Julius Caesar and his strong Roman army invaded England in 55 B.C. He was unsuccessful at taking over the country or the language.
However Emperor Claudius and his Roman army invaded and conquered England in 43 A.D. Their language was called Latin. Latin never really took off and ordinary people did not speak Latin. The Romans stayed in power for almost 400 years.
In 449 A.D Teutonic tribes from Scandinavia and Northern Germany started to invade England. The tribes which invaded were the Saxons, the Angles, the Jutes and the Frisians. Nearly all the Roman towns were destroyed. The Angles and the Saxons united together to form several kingdoms. The language they created was Anglo-Saxon or Old English. It was closely related to Old High German, Frisian, and Scandinavian.
By the end of the 6th century the Anglo-Saxons came to be called the ‘Angles’ or the ‘Engles’. Old English was ‘Englisc’ and England was called ‘Engaland’. ‘Engaland’ and ‘Englisc’ eventually formed into England and English.
There are quite a few differences between Modern English and Old English. For example in Old English there are different letters in Old English such as ‘ð’ and ‘þ’, which are pronounced as ‘th’. There are unnecessary words in Old English e.g. line 1 in the ‘Lord’s Prayer’ is ‘who thee art in heaven.’ In this ‘thee’ is the unnecessary word. There are also non-existent words in Old English, such as ‘swa’, ‘gewurþe’, ‘gelæd’ and ‘gedæghwamlican’. Some verbs have different verb endings e.g. ‘forgyf’ which means ‘forgive us’ and ‘forgyfað which means ‘we forgive’. The word order in Old English is also different e.g. ‘Gewurþe ðin willa on eorðan swa swa on heofonum.’ As it is it is translated as, ‘Done thy will on earth as it is on heaven.’ In modern English it is translated as, ‘thy will be done on earth as it is on heaven.’
As well as the differences there are also some similarities in Old and Modern English. There are many recognisable words in Old English e.g. faeder can easily be seen as father, as is of, willa, is will, todæg as today and nama as name.
Robert of Gloucester’s extract quotes that higher class men would have spoken French, since you would have been thought very highly of if you spoke French. The higher classes would teach their children French. The lower classes were very proud of their language and continued speaking Old English. The French gave us a great influence in our language, particularly in Government, Law and the Church.
English consists of many languages. There have been many influences on English starting from 500 B.C and there are still influences on our language developing.
