Resources: History of English

Wow, where has the time gone? Coping with snow, teaching Credit Analysts from the Saudi Industrial Development Fund at Queen's, and looking after our writing clients has transformed the last three weeks into a blur. I'll try to be more reliable in posting to this blog.

In the meantime, here is an excerpt from The History of English.

A Brief History of the English Language

From http://grammar.about.com/od/words/a/historytimeline.htm

The Prehistory of English

The ultimate origins of English lie in Indo-European, a family of languages consisting of most of the languages of Europe as well as those of Iran, the Indian subcontinent, and other parts of Asia. Because little is known about ancient Indo-European (which may have been spoken as long ago as 3,000 B.C.), we'll begin our survey in Britain in the first century A.D. 43 The Romans invade Britain, beginning 400 years of control over much of the island.

410 The Goths (speakers of a now extinct East Germanic language) sack Rome. The first Germanic tribes arrive in Britain.

Early 5th century
With the collapse of the empire, Romans withdraw from Britain. Britons are attacked by the Picts and by Scots from Ireland. Angles, Saxons, and other German settlers arrive in Britain to assist the Britons and claim territory.

5th-6th centuries
Germanic peoples (Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians) speaking West Germanic dialects settle most of Britain. Celts retreat to more distant areas of Britain: Ireland, Scotland, Wales.

For more, go to History of English at Writing Tips at Moore Partners.