Excerpt from A Brief History of English John Devine
Have you ever wondered where words come from? They do not drop out of the sky or spring up from the earth. There was no
prehistoric gathering of cavemen at which our ancestors put down their clubs and picked up stone pens and forged the first
Language. The origin of language, including the English language, is a mystery
Scholars differ in their attempts to come to terms with the history of the English language. Some divide it into three distinct
periods (Old English, Middle English, and Modern English) while others divide it into four or five. Regardless of how one
organizes this history, however, one thing is clear the language that we speak every day was shaped by an incredible array of
events and will continue to change as long as it is spoken
Sit is estimated that about four hundred million people in the world today speak English as a first language. Perhaps as many
as eight hundred million more speak English to some extent English is the most common language used on the Internet
How did the English language become so widespread and so influential?
The word English derives from a West Germanic tribe called the Angles. This tribe, along with others such as Saxons and
Jutes, invaded England about fifteen centuries ago. As remote and irrelevant as this invasion may seem, had it not occurred,
we would speak, write, and think in a radically different language. Without the Anglo-Saxon influence, we would lose such
basic words as sea, gold, man, and island
Highlighs
Time
Remaining
00:05:34
Hide Tools
The word English derives from the name
which tribe?
A)
Angles
B)
Inglits
Ongtals
D)
Ugarits