounts from other cultures.
The first historical recorded encounter of a people displaying the cultural traits associated with the Celts comes from northern Italy around 400 BC, when a previously unkown group of barbarians came down from the Alps and displaced the Etruscans from the fertile Po valley, a displacment that helped to push the Etruscans from history's limelight. The next encounter with the Celts came with the still young Roman Empire, directly to the south of the Po. The Romans in fact had sent three envoys to the beseiged Etruscans to study this new force. We know from Livy's The Early History of Rome that this first encounter with Rome was quite civilized:
[The Celts told the Roman envoys that] this was indeed the first time they had heard of them, but they assumed the Romans must be a courageous people because it was to them that the [Etruscans] had turned to in their hour of need. And since the Romans had tried to help with an embassy and not with arms, they themselves would not reject the offer of peace, provided the [Etruscans] ceded part of their seperfluous agricultural land; that was what they, the Celts, wanted.... If it were not given, they would launch an attack before the Romans' eyes, so that the Romans could report back how superior the Gauls were in battle to all others....The Romans then asked whether it was right to demand land from its owners on pain of war, indeedwhat were the Celts going in Etruria in the first place? The latter defiantly retorted that their right lay in their arms: To the brave belong all things.
The
Roman envoys then preceded to break their good faith and helped the Etruscans
in their fight; in fact, one of the envoys, Quintas Fabius killed one of the
Celtic tribal leaders. The Celts then sent their own envoys to Rome in protest and demand the Romans hand
over all members of the Fabian family, to which all three of the original Roman
envoys belonged, be given over
to the Celts, a move completely in line with current Roman protocol. This of
course presented problems for the Roman senate, since the Fabian family was
quite powerful in Rome.
Indeed, Livy says that:
The party structure would allow no resolution to be made against such noblemanm as justice would have required. The Senate...therefore passed examination of the Celts' request to the popular assembly, in which power and influence naturally counted for more. So it happened that those who ought to have been punished were instead appointed for the coming year military tribunes with consular powers (the highest that could be granted).
The
Celts saw this as a mortal insult and a host marched south to Rome. The Celts
tore through the countryside and several battalions of Roman soilders to lay
seige to the Capitol of the Roman Empire. Seven months of
seige led to negotiations wherby the Celts promised to leave their seige for a
tribute of one thousand pounds of gold, which the historian Pliny tells was very difficult for the entire
city to muster. When the gold was being weighed, the Romans claimed the Celts
were cheating with faulty weights. It was then that the Celts' leader, Brennus, threw his
sword into the balance and and uttered the words vae victis "woe to the
Defeated". Rome never withstood another more humiliating defeat and the
Celts made an initial step of
magnificent proportions into history.
Other Roman historians tell us more of the Celts. Diodorus notes that:
Their aspect is terrifying...They are very tall in stature, with ripling muscles under clear white skin. Their hair is blond, but not naturally so: they bleach it, to this day, artificially, washing it in lime and combing it back from their foreheaads. They look like wood-demons, their hair thick and shaggy like a horse's mane. Some of them are cleanshaven, but others - especially those of high rank, shave their cheeks but leave a moustache that covers the whole mouth and, when they eat and drink, acts like a sieve, trapping particles of food...The way they dress is astonishing: they wear brightly coloured and embroidered shirts, with trousers called bracae and cloaks fastened at the shoulder with a brooch, heavy in winter, light in summer. These cloaks are striped or checkered in design, with the seperate checks close together and in various colours.
[The Celts] wear bronze helmets with figures picked out on them, even horns, which
made them look even taller than they already are...while others cover
themselves with breast-armour
made out of chains. But most content themselves with the weapons nature gave
them: they go naked into battle...Weird, discordant horns were sounded, [they
shouted in chorus with their]
deep and harsh voices, they beat their swords rythmically against their
shields.
Diodorus also describes how the Celts cut off their enemies' heads and nailed
them over the doors of their huts, as Diodorus states:
In exactly the same way as hunters do with their skulls of the animals they have slain...they preserved the heads of their most high-ranking victims in cedar oil, keeping them carefully in wooden boxes.
http://www.ibiblio.org/gaelic/celts.html
The celtic languages
The Celtic languages form a branch of the larger Indo-European family. By the time speakers of Celtic languages enter history around 400 BC (Brennus's attack on Rome in 387 BC), they were already split into several language groups, and spread over much of Central Europe, the Iberian peninsula, Ireland and Britain.
Some scholars think that the Urnfield culture of northern Germany and the Netherlands represents an origin for the Celts as a distinct cultural branch of the Indo- European family. This culture was preeminent in central Europe during the late Bronze Age, from ca. 1200 BC until 700 BC, itself following the Unetice and Tumulus cultures. The Urnfield period saw a dramatic increase in population in the region, probably due to innovations in technology and agricultural practices. The Greek historian Ephoros of Cyme in Asia Minor, writing in the fourth century BC, believed that the Celts came from the islands off the mouth of the Rhine who were "driven from their homes by the frequency of wars and the violent rising of the sea".
The spread of iron-working
led to the development of the Hallstatt culture directly
from the Urnfield (c. 700 to 500 BC). Proto-Celtic, the latest
common ancestor of all known
Celtic languages, is
considered by this school of
thought to have been spoken at the time of the late Urnfield or
early Hallstatt cultures, in the early first millennium BC. The
spread of the Celtic languages
to Iberia, Ireland and Britain would have occurred during the first half of the
1st millennium BC, the earliest chariot burials in Britain
dating to ca. 500 BC. Over the
centuries they developed into the separate Celtiberian,
Goidelic and Brythonic
languages.
The Hallstatt culture was succeeded by the La Tène culture of central Europe, and during the final stages of the Iron Age gradually transformed into the explicitly Celtic culture of early historical times. Celtic river-names are found in great numbers around the upper reaches of the Danube and Rhine, which led many Celtic scholars to place the ethnogenesis of the Celts in this area.
Diodorus Siculus and Strabo both suggest that the Celtic heartland was in southern France. The former says that the Gauls were to the north of the Celts but that the Romans referred to both as Gauls. Before the discoveries at Hallstatt and La Tene, it was generally considered that the Celtic heartland was southern France, see Encyclopedia Britannica for 1813.
Almagro-Gorbea[6]
proposed the origins of the Celts could be traced back to the third millennium
BC, seeking the initial roots in the Bell Beaker culture,
thus offering the wide
dispersion of the Celts
throughout western Europe, as well as the variability of the different Celtic
peoples, and the existence of ancestral traditions an ancient perspective.
Meanwhile, genetics, history, and archaeological researcher and writer Stephen Oppenheimer suggests the Celts were a Mediterranean people first established in what is now southern France by the end of the last glacial maxum, around 11,000BC. From there through further integration with what might have been proto-Basque populations, these people spread outward into Italy, Spain, the British Isles and Germany. Indeed, Celtic origin myths recorded in Medieval Scotland and Ireland suggest a possible beginning in Anatolia and then to Iberia via Egypt. But, in his 2006 book The Origins of the British, revised in 2007, he argued that neither Anglo-Saxons nor Celts had much impact on the genetics of the inhabitants of the British Isles, and that British ancestry mainly traces back to the Palaeolithic Iberian people, now represented by Basques, instead.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celts
Celtic Substratum in English Language
Very few words of Celtic origin are found in Modern English:
• Rivers: Avon, Clyde, Dee, Don, Forth, Severn, Thames, Usk
• Axminster, Caerleon-on-Usk, Exmouth, Uxbridge from the Word for water.
• The Word whisky/whiskey also comes from a compound of this word: uisge beatha=water of life.
Cities: Belfast, Cardiff, Dublin, Glasgow, London, York.
• Landscape words: ben, cairn, corrie, crag, crannog, cromlech, dolmen, glen, loch, menhir, strath, tor.
• First Names: Alan, Donald, Duncan, Eileen, Fiona, Gavin, Ronald, Sheila
• Other words: badger-brock-tejón; peat -turba; bucket –cubo; dun = “dark coloured”,binn= “basket”
Moreover, Some of the Celtic words that entered English come from Latin. These words were borrowed during the Roman Occupation of Gaul*:
• car, carry, carriage, chariot, charioteer, carpenter, carpentry, lance, andlancer.
Roman Occupation of Gaul
Roman Gaul consisted of an area of provincial rule in what would become modern day France , Belgium , Luxembourg , and western Germany . Roman control of the area lasted for nearly 600 years. The Roman Empire began its take-over of what was Celtic Gaul in 121BCE, when it conquered and annexed the southern reaches of the area. Julius Caesar completed the task by defeating the Celtic tribes in the Gallic Wars of 58-51BCE.
http://infao5501.ag5.mpi-sb.mpg.de:8080/topx/archive?link=Wikipedia-Lip6-2/2068003.xml&style
THE ROMANIZATION OF ENGLAND: CAESAR AND CLAUDIUS
With the Roman Conquest in 43 AD came the first written records of
England's history. Julius Caesar had of course paid earlier visits to England
in 55 and 54 BC however these had only been to please his adoring
public back home in Rome. In 43 AD the emperor Claudius resumed the work of
Caesar by ordering the invasion of England under the command of
Aulus Plautius.
The
Romans quickly established control over the tribes of southeastern
England. One British chieftain of the Catuvallauni tribe known as
Caractacus, who initially fled from
Camulodunum (Colchester) to south Wales,
stirred up some resistance until his defeat and capture in 51 AD.
Dispatched off to Rome, he obviously made friends in high places,
appearing in Claudius'
triumphal procession. He was later released in recognition of his courage and
died in Rome. Resistance to Roman rule continued in Wales, particularly inspired by the Druids, the
priests of the native Celtic peoples.
All was relatively quiet in England for ten years or so until Prasutagus the king of the Iceni tribe, died. His queen, Boudicca, a little upset at having her lands taken from her by the Romans and her two daughters raped, opted for affirmative action rather than the diplomatic approach. Under Boudicca' leadership the Iceni together with their southern neighbours the Trinovantes revolted, burning to the ground Londinium (London), Verulamium (St. Albans) and Camulodunum (Colchester). Boudicca poisoned herself after her army was annihilated by Roman legions returning from active service in North Wales. They had again been attempting to quell the Druids in Anglesey.
During the 70's and 80's the Romans, under the command of Gnaeus Julius
Agricola extended their control into northern and western England.
Legions were located at York, Chester and Caerleon marking the limits of
the 'Civil Zone'. Agricola moved northwards defeating the Caledonian tribes
under the leadership of Calgacus at the battle of Mons Graupius in
northeastern Scotland. The
Romans gradually gave up their conquests in Scotland until in 122 AD the
emperor Hadrian ordered the construction of a wall from the west coast of
Britain to the east. Hadrian's
Wall ran for eighty miles from Newcastle in the east to Carlisle in the west.
Designed to mark the boundaries of the Roman Empire, much of the great monument can still be seen today.
When Hadrian died in 138 AD his successor Antonius Pius abandoned the newly
completed wall and again pushed northwards. A new frontier, the Antonine Wall was established between
the Forth and Clyde rivers in Scotland. Around 160 AD the Antonine Wall
was abandoned and thereafter Hadrian's Wall*
again became the northern
boundary of the Roman Empire in Britain.
The
Romans never did succeed in subduing all of Britain. They always had to
maintain a significant military presence to control the threat from the
unconquered tribes. But most people in England settled down to
Roman order and discipline. Towns appeared for the first time across the
country, including York, Chester, St. Albans, Bath, Lincoln, Gloucester and Colchester. All of these major
centres are still linked today by the system of Roman military roads radiating
from the great port of London such as Ermine Street, Watling Street and the Fosse Way. These roads also allowed for the distribution of Roman luxuries such
as spices, wines, glass etc. brought in from other regions of the Empire.
It is likely that the Romanisation of Britain principally affected only the rich. This aristocracy
may have increased status by adopting Roman ways and practices such as regular
bathing. The vast majority of the populace would remain relatively untouched by Roman civilisation, living
off the land and eking out a living.
http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/RomanEngland.htm
Hadrian’s Wall
Hadrian's Wall is one of Northumberland's true icons and England's largest World Heritage Site, standing dramatically on the lofty crags of the dramatic countryside to which it lends its name. Built by Roman Emperor Hadrian almost 2,000 years ago, to 'separate the Romans from the Barbarians,' standing by the wall today is to look upon a landscape little changed since Roman eyes scoured the horizon for signs of northern invaders.
A wise military strategist, the Roman Emperor Hadrian (117-138 A.D.)
realized the futility of trying to subdue the Celtic tribes. Successful Roman
warfare depended upon a fight
in open space, where waves of
infantry could pound the enemy mercilessly. The forested hills and dales of
Scotland favored Celtic guerrilla-tactics, especially ambush. Hadrian
selected the limits based on
the land’s topography: Hadrian’s Wall is a fortified boundary line.
Built in A.D. 122 by three Roman Legions, the Wall with its fortifications
linked a series of turrets, garrison castles, and stationary, military camps
along seventy-three miles of
windswept moor. The Wall
hugged the north rim of the River Tyne, thereby commanding the vicinity’s water
supply and the hills above. Rather than Scottish forests, Roman
sentries instead controlled
the bleak and desolate moor stretching between the Irish and North Seas. The
Roman surveyors and engineers traveling with Hadrian established the Wall’s position, maximized the use of local
materials and talent in its speedy construction, and designed advantages for
every Roman defender. "In
pursuing its course from sea to sea, the Wall seldom deviated from the
shortest and straightest course it could follow, and then only within the evident design of seizing
neighboring elevations that would have otherwise
commanded its position."
When first constructed, the Wall stood about 15 feet high, 10 feet wide at the
base and seven and one half feet wide at the top. It is believed that an
embattled parapet rose above
the wall proper, to protect
sentries on patrol. To the north a short distance a ditch averaging 25 feet in
width and 10 feet in depth strengthened the defense. To the south,
another ditch was created,
with the excavated earth forming mounds along either side. Today this ditch is
known as the Vallum, although the Roman word means "mound." The Vallum was the actual boundary line
of Pax Romana and the official limit of the Roman Empire, and as
such, was probably constructed
first and used as an offset to the Wall, and for defense of the
construction crews.
Local availability of materials counseled the Wall’s construction: stone was
used for the 43-mile-long eastern portion and earth was used on the remaining
30 miles to the west. The stone blocks were generally 9
inches deep, 10 inches high, and ranged between 15 and 20 inches long. The
stone faced an inner core composed of concrete and rubble. The
earthen portion was an early
example of cut and fill engineering; the Wall was formed with material
excavated from the ditches.
It
took three years to build the Wall and its fortifications. This was
accomplished by three of the mobile forces known as a Legion. More than five
thousand strong, a legion was
an infantry force organized
into ten cohorts, nine of them numbering about 500 men each. "The First
Cohort was a special unit of almost double strength that included fighting troops
as well as specialists and
clerks of te headquarters staff. The ordinary cohort was subdivided into six
centuries, or companies, each of which contained about 80 men
under the command of a career
officer, the centurian. Still smaller units were formed by the division of each
century into 10 sections of
eight men - contubernia, ‘tent parties,’ so called because in the field they shared a
leather tent. On the march, each contubernium was provided with a
mule, which carried the tent
plus construction equipment. According to first-century AD
historian Josephus, this
equipment included a saw, a pickaxe, a sickle, a chain, a rope, a spade, and a large
basket for moving earth."² Every legion included a body of specialized
soldiers known as immunes;
their skills earned them an immunity from routine duties. The list
of immunes included architects, surveyors, plumbers, medics, stonecutters,
water engineers, ditchers,
blacksmiths and clerks.
The
military surveyors, known as mensors, carried a Groma with them
for laying out right angles, a decempeda (a 10-foot rod) for
measuring short distances, a waxed cord or rope for
measuring longer distances, a plumb line level known as a libra, and writing
and drawing materials. The mensors were responsible for the overall position of the Wall,
the stationing along its
length of turrets, mile-castles, and forts, and the interior layout of each
fort. To establish unerringly a line across Britain at just the point
where the land was most arrow
was quite an achievement. It is thought that the Roman surveyors performed the
initial layout by lighting fires on hilltops, and "lining themselves in" along the lowlands.
Once the line of the wall was
established, the distances between structures were measured and marked. Turrets occurred every
1600 feet. These were small stone towers, thought to have been surrounded by wooden
walkways. Turrets are sometimes referred to as signaling stations, but
it is not known what devices or codes the Roman sentries might have been using. The
"mile-castles"were established every 4,860 feet (a Roman mile), and were
square fortresses housing a garrison of 32 men. In addition to patrolling the
Wall, their duty was to
protect the double gates that marked a crossing point between
"civilized" and "barbarian" worlds. The stationary military
camps were very large, and occurred along the Wall approximately every four miles. Here the mensors laid out a rectangular grid of streets, walkways and
buildings. The layout was practical, military, and predictable. Soldiers
hailing from many parts of the Empire could
orient themselves wherever they found themselves stationed. The praetorium,
or headquarters, was centrally-located. Around it were
grouped the quarters of staff
and bodyguard. Beyond this was a forum where the soldiers could meet, and again
behind this the quaestorium, or paymaster’s office. Adjoining
blocks contained the hospital,
the foot-soldier’s barracks, kitchens, storehouses and granaries, workshops,
stables, and baths. Yes, even in this remote outpost the Romans enjoyed
the luxuries of plumbing.
"There were centrally heated communal baths as well as latrines. The
toilets consisted of wooden seats placed over a channel into
which water could be poured to
flush the waste into a refuse ditch. In the baths, furnaces heated bronze boilers that supplied steam
and hot water. Besides cold or
heated pools, the facilities frequently
offered a dry-heat sauna
chamber and a steam bath. They were focal points of the soldiers’ off-duty hours. There were other
pastimes to fill the lonely posting: archeologists have uncovered remnants of
board-games, drinking cups and flagons, letters written from home, and small shrines for worship.
The Legion surveyors were there to physically define the legal boundary of the Roman Empire. Once delineated, Hadrian’s Wall and fortifications represented the strength, stability and comfort of being a Roman. The Wall was Emperor Hadrian’s strategic solution to hostile terrain and intractable enemies. In time, he hoped to gain the northern territories, but not by force; Hadrian believed that the prosperity, goods and services of the Roman Empire would eventually accomplish more than its military might.
http://www.surveyhistory.org/roman_glory_hadrian's_wall1.htm
Early Latin borrowings
Period of Continental Borrowing from Latin 1st to 5th centurias A.D.
Around 50 words through Germanic contact with Rome before the invasion and settlement of Britain: straet (strata) ,
pund (pondo), mil (milia).
From Roman Occupation of Britain -up to 410 AD:
Very little influence Turing this period.
Place names: ceaster (castra= “walled
encampment'), for example: Dorchester,
Winchester, Manchester,
Lancaster.
Wic (vicum= “village”) Greenwich, etc.
Period of the Christianizing of Britain
(7th to10th centuries AD)
• abbot, alms, pope, priest, oyster, fig,
pine, cedar, sack, sock, etc.
• loan translations (native word formations
in imitation of a Latin model): se haliga
gast, godspel.
Briefly: Britain before the Germanic Conquesthe history of the English language begins with the settlement of Britain by Germanic tribes int he middle of the fifth Century AD. Yet, before this happened, the island (inhabited by Celtic peoples for a few centurias) witnessed a number of important political and military events, which finally led to its conquest by Germanic invaders.
© Fernández, Francisco, A History of English, Valencia, Albatros, 1998.
THE
GERMANIC INVASIONS OF THE BRITISH ISLES: ANGLES, SAXONS AND JUTES
The Jutes - coming from the northern part of Jutland - that settled in Kent, the Isle of Wight and the south of Wessex opposite Wight.
The Angles - originally inhabiting the country called Angulus: the area south of the Jutes and north-east of Schleswig- that settled north of the Thames; and from them stemmed the East Anglians, the Middle Anglians, the Mercians and the Northumbrians.
The Saxons - coming from a Continental area to the south of the Angles: stretching from the Baltic coast to the Weser- that settled south of the Thames and west of Kent; and gave origin to the East Saxons, the SOuth Saxons and the West Saxons.
ANGLO-SAXONS
The Stablishment of Anglo-Saxon Rule in Britain
- In the South, the advance towards the west was resumed in the middle of
the seventh century. In the eight century most of the country south of the
Thames was in the Saxon hands. The final defeat of Britons
(pushed to the area of Cornwall) took place after a battle in 838.
- In the Middlands, the western border separating Wales from Mercia was established at the end of the eight century,
-
North of the River Humber, the Anglians established a kingdom in 547, which in
the seventh century included the actual counties of Cumberland, Westmoreland
and Lancashire.
Until the tenth century there was no English monarchy. The Germanic tribes founded several small kingdoms. Seven of them are known as the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy:
Northumbria
Mercia
East Anglia
Wessex
Sussex
Essex
Kent
THE
CHRISTIANIZATION OF ENGLAND
Christianity came to Britain Turing the Roman
rule. It became, then, the religion of the Celtic inhabitants. The Celtic
Britons did not Christianized the Germanic invaders, though. And it is indeed
interesting that, in the seventh Century –when English bishoprics were being
established-, the Celtic ones would not recognize them.
The Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons was a slow
process and came to Britain from two directions:
In
597, Pope Gregory sent St Augustine (with forty monks) to convert the heathen
Germanic inhabitants of Britain. St Augustine Landed in Kent where he was well
received by Queen Bertha (who was a Christian Frank). Three months later after
his arrival her husband King Ethelbert became Roman Catholic.
In
601 the Archbishopric of Canterbury was established with St. Augustine as the
Archbishop. And before his death (604) the whole Kingdom of Kent had been
Christianized.
From Canterbury, missionaries were sent to other kingdoms: Essex, East Anglia and York became Christian in 625-627; Wessex in 635; and Sussex in 681.
The
conversion of Northumbria was more complicated. Roman missionaries baptized
King Eadwine but, after his fall (633), the mission was closed and the monks
left to York.
Oswy,
a bernician Prince, was driven out of the country and settled in Iona. When he
regained his land (634), he brought monks from there and founded the
Lindisfarne monastery as the base for missions to convert the country.
© Fernández, Francisco, A
History of English, Valencia, Albatros, 1998.
CELTIC BRANCHES OF CHRISTIANITY
Celtic Christianity, or Insular Christianity
(sometimes called the Celtic Church or the British Church or Irish Church)
broadly refers to the Early Medieval
Christian practice that developed in Britain and Ireland before and during the
post-Roman period, when Germanic invasions sharply reduced contact between the
broadly Celtic populations
of Britons
and Irish with Christians on the Continent until their
subsequent conversion in the 5th and 6th centuries. Then through the works of Columba and Aidan
it was spread to others on Great Britain, such as the Picts and Northumbrians respectively
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Christianity
SYNOD OF WHITBY
The Christianization of Saxon lands was rolling right along in the early 7th century. Kent was the first to convert; then came Essex and Northumbria. Missionaries were making inroads in other of the Saxon lands as well.
But by the middle of the century, the teachings of
the Christian faith had reached a crossroads. Kent and Essex and such were
converted by monks and others of the Roman Church. Also alive and well and
flourishing quite nicely in Britain at this time was the Celtic Church. It was
Christian as well, melding elements of the old faith and the new faith. Yet,
Celtic and Roman teachings differed on certain significant points as well: The
calculation of Easter was the largest stumbling block. The proper cutting of
the tonsure was another. (This was, of course, the shaving of the head. It
might not seem like a big deal to us today, but it was a huge deal to the monks
and other leaders of the church back then.)
Northumbria by this time had become the center of
learning. The Venerable Bede was ensonced at Jarrow. Other scholars were making
a name for Northumbria as well. So when a place was desired for an important
religious conference, Whitby, in Northumbria, was chosen.
The Synod of Whitby marked a turning point in the
teachings of Christianity in Britain. At this council, religious leaders
decided to follow Roman, not Celtic, teachings. What really happened is that
the practicers of Celtic Christianity suddenly had to stop doing things their
own way and follow the lead of Rome. Absent Roman direction for a few hundred
years in the period between the Roman withdrawal (in 410) and the Roman
reappearance (in the form of Augustine in 596), the Celtic Christians had kept
the teachings of Patrick and Columba and had adapted their religious practices
to fit the audience.
But after Whitby, Christian
leaders followed the Roman line. Celtic Christianity did not die, however; it
just faded back into Ireland and Scotland, there to exist in isolation from the
Saxon occupation of England.
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/ancient_british_history/60236
VIKING INVASIONS
The Viking Age was from 793AD -
1066AD. It began with a raid on the Lindesfarne Monastery in the Northern
British Isles:
AD. 793. This year came dreadful
fore-warnings over the land of the Northumbrians, terrifying the people most
woefully: these were immense sheets of light rushing through the air, and
whirlwinds, and fiery dragons flying across the firmament. These tremendous
tokens were soon followed by a great famine: and not long after, on the sixth
day before the ides of January in the same year, the harrowing inroads of heathen
men made lamentable havoc in the church of God in Holy-island (Lindisfarne), by
rapine and slaughter." -Anglo Saxon Chronicle.
Thus began the Viking Raids, driven by the
population explosion in Scandinavia at the time...
The Vikings were more than just bloodthirsty
raiders, in fact, most were not Vikings at all. The word "Viking"
(derived from "Vik" meaning bay, creek, or inlet in Old Norse) came
to be synonymous with naval expedition, or a person on a naval expedition. As
such, the majority of the people who lived during the Viking Age in northern
Europe would not have been "Vikings". The true Vikings were those who
traveled on their dreaded long ships and fought in wars, raids, or just for
survival.
The bulk of the Northern European populace
were known collectively as the Norse. The Norse (or Northmen) were farmers,
traders, craftsmen, and musicians, as well as, feared warriors. They were known
for their naval prowess and swift longboats, that could easily carry a raiding
force inland on a shallow river or across a vast sea. For almost 400 years the
Norse spread across most of Europe and were the first Europeans to set foot on
North American soil.
The Viking Age ended as violently as it began, at the Battle of
Hastings*, between the King of
Norway, Harald III Sigurdsson (Haraldr harðráði), and Harold Godwinson King of
the Anglo-Saxons.
http://www.vikinginvasion.org/history.html
The battle of Hastings
The Battle of Hastings (14 October 1066) was the decisive Norman victory in the Norman
Conquest of England. It was fought between the Norman army of William the
Conqueror, and the English army led by Harold Godwinson.[1] The battle took place at Senlac Hill, approximately
6 miles north-west of Hastings.
The Norman
army was estimated to number as many as 8,400 and consisted of at the most
2,200 cavalry, 4,500 infantry and 1,700 archers and crossbowmen. William's
strategy relied on archers to soften the enemy, followed by a general advance
of the infantry, and then a cavalry charge. The Norman army was composed of nobles, mercenaries, and troops
from France and Europe, including some from southern Italy. The English army is
usually thought to have numbered roughly 7,500 and consisted entirely of infantry. It is most
probable that all the members of the army rode to battle, but once at the
appointed place they dismounted to fight on foot.
The battle was a decisive Norman victory. Harold II was killed;
traditionally, it is believed he was shot through the eye with an arrow.
Although there was further English resistance, this battle is seen as the point
at which William gained control of England.
The famous Bayeux Tapestry depicts the events before and during the battle. An abbey, known as Battle Abbey, was subsequently built on the site of the conflict.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/normans/1066_05.shtml
For further information visit: http://www.battle1066.com/intro.shtml
http://www.battle-of-hastings-1066.org.uk/
DARK AGES
The period following the withdrawal of the Roman legions from Britain
is generally known as the Dark Ages, simply because there is little known about
it.
The age is characterised by a continual struggle between warring
factions, including invaders from Germany and Scandinavia, finally resulting in
a unification of England under one ruler around the end of the first
millennium.
For almost 500 years Rome had kept at least three Legions and numerous
auxiliary troops in Britain. This was to ensure that the wealth of Britain
(tin, copper, iron and wool etc.) were available exclusively to Rome and not
the surrounding barbarian tribes.
Immediately after the Legions had departed the ownership of the land
(and wealth) was bitterly fought over by the native Celtic-Britons, Picts from
the North, Scots from Ireland and increasingly by the Germanic tribes across
the North Sea; mostly Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians from Denmark and
Northern Europe.
In the north the Britons were being attacked by the Picts and, to prevent
this, a warlord called Vortigern or ‘great leader’ hired mercenaries from
Saxony to defend against the threat. Following his success in stopping these
raids he became acknowledged as the most powerful ruler among the kingdoms in
Britain. The most famous of these mercenaries were Hengist and Horsa and when
Vortigern failed to pay them they rebelled and formed their own kingdoms.
The Anglo-Saxons continued to settle in Britain and, as their
territory expanded, they became more and more at odds with the native
Celtic-Britons culminating in a power struggle that, by AD600, eventually gave
the Anglo-Saxons control of the southern, eastern and midland parts of lowland
Britain. The Anglo-Saxon language and culture was slowly adopted until the
native language and culture of the Celtic-Britons only persisted in Cornwall
and Wales. This was the period that gave rise to the legend of King Arthur who
was one of the leaders of the Briton resistance against the Anglo-Saxons.
Even though the Anglo-Saxons had been successful in defeating the
Britons there was little unity amongst them; the Jutes controlled the Isle of
Wight, Kent and parts of Hampshire, the Saxon tribes controlled Sussex, Essex
and Wessex and the Angles controlled East Anglia, Northumbria and Mercia.
Gradually Northumbria became the major power and, by the beginning of
the 7th century, nearly became established as the ruler of the whole of
Anglo-Saxon England. But, by the second half of the century, the Mercians
gained the upper hand over Northumbria; Essex and East Anglia became subject
states by AD670. Wessex and the other kingdoms were also forced to accept
Mercian rule and by AD760 Offa, the greatest of the Mercian leaders, felt that
he could call himself "King of all England".
After the death of Offa's successor in AD821 the King of Wessex embarked on a series of campaigns that would eventually bring the whole of England under his rule. The Wessex line of succession, broken only by a brief period of Viking rule, would last until the death of Edward the Confessor in AD1066.
http://www.3dhistory.co.uk/02Saxons.htm
THE DANELAW
That part of England where Danish conquest and colonization in
the late 9th-c left an imprint not only on legal and administrative practices,
but on place-names, language, and culture. Danish-derived customs survived even
the Norman Conquest, and in the 12th-c all E England from the Thames to the
Tees was so designated.
The Danelaw (from the Old English Dena lagu, Danish: Danelagen ) is an
11th century name for an area of northern and eastern England under the
administrative control of the Danish Viking empire (or Danes, or Norsemen) from
the late 9th century. The term is also used to describe the set of legal terms
and definitions established between Alfred the Great and the Viking Guthrum,
which were set down following Guthrum's defeat at the Battle of Edington in
878. Later, around 886, the Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum was created, which
established the boundaries of their kingdoms and made some provision for
relations between the English and the Danes.
Geography of the Danelaw
The area occupied by the Danelaw was roughly the area to the north of
a line drawn between London and Chester.
Five fortified towns became particularly important in the Danelaw:
Leicester, Lincoln, Nottingham, Stamford and Derby, broadly covering the area now
called the East Midlands.
History of the Danelaw
From about 800 AD on, waves of Danish assaults on the coastlines of
the British Isles were gradually followed by a succession of Danish settlers.
In response to this Danish invasion, King Æthelred of Wessex and his
brother, Alfred, led their army against the Danes at Nottingham, but the Danes
refused to leave their fortifications.
The Danes under Ivar the Boneless continued their invasion in 870 by defeating King Edmund at Hoxne and thereby conquering East Anglia. Once again, the brothers Æthelred and Alfred attempted to stop Ivar by attacking the Danes, this time at Reading. The Danes pursued, and on January 7, 871, Æthelred and Alfred defeated the Danes at Ashdown.
Shortly thereafter, on April 23, 871, King Æthelred died and Alfred
succeeded him as King of Wessex.
Guthrum and the Danes brokered peace with Wessex in 876, when they
captured the fortresses of Wareham and Exeter the following year. Alfred laid
siege to the Danes, who were forced to surrender after reinforcements were lost
in a storm. The Danes were defeated and retreated to Chippenham, where King
Alfred laid siege and soon forced them to surrender. As a term of the
surrender, King Alfred demanded that Guthrum be baptized a Christian, which he
did (with King Alfred serving as his godfather).
This peace lasted until 884, when Guthrum once again attacked Wessex.
He was defeated, with Guthrum and Alfred agreeing to peace through the aptly
named Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum.
The reasons for these waves of immigrations are complex and bound to
the political situation in Scandinavia at that time;
The Danelaw was gradually eroded by Anglo-Saxon raids in later years.
Legal concepts of the Danelaw
The Danelaw was an important factor in the establishment of a civilian
peace in the neighbouring Anglo-Saxon and Viking communities.
Enduring impact of the Danelaw
The influence of this period of Scandinavian settlement can still be
seen in the North of England and the East Midlands, most evidently in place names:
name endings such as "by" or "thorp" being particular
giveaways.
• Toponyms
Scale (dwelling) ScalbyBeck
-by (village) Ormsby, Kirkby
-gill (ravine) Aisgill
-fell (hill) Cross Fell
-thorpe(farm) Priesthorpe
-slack (dell, valley) GartonSlack
-thwaiteMicklethwaite
• egg for OE ey
• sister for swuster
• leg for shanks
• Word pairs: skiff-ship; skirt-shirt
• OE words replaced by Scandinavian
words:
• take-niman; cast-weorpan
• cut-ceorfan, die-steorfan(starve)
Old Norse and Old English were still mutually comprehensible and the
mixed language of the Danelaw caused the incorporation of many Norse words into
the English language, including the word law itself, as well as the third
person plural pronouns they, them and their and most of the function words.
Four of the five boroughs became county towns — of the counties of
Leicestershire, Lincolnshire.
http://encyclopedia.stateuniversity.com/pages/5425/Danelaw.html
THE NORMAN CONQUEST
Although William the Conqueror was crowned King of England in 1066,
his sovereignty was recognized only in the Southeast; it took the Normans four
more years to subdue the whole country: the English did not want to accept the
new overlords and rebelled against them in the Southwest, the West, and the
North of the country. And the rebellions were handled with unusual ruthlessness
to deter further attempts to opposition to the new king.
Political
and social situation in England
The Norman Conquest brought about:
- The introduction of new nobility: many members of the English higher class died at Hastings; those who arrived, were treated like traitors and were soon executed. So that, for more than a century after the conquest, almost all large estates and important positions were in the hands of Normans (or other foreigners).
- The establishment of a strong military force control: the number of troops (from Normandy or from other foreign places) were constantly rising during the reign of William and his immediate successors.
- The important positions in the church were also given to Norman clergymen: the Norman gradually replaced English bishops and abbots. New monasteries were also founded and filled with foreign monks.
- A considerable number of merchants and craftsmen (the future bourgeoisie) arrived in England and settled in several cities.
The linguistic situation
The issue of the use of French and English in England (at the close of the twelfth century), it should be pointed out that there was actually a “trinlingual” scene:
The English language was, therefore, used side by side with French from 1066 to 1200 and – even being less prestigious- it functioned continuously in social, cultural and other spheres. As a result of the growing bilingualism (in a situation where French had higher prestige), English began to undergo serious changes under the influence of French. The reverse was probably true also, although on a much smaller scale.
In Early ME 91.5 % of words had English
origin; in later Middle English
this figure had fallen to 78.8 %.
• The language of 5 or 10% of the population
became the most substantial source of new words in written ME.
• 13th c. Parisian French superseded
Anglo-Norman French.
Vocabulary
• Pre-Conquest French borrowings: prud, castel.
• Early Post-Conquest words: natiuite, canceler, concilie, carite,
• Borrowings increased dramatically around
the 13th century, not because
of structural gaps but because they were
felt to be stylistically more suitable.
Norman and French Word Pairs
• Wile (1154) guile (1225)
• warrant(1225) guarantee (1624)
• warden(1225) guardian(1466)
• reward(1315) regard(1430)
Latin Borrowings in ME
• Words of common use: aggregate, applaude,
assimilate, etc.
• Words used in the church: curate,
pulpit; administration: legitimate, elect, convict; education:pedagogue,
graduate, literate.
MIDDLE ENGLISH DIALECTS
The Middle English dialects can be divided into five
major groups:
South-Western (SW) (or simply Southern), a
continuation of OE West Saxon
South-Eastern (SE) (or Kentish, though it extended
into neighbouring counties as well), a continuation of OE Kentish
East Midland (EM), in the eastern part of the OE
Mercian area
West Midland (WM), in the western part of the OE
Mercian area
Northern (N),
north of the Humber
http://www.hf.ntnu.no/engelsk/staff/johannesson/!oe/texts/imed/intro/intro_1w.htm