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Was English spoken in pre-Roman Britain? | ||
Tags: Celtic languages | English | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Huey_Breaux Newbie United States Joined 6929 days ago 24 posts - 24 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Norwegian, French, Esperanto, Gujarati | Message 1 of 7 05 March 2007 at 6:38pm | IP Logged |
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There is an article in today's New York Times discussing the latest findings and theories on British genetics; language is also mentioned (page 2 of the article).
I was aware of newer theories disputing the widely-held notion that Angles, Saxons and Jutes ethnically cleansed the Celtic British in the 400-500s and in doing so repopulated England. These new theories are that the British people merely adopted some aspects of Anglo-Saxon culture and language quickly the way many of the Irish did so later (whereas other forms of Anglo-Saxon culture were never adopted). However, today's article suggests that English was a separate branch of Germanic (distinct from West Germanic languages) and has been the language of parts of England for at least 2,000 years. The absence of Celtic place names is cited as evidence to support this view. Anyway, I thought some of you might find it interesting as I know several readers here are familiar with Anglo-Saxon and the Celtic languages. Link to the article - English, Irish, Scots: They're All One Edited by Huey_Breaux on 05 March 2007 at 6:48pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| LilleOSC Senior Member United States lille.theoffside.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6691 days ago 545 posts - 546 votes  4 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: French, Arabic (Written) | Message 2 of 7 05 March 2007 at 7:23pm | IP Logged |
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Interesting article.Thanks for the link and info.
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 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6703 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3 of 7 06 March 2007 at 1:22am | IP Logged |
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As far as I can see the article only discusses the genetic material of the British population, and the thesis is that the Anglosaxons didn't kill off the original population (which may have been mostly Celtic, with even older populations such as the Picts in Scotland looming in the background), but just imposed their language on the majority of them. That in itself is a major feat, comparable to the Romanization of modern day France or Romania. In both these cases a fair amount of barbaric brutality was necessary, but not a complete extermination of the population.
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| Huey_Breaux Newbie United States Joined 6929 days ago 24 posts - 24 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Norwegian, French, Esperanto, Gujarati | Message 4 of 7 06 March 2007 at 7:12am | IP Logged |
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Although it is true the article was concerned for the most part with genetics, there was a discussion of language about halfway down the second page.
Britain A.D. (published in the past several years) collected archaeological arguments that rather than having the Anglo-Saxon language imposed them, the native British adopted the language of the Anglo-Saxon invaders due to its newfound power or prestige. However, the article yesterday called into question how English originally arrived in Britain. Some now believe that English (in some form) had already been spoken in Britain for centuries prior to the arrival of the Germanics who arrived after Rome withdrew. To the extent English has been grouped with Dutch and Frisian and German simply because the Anglo-Saxons were believed to have emigrated from the same Germanic lands 1,500 years ago, the classification of English may also require some review. Unfortunately the article did not go into detail as to why English would constitute an individual branch of the Germanic tree if it had been spoken in Britain for a much longer period of time. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| alfajuj Diglot Senior Member Taiwan Joined 6211 days ago 121 posts - 126 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: Taiwanese, French | Message 5 of 7 07 May 2008 at 5:53am | IP Logged |
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I for one, would love to know more about the possibility of English being its own branch of the Germanic tree. Is there any other research out there on this?
I thought that the lexical similarities of English to Frisian (about 80%) proved that The two languages are closest relatives to one another. I would think that proves that they are part of the same branch which is Western Germanic and geographically originating from the north sea area. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| scott_buxt Newbie United Kingdom Joined 6215 days ago 14 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* | Message 6 of 7 16 May 2008 at 7:01am | IP Logged |
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The Celts originally inhabited Britain, but not to the same extent they did the six celtic nations. When the anglo-saxons came, some celts stayed(like the semi-mythical king arthur) to fight, some ran to places like cornwall etc, some just stayed. I can't say much bar what i've read, which is only about the above historical part. Also, the Irish didn't so much adapt the English language, as it was forced upon on them.
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| Sulpicius Diglot Groupie United States Joined 6027 days ago 89 posts - 91 votes Speaks: English*, Latin Studies: French, Arabic (Written) | Message 7 of 7 27 May 2008 at 5:49am | IP Logged |
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I don't think so. Old English, which was used for things such as Beowulf and Judith, is highly linked to German, and thus there are is a great deal of influence from the invaders.
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