KISII UNIVERSITY COLLEGE

FACULTY OF RTS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

BACHELOR OF EDUCATION ARTS
YEAR 1 SEM 2, CF: 3.0, 45 HOURS
COURSE : ENG 121
COURSE TITLE : History and Development of English
COURSE INSTRUCTOR : Everlyne Onkwani
CONTACTS : 0720891402 0732032076

LECTURE NOTES
ENGLISH LANGUAGE: THE ROOTS; THE LANGUAGE SITUATION IN ENGLAND
BEFORE ENGLISH; THE ROMAN CONQUEST
English Language: The Roots
 English did not originate in England. In Europe, languages are grouped into „families‟
depending on the features of each member of the group.
 English belongs to the group known as the “Indo-European Family” which includes most
of the languages in Europe.
 Within the Indo-European family, are other sub-groups called Italic and Germanic.
 Germanic is also known as Teutonic. Latin and French developed from Italic at different
times. The Germanic group has three branches namely North Germanic, East Germanic,
and West Germanic. It is not certain whether North, East and West Germanic represent
actual languages.
 The North Germanic is the group where we find language like Danish, Swedish,
Norwegian and Icelandic.
 The West Germanic group developed into modern German, Dutch, Frisian and English.
In this group are still other sub-groups, namely High West Germanic and the Low West
Germanic due to their grammatical features.
 Both English and Frisian belong to the Low West Germanic and are therefore the closest
of relatives.
 Frisian is spoken in North-west Netherlands.
 Remember that when we say that languages belong to one linguistic „family‟, it means
that they share essential similarities in grammar and in their stock of words. English was
separated from its Germanic root when some Germanic tribes: the Angles, the Saxons

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 and the Jutes migrated from their original home in North-western Europe to Britain, and
English language began to develop into an independent language with new characteristics
distinct from other Germanic languages.

The Language Situation in England before English

 English came to England only at about the middle of the 5th century, whereas men had
inhabited Britain for thousands of years before then.
 The first people known to have inhabited the island that was later to become England
were the Celts and they spoke „Celtic‟.
 The Celtic language and its varieties were another branch of the Indo-European family.
The Celtic languages were the most extensive groups in the Indo-European family to be
spoken in England at that time and up till today a good number of people in some parts of
Wales and Highlands of Scotland still speak it.
 When Latin was later introduced in Britain, Celtic remained the language of the
populace, especially of the rural dwellers.
 How the Celts came to England is not really known but history confirms that at the
beginning of the Christian era, the Celts were found in Spain, West Germany, Italy and
Great Britain. In fact they covered some greater part of Western Europe. Some centuries
earlier they were said to have gained entry to Greece and Asia Minor. But how the Celtic
languages increasingly declined over time is still quite surprising.
 Today Celtic languages are found only in some remote areas of France and Britain as we
said earlier. The impact of Celtic on modern English however, has survived mainly on
place-names. Names of cities like Belfast, York, London, Glasgow or Cardiff are Celtic.
The Roman Conquest
 The Romans under Julius Caesar first invaded Britain in 55B.C, but the actual conquest
was in AD 43 under Claudius when the Celtic warriors could no longer resist the much
stronger Roman army.

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  The Roman occupation of Britain lasted from about AD 43 until 410. This was a very
long period which invariably planted much of Roman occupation, civilization and culture
in Britain.
 Latin was the language of the Romans so it became the official language, in the Roman
Britain especially in towns and cities.
 Celtic was spoken in the rural areas. In some localities outside the cities, Latin was
spoken; workmen and artisans were familiar with the language as they often scratched
Graffiti on tiles and some pieces of pottery. At this time, English had not come. Since
Latin was not wide spread enough it could not survive the later Germanic invasions.
Latin began to wane around AD 410, the time the last of the Roman troops were
officially withdrawn from Britain.
 However, the Roman conquests have some linguistic contributions to the present day
English lexicon. For instance, the old English “Caestar” (an enclosed place) is from the
Latin “casta” (camp).
 Today we have some English place-names like Chester, Dorchester, Manchester and
Lancaster. The Latin „portus‟ (gate) gave English the following names: Newport, Port
sea, Portsmouth; from Latin „mons‟ (mountain) we have Larchmont, and Oakmont, while
the Latin „turris‟ (tower) gave rise to Torrington, Torbridge. So you can see that Latin
contributed to the development of English.

ANGLO-SAXON CONQUEST; THE ORIGIN AND STATUS OF OLD ENGLISH;

SOME FEATURES OF THE OLD ENGLISH

Anglo-Saxon Conquest
 The Romans occupied Britain for more than 300 years. But the power of the Roman
Empire began to decline due to series of attacks from Northern Europe and the Romans
needed to protect their territories.
 Consequently the Roman soldiers in Britain were withdrawn to fight subsequent battles.
This left the Celts unprotected.
 There were two tribes from Northern Britain which the Romans did not conquer, known
as the Picts and Scots.

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 These people saw the withdrawal of the Romans as an opportunity to attack and plunder
the much vulnerable Celts.
 The Celts then appealed to the Germanic warriors - the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes
for help. They came in great numbers and at different times.
 The Angles from the modern state of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany came in AD547 and
settled in the north and central England.
 The Saxons (AD 477) also from modern Germany occupied the south of the island; while
the Jutes occupied Kent.
 The Jutes were the first to arrive in AD 449 driving the indigenous Celtic speaking
people notably the Britons to the North and West – the present day Wales. The Jutes were
from modern Denmark or Northern Germany; their territory bordered that of Saxons.
 These Germanic tribes helped the Celts defeat the attacking Picts and Scots, but then
turned around to loot, and destroy their host country and eventually occupied it.
 The Celts realized too late that their friends had become their conquerors. Although wars
to resist the Germanic tribes continued for the next 200 years, the Celts could not drive
the Germanic tribes out.
 Some of the Celts were rather driven to places like Wales, Cornwall and the Scottish
highlands.
 Those who remained were forced to accept the government of the new comers and
became absorbed through inter-marriages. After a few centuries, the Celts lost their
identity within the Anglo-Saxon society.
 The Germanic tribes had a lot of things in common: they were seminomadic (they moved
from place to place) warlike, sea-fearing but land loving.
 The Angles and the Saxons were more in number than the Jutes, and were also more
persistent. The Celts called the invaders “Sassenachs” i.e. “Saxons” regardless of their
specific tribes.
 By the end of the 6th century the term “Angles” was used. During the seventh century the
Latin name for the country was Angli or Anglia. This became “Engle” in Old English,
while the name of the language was called “Englisc”. It was around the 10th century that
the word “Englaland” or “Aegle-land”, (land of the Angles) appeared; this later became
England.

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The Origin and Status of Old English
 Old English was the language the three Germanic tribes spoke as they settled in England.
 It was more of a fusion of the dialects of the Germanic tribes and it is difficult to say how
much the speech of the Angles differs from that of the Saxons or that of the Jutes.
However, it was never a uniform language.
 Four main dialects of the Old English were spoken during this period namely,
Northumbrian, Mercian, West- Saxon and Kentish.
 These dialects were spoken in different parts of Britain and Scotland. For instance,
Northumbria and Mercian were spoken in the region north of the Thames where the
Angles occupied.
 English belongs to the low Germanic branch of the Indo-European family. This means
that English has in common certain characteristics with other Germanic languages. For
instance, it has both the „weak‟ and „strong‟ stress patterns in adjectives and verbs. It
shows that there is a strong stress accent on the first or the root syllable of most words.
 This feature is common to all Germanic languages since it is mainly responsible for the
decay of inflections in these languages.

Some Features of the Old English

 The period from AD450 to 1150 is referred to as Old English.
 The grammar of the Old English took after the Latin grammar. One of the features of
Latin is that it is heavily inflected. This means that the Latin words are full of inflections;
what you may call affixes today. That is why the Old English period is sometimes called
the period of full inflection, because during this period, the endings of nouns, adjectives
and verbs had inflections.
 A noun for example is described in terms of cases, Latin has six (6) cases, Nominative
(subject), Genitive (possessive), Accusative (objective), Dative (indirect object) Ablative
and Vocative. The Latin “Nauta” (sailor) for example has its singular form (nominative)
as „nauta‟, plural “nautae”.

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 Remember in its grammar, Old English resembled Latin. The nouns and adjectives are
inflected for up to four or five cases. The old English “fisc” (fish) for example has the
following cases:

Singular Plural
Nominative fisĉ fisĉas
Genitive fisĉes fisĉa
Accusative fisĉ fiscas
Dative fisĉa fîscum
 Old English adjectives had separate forms of each of the three genders. For example: gōd
(good)

Masculine Feminine Neuter

Nominative gōd gōd gōd
Genitive gōdes gōdre gōdes
Dative gōdum gōdre gōd

 Old English takes much of Latin. In pronunciation, Old English differs a great deal from
its modern equivalent. For example, the Old English “stan” is the modern „stone‟ but the
vowel differs. This is the same thing in words like halig (holy); gań (go), bán- (bone) ráp
(rope), c_ne (keen), fyr (fire), sc_ap (sheep) etc.
 The difference is also reflected in spelling. Because the Old English represented the
sound „sh‟, by „sc‟ the spelling of „sheep‟ was written as „„sceap‟.
 Old English vocabulary is almost entirely lifted from the Germanic languages.
 A large part of this vocabulary has disappeared today.
 When the Northern conquest introduced French to England as the language of the upper
classes, much of the Old English vocabulary for literature and education gave way to
words borrowed from French and Latin.

 Those that survived were very few, with such words as „mann‟ (man), „wif‟ (wife) „cild‟
(child) „h_s‟ (house) etc.

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  Both in grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation, old English is distinct from modern
English. Below is a sample from a West-Saxon version of the gospel according to Saint
John Chapter 1:1-3
TEXT 1
On frymthe waes Word, and thaet Word waes mid Gode and God waes thaet
Word. That waes on fruman mid Gode. Ealle thing waeron geworhte thurh hyre;
and nan thing naes geworht butan him. In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with
God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that
was made.

INFLUENCES ON THE OLD ENGLISH: RELIGION, THE DANISH INVASION AND

THE AGE OF THE VIKINGS

This section introduces some of the influences on old English. The most important are religion
(Christianity) and the Danish conquest.

Religious Influence on Old English

 Christianity was introduced in England at about AD597 and from this time to the close of
the Old English period (around AD1100) is over 500 years.
 The dominant church then was the Roman Catholic and the religious zeal that greeted the
7th century was responsible for building churches and monasteries. And Latin being the
primary language of religion was once again rapidly imported.
 The temporary decline Latin experienced earlier with the coming of the Anglo-Saxons
was overtaken by this religious revival.
 The missionaries from Rome did not only introduce Christianity, they came with classical
civilization, education and the Latin language, which was the universal language of the
church and education.
 Many of the Latin words were adopted early, while some were adopted towards the end
of the tenth and eleventh centuries. These words also found their way into the literature of

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 the time. Normally, it is expected that the new words would express new ideas and
concepts. So the new religion introduced words about the church, and explained its
internal and external organization. Remember that the Anglo-Saxons were not Christians,
so the church and pagan ideas and customs survived side by side. But much of paganism
was absorbed by the church.
 With education the Anglo-Saxons could record their tradition and poetry. People began to
express themselves in literature.
 One of the first works of Literature in the Old English language is called “Beowulf.”The
author is one of the earliest converts who were educated in classical literature. He must
have read some of the earliest classical writers called Virgil and Homer. Virgil wrote
Aeneid; while Homer wrote the Odyssey. Another product of this early Christian
education is a man by name Bede - Venerable Bede. Bede was born in Northumbria and
educated at the University of Warmouth. He authored the Ecclesiastical History of the
English Nation; this was just one of the thirty-six books credited to him. He wrote in
Latin.

Words Relating to Religion

 Some words relating to Christianity such as “Church” and “Bishop” were borrowed
earlier because the Anglo-Saxon had had contact with some bishops and had plundered
churches before they came to England. But most of the words relating to religion were
borrowed at the time of Christian evolution. The following words given in their modern
forms have survived over time: canon, alms, chalice, altar, angel, anthem, epistle, hymn,
litany, cleric, martyr, nun, minister, organ, pope, priest, psalm, provost, shift, shrine,
deacon, synod, temple, noon, ark, candle etc.
 The church also influenced the domestic life of the people. You can see this in the words
that relate to clothing and household use, e.g. cap, sock, silk, mat, sack, purple; words
denoting food or food items such as beef, cabbage, lentil, millet, pear, oyster, lobster,
mussel were also adopted from religion. Some number of words that relate to education
and learning show another dimension of the church‟s influence. Such words are school,
Latin, master, grammatic, verse, meter, rotary etc.

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  Names of trees, plant and herbs are also rooted in religion. Examples are lily, pine aloes,
balsam, fennel, hyssop, mallow, myrrh and the general word “plant‟. There are various
words that one can trace to the religion of this period like anchor, fan, fever, place,
sponge, phoenix, elephant, circle, giants, legion, talent and consuls.

The Danish invasion and the age of the Vikings

 Towards the end of the Old English period, another invasion of England took place, this
time by the Danes from Denmark. Also called the Vikings, their contact with English
constituted another major influence on the language.
 Denmark, Sweden and Norway are among countries that come from the Scandinavian
region.
 The Scandinavians, i.e., the Swedish, and the Norwegians were actually neighbours to
Anglo-Saxons and were even related in language and blood.
 Their plundering activities started from the 8th century to the beginning of the 11th
century.
 The climax of their achievement came in the 11th century when the King of Denmark
took over the throne of England, conquered Norway and rule the greater part of the
Scandinavians world.
 The period of the Danish activities and influence from 1014 -1039 is known as the
Viking Age.
 The Danish attacks were in three stages:
a. The first early stages, between AD787 and 850, were characterized by
plundering of towns and church facilities.
b. The second stage was in 850 when the Danes came in a fleet of 350
ships. They invaded and captured Canterbury London, York and East
Anglia. By 878 they had overrun almost the whole of Britain.
c. The third stage of the Scandinavian invasion was more of political
adjustment and assimilation from 878 to 1042. In 1042 the English
king was sent on exile and for the next 25 years England was ruled by
the Danes.

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  As the Vikings became permanent settlers in England they gradually got absorbed in the
native population and accepted the Anglo-Saxon religion and language. Their adoption of
the language, though very similar with theirs, altered the Old English in some noticeable
ways, especially its influenced on place names.
 More than 1,400 places in England bear Scandinavian names. Their early acceptance of
Christianity can also be seen in the Scandinavian names found among the Monks, Priests
and Bishops. The Danes settled mainly in Northumbria, and the West Coast of Ireland.
 The relationship between the Old English and Danish (also called Norse) was more of
interference.
 The situation is similar to what is obtainable in many cities of the world today where
people from different cultures leave and spoke different languages. In some parts of
Scotland, Norse was spoken as late as the 17th century, while in some part of England,
English was generally spoken but newcomers to such districts will normally speak their
own languages.
 There is no doubt that many words in modern English are borrowed from the
Scandinavian tongue. For example in Old English, the modern sound of „sh‟ (like ship) is
written as „sc‟. In the Scandinavian sound „sk‟ is retained in modern English. Native
words like ship, shall, fish have „sh‟ in modern English.
 Words borrowed from the Scandinavian are still pronounced with „sk‟ e.g. sky, skin, skill,
scrape, whisk or bask. The O.E „scyrte‟ has become “shirt” while the corresponding O.N
(Old Norse) from “skyrta” is retained “skirt”. Also words with the retention of „g‟ sound
as in get, give, gild and egg indicate Scandinavian origin.

Scandinavian Place Names

 One of the notable evidences of the Viking settlement is the extensive number of place
names in England.
 More than 600 places with names ending in –by are Scandinavian e.g. Grimsby, Wgitby,
Derby, Rugby, Thoresby etc. Some 300 names end with – pe. As in Althorp,
Bishopsthorpe, Gawthorpe, etc.

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  The Scandinavian „thrope‟ means village. Some others contain the word „thwaite‟
meaning „an isolated peace of land”. They include Applethwaite, Braithwaite,
Cowperthwaite etc.
 About a hundred names bear the ending „toft‟ (a piece of ground) e.g. Brimtoft, Eastoft
Langtoft, Nortoft etc. Personal names ending with the suffix „son‟ are also of
 The earliest influence of the Norse on the Old English vocabulary is words that are
associated with sea-faring or sea-roving. You know that the Danes lived an adventurous
and predatory life. The Old English scegÞ (vessel), lip (fleet), scegÞmann (pirate), dreng
(warrior) etc. are Scandinavian words.
 Later, a number of words relating to law, and those relating to the social and itself is a
Scandinavian word.
Scandinavian Words
Some common place nouns that have the Scandinavian origin are bank, birth, bull, dirt, down,
dregs, egg, fellow, gap, guess, kid, leg, loan, mire, root, scales, score, seat, sister, skin, sky,
slaughter, thrift, tidings, trust etc. among adjectives we have awkward, flat, ill, brose, low, meek,
rotten, rugged, tight, and weak. There are also some number of verbs, such as grave, call, crawl,
die, gape, get, give, lift, nag, raise, scare, take, thrive. These are some of the words that the
Danish invasion and subsequent settlement introduced to English.*
MIDDLE ENGLISH PERIOD: THE NORMAN CONQUEST (1066-1200); THE
ASCENDANCY OF FRENCH; THE FUSION OF FRENCH AND
ENGLISH; RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF ENGLISH

Middle English Period: The Norman Conquest (1066-1200)

 The civilization of Normandy was essentially French, and the Normans were among the
most progressive and advanced of the people of Europe at this time.
 Before the conquest, England and Normandy had enjoyed a fair long standing
relationship.
 For instance, one of the English kings (Ethelred) married a Norman wife and when he
was driven to exile by the Danes, he took refuge with his brother-in-law, the duke of
Normandy.
 His son Edward, then brought up in France was more of French than English.
 In 1042, the Danish government declined in England and Edward known as the confessor
was restored to the throne from which the Danes had earlier expelled his father.
 He came back with his Norman friends, enriched them and gave them important positions
in his government, thus a strong French atmosphere reigned in the English court during
the 24 years of Edward‟s government.

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  Edward died in 1066 without a son to succeed him. William the Duke of Normandy was
a second cousin of the late King Edward and had nursed the ambition of succeeding the
king.
 His relationship with Edward however, didn‟t give him any right to the English throne.
So he decided to take the throne by force. This he did, and at the battle of Hastings, his
forces killed the reigning king Harold and defeated his army.
 William was eventually crowned king of England on the 25th December 1066.
 With the possession of the English crown, William introduced new nobility. Most of the
English higher class died in the war at Hasting and those that escaped were treated as
traitors.
 By 1072, the Old English nobility was practically wiped out, and their places were filled
with Norman followers of the king.
 What the Norman settlement in England meant to language was that French, which was
the language of the Normans, was introduced as a second official language in England.
And it functioned particularly as the language of the upper class.
 Unlike the Anglo-Saxons language that came to replace the existing Celtic language,
French was adopted to be used side by side with English but the two languages were to
perform different roles.

The Ascendancy of French

 Following William of Normandy‟s ascension of the English throne, French strictly
became the language of government.
 French speaking officials of government were appointed, who in turn brought their own
personal staff.
 French speaking bishops and clergymen were also appointed, and for almost 20 years of
the invasion of England, almost all the religious houses were under French-speaking
superiors.
 Large numbers of French merchants and craft men flooded England to take advantage of
the commercial opportunities provided by the new regime.
 The French nobles and aristocrats in England retained their links with Normandy where
their estates and investments were.
 For about 200 years after the Norman Conquest, French remained the language of
communication among the upper and ruling class in England. Initially only those who
spoke French were of the Norman descent, but soon through intermarriages and
association with the ruling class, many English speaking people found it a social
advantage to learn French, and before long the distinction between those that spoke
French and those that spoke English was no more ethnic but social.
 To be more socially recognised, one had to learn to speak French. Bilingualism
flourished; English people needing to cross some social hurdles and gain some advantage
from the aristocracy learned French.
 Some junior staff of government who needed to improve their daily communication
contact with the local communities however, learned English. The language of the masses
remained English.
 It was the language of the inferior class.
 Some of the factors that favoured the continual use of French by the English upper class
were the close link between England and Europe, especially Normandy.

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  From the time of the conquest, the kings of England were also dukes of Normandy.
William himself was more attached to his dukedom and spent more of his time in
Normandy than in England.
 The English nobility were also more of French aristocracy.
 Their business interests and possession were in the continent especially France and many
of them spent most of their time there. They frequently contracted marriage there also.
 The Normans maintained a strict French culture and civilization in England and this
raised the status of French above all other languages.

The Fusion of French and English

 The French language exerted a lot of influences on the English people‟s life, socially,
politically and religiously.
 Most of the abbots (clergymen) and monks were Normans.
 For example, the Archbishops of Canterbury and of York were Normans and spoke
French. English kings were equally dukes of Normandy.
 William even considered Normandy more important that he left it to his eldest son while
England was for his second son.
 All English kings until Edward IV (1461-1483) made it a tradition to marry French
wives. The English nobility were equally French conscious, marrying French wives and
engaging in French wars and campaigns.
 Most literary works in England at that time were all written in the language and were
encouraged by members of the upper class.
 However, English survived in some monasteries and among church men, the ability to
speak English was fairly common. And interestingly, some notable bishops of Norman
descent spoke French, English and Latin.
 Both languages were used by the upper class and nobility. But French was the language
of social civilization and refinement.
 English held a subordinate position and remained the language of the low class.

Re-Establishment of English
 Changing social and political conditions in Europe and England after 1200 gave rise to
re-establishment of English language in the English public service.
 As a result of these changes, English became more widely used among the upper classes.
 The English and Normans had so lived together, doing things together and intermarrying,
that the two nations became so mixed up that it became difficult to tell who was English
or who was French.
 And by the end of the 12th century, it was noticed that some children of the nobility
spoke English as their mother tongue and were taught French at school.
 French continued to be used in government and in courts. Now what happened that raised
the status of English?
 From 1204 a different political and economic climate emerged.
 King John of England lost his control of Normandy, because of a conflict he had with
king Philip of France. Consequently the English nobility lost their estates in France and
enmity grew between England and France.
 This led to about a hundred years war (1337-1453). The popularity of French began to
decline as the spirit of English nationalism grew.

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  In 1362, English was used for the first time at the opening of parliament.
 By about 1425, English became more popular in England and was used in speaking and
writing.
 Remember that when Normandy was lost, many English noblemen lost their estates and
were forced to look up to England as their primary concern. This helped the English
language.
 English survived more because the language in the 11th century was well established,
unlike the Celtic and had a considerable written literature and strong tradition.
 French was mainly the language of government, law, administration, literature and the
church. Latin was also used in education, administration and worship.
 By the 13th century the position of English became clearer when it was evident that a
number of sermons, prayers, poems and songs were written in English language.
 Finally in 14th century, major achievements in Middle English literature began to
emerge, with the works of Geoffrey Chaucer.

ENGLISH AND FRENCH IN THE 13TH CENTURY; THE DECLINE OF FRENCH; THE
RISE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS; GENERAL ADOPTION OF ENGLISH

English and French in the 13th Century

 In the 13th century French and English continued to function as the primary language of
communication.
 The upper class mostly continued to speak French, but this time, it was no longer as the
mother tongue inherited from Norman ancestors but as a matter of social custom,
business and administrative convention.
 Meanwhile English made progress and it was becoming a favourite language.
 When the English nobles lost their interest in Normandy and France English became a
matter of general use among the upper class.
 At this time also, there was wholesale adoption of French words into English; the reason
being that those who spoke French now tried to express themselves in English.
 Within this period also, literature that was intended to entertain the nobility began to be
translated from French to English.
 Towards the end of the 13th century, children of the upper class began to speak English
as their mother-tongue, which implied that English was becoming a household language
among the upper class.
 English was used in parliament, in the law courts and in public communication.
 The spread of English among the upper class was making steady progress and the general
attitude began to favour the use of English.
 The attitude then was that the language for proper English people to know and use was
English.
The Decline of French
 French began to lose its status as the official language of England in 1204 when King
John lost the control of Normandy.
 This affected the fortunes of the English nobles who lost their estates and began to lose
their connections with the continent.
 Consequently, they began to see themselves as English men and began to identify with
English cultures including language.

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  Hundred Years of War (1337-1453) led to the decline of French. Edward III claimed the
French throne and invaded France. England was victorious at Crecy (1346) and Poitiers
(1346).
 Henry V also won a significant victory over France in 1415. This long time antagonism
and hostility among the two nations contributed to the weakening of the influence of
French in England and enhanced interest in learning and using the English language.
 At the close of the 13th century, it was clear that French was losing its hold on England
and the tendency to communicate in English was becoming increasingly stronger, even in
the church and universities.
 The provincial character of French in England also undermined the position of French in
England. French was spoken in provinces, and was particularly restricted to the ruling
and upper classes.
 Norman French was a mixture of dialect, which became further corrupted by contact with
English.
 The Anglo-Saxon French was no-standard French. So, when the opportunity came to
drop the language, it was quite easy to do.

The Rise of the Middle Class

 English rose and the use of French in England was de-empasized because as the living
conditions and prestige of the common people improved, it also improved the position of
English Language. This was as a result of:
The Black Death- Led to death of 40% of the clergy, 30% of general
population and Villeinage – high death rate of the villeins (labourers)
during the Black Death caused by the plague/epidemic/diseases.
Many villeins (labourers) escaped England during the Plague.
Discontent soon arose, which led to the Peasants‟ Revolt of 1381. Coupled
with the effect of the Black Death, the importance of the labouring class
was recognized.
This increased the importance of the language of the emerging class,
which is English.
Another important group arose - the craft men and the merchant class. By
1250 England had grown to about 200 towns with increasing populations.
Some places like London and York were considerably large. The people
were engaged in trade mostly. Some were in manufacturing crafts, with
commercial groups and fraternities to secure their positions. In these
environments, each town began to have a strong wealthy class, standing
halfway between the rural low class (the peasants) and the aristocracy
which was then hereditary. With such changes, you can see that the social
and economic life of the English speaking population was a great
advantage to the final triumph of the English language

General Adoption of English

 English in the 14th C began to gain ascendancy in England.
 Popular literature of this period was primarily in English, which until a generation before
had been in French.

15
 Though the English was now understood by everyone, French did not die out completely.
It was still used in the courts although English had largely taken its place.
 Those who spoke French in the 14th century were bilingual, and some people in the
upper class still spoke French in the parliament when necessary but generally used
English.
 In 1362, the Chancellor opened parliament for the first time with a speech in English.
 In 1388 parliament required all gilds (professional associations) to submit reports on their
foundations, statuses, property etc. The submissions were mostly in Latin, but about 49 of
them were in English, out numbering those in French.
 Towards the latter part of the century, much of the business of parliament was conducted
in English. When Richard II was deposed of, the article of accusation read to him was in
Latin and English. The order deposing him was also read to him in English.
 Henry IV‟s speeches claiming and accepting the throne was delivered in English.
 In the 14th century English was again the mother tongue of English.
 To give English language its rightful place in all England, steps were taken to adopt it in
the English legal system.
 Hitherto, French had been the language of legal proceedings. But in the 14th century it
became necessary to reverse the trend.
 In 1356 the Mayor of London ordered that proceedings in the Sheriff‟s courts in London
and Middlesex be conducted in English. In 1362, “the statue of pleading” in court was
enacted, stating that all lawsuits shall be conducted in English, and the reason for this was
that French was much unknown in the country.
 By the 14th century English began to be used in schools and by 1385 the practice had
become general and overwhelming.
 By the 15th century, the French language became increasingly unknown. Many nobles
could no longer speak French and the ability to communicate in French was viewed as an
accomplishment.
 The last significant progress which the English was to make in its growth to supremacy
was its use in writing.
 Before the Norman conquest, Latin was the recognized language of literature and written
communication, and before the 14th century French was adopted as the first language of
England and the primary language of writing and literature. In the 14th century English
replaced both.
 After 1450 letters were written in English as a general rule. Wills were also written in
English. For example, the wills of Henry IV, Henry V and Henry VI were all written in
English. English was also adopted in writing records of towns and gilds and in branches
of the central government.
 At about 1430 many towns were translating their ordinances and their customary books
in English. And English became general in their transactions.
 After 1450s the English literature of the Middle English period showed that English had
gained general adoption throughout England.
 Where French had enjoyed primacy as the language of poetry and books among the
nobles, English now became the preferred medium.
 It was this general adoption of English by all classes in the latter part of the 14th century
that triggered a new interest in literature, which gave rise to a high point of English
literary achievements in the Middle Ages.

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  The period between 1350 and 1400 had been called the period of great individual writers.
This was the period that Geoffrey Chaucer, (1300- 1400) regarded as the greatest English
poet before Shakespeare wrote, authored a love story titled Troilus and Criseyde as well
as the Canterbury Tales. Other big names of English literature of this period include
William Langland, author of Piers Plowman (1362-1387); John Wycliffe, the translator
of the Bible and the unknown poet who wrote one of the finest of the Middle English
Romances titled Sir Gawain and the Green Knight”.
 Middle English no doubt, contributed immensely to the fortunes of the English language.

CHARACTERISTICS OF MIDDLE ENGLISH: GRAMMAR, VOCABULARY,

SPELLING AND SPEECH SOUNDS

 Middle English is characterized by the decay of inflections which was a feature of Latin
in Old English since it was difficult to pronounce stress on the first syllable of words
places by inflections.
 There was a development of a fixed pattern of word order between clause elements. The
subject-verb-object (SVO) order that was partially evident in Old English was now
consolidated.
 Where the Old English would say „robbed they‟, Middle English would say “they
robbed”. Today, we rely much on word order to enable us work out grammatical
function. In Old English this was determined by inflections.
 Nouns lost their numerous inflectional endings or declensions as a result of decay of
inflections.
 In early Middle English, only two methods of indicating plurals remained fairly distinct: -
s, - es or – en, (as in oxen).
 Adjectives also lost their inflections, partly because of changes in sounds. What this
means is that rather than have a word like „blinde‟ in Old English as “blinda - blinde and
blindan” indicating singular and plural, it became simply „blinde‟ (blind) in Middle
English.
 So we can easily say “blind man” or “blind Men.” In Old English it would be something
like “blinde man” or “blindan men”.
 Decay of inflections the structure of nouns and adjectives were now simplified and it
became necessary to depend less on gender, case, and number.
 The relation of words in a sentence was indicated using word order and prepositions.
 Demonstratives and pronouns forms were also reduced and simplified. For example, the
various forms of sē, sēo, ðæt (i.e. the) survived as “the” and “that” through Middle
English till today.
 The demonstrative “pēs” “pēos” “pis” (i.e. this) was also reduced to “this”.
 However, some personal pronouns in Old English were retained e.g. hē (he) hēo (she) hit
(it).
 The same is true of some forms of accusative (objective) and dative (indirect object)
which were combined e.g. him, her (t) hem, h (it). This means that rather than have
different forms say “him” or “her” as direct object and indirect object. The Middle
English had the same form e.g. I gave him the book (indirect object). I love him (direct
object). This survived till Modern English.

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  In Old English, “him” would have different forms using inflections to show grammatical
functions (i.e. to indicate which is direct or indirect object in this case).
 Some nominative (subjective) plurals were also extended to all cases of plural appearing
in Modern English as “those” and “these”. The second person pronouns in Middle
English looked like this:

Function Singular Plural

Subjective
(nominative) Thou Ye
Objective (accusative) Thee You
Possessive (genitive) Thy/thine Your/yours

 In Old English, verbs generally had two forms depending on their conjugations “strong
verbs” and “weak verbs”. Strong verbs are those whose forms are changed in order to
derive their past tense. Today, we call them “irregular verbs” e.g. write, wrote, written, or
sing, sang, sung; while weak verbs (regular verbs) are those that take –d, -ed, or –en for
their past tense, e.g. walk, walked, walked.
 In Middle English, almost one third of strong verbs in Old English died out.
 Some strong verbs in Old English became weak verbs in Middle English.
 English was mainly spoken by the lower class and largely removed from the influences of
education and literature; many speakers were already wrongly applying the pattern of
weak verbs. For example, we have come, came, come (strong verb) but drive, drove,
driven; (notice “driven”) as a feature of a weak verb. In the 13th century this trend
became clear in written literature.

Verbs like burn, brew, flow, help, mourn, step, weep were then undergoing change and by the
14th century, these verbs showed weak forms. During the Middle period however, strong forms
continued to be used while the weak forms continued to grow, and in many cases the inflections
for weak verbs were established. So there were variations.

In the Middle English, there were still inflections for simple present tense in verbs. For example:

Person Modern English Middle English

Singular Ist – I Thank Thanke
2nd – you Thank Thankest
3rd – he/she/it Thanks Thanketh (-es)
Plural Ist – we Thank Thanke (n) (-es)
2nd – you Thank Thanke (n) (-es)
3rd – they Thank Thanken (n) (es)

Present Past tense

I Turn (e) Turned (e)
(thou Turnest Turnedest
(he/she/it) Turneth Turned (e)
(we/you/they) Turneth Turned (en)

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There were about six (6) dialects of the Middle English, namely Northern dialect, Southern
dialect, West Midland, East Midland, Kentish and East Anglia. The examples above are
examples from Midlands.

Middle English Vocabulary

 Middle English vocabulary was dominantly influenced by the French language, though
Latin also contributed a great deal.
 It was estimated that about 10,000 French words came into English in the 13th century.
These words were mainly from law, administration, medicine, art, fashion, science and
learning.
 Over 20% were nouns. Some were constructed using French affixes like con-, trans-, pre-
, -ance, -tion, and -ment.
 Many French loan words drawn from the fields of administration included words such as
authority, empire, duke, crown, liberty, majesty, palace, parliament, tax, treaty, royal;
 From Law we have examples like adultery, accuse, arrest, assault, execute attorney,
evidence, crime, fine, fraud, indictment, judge, summons, legacy etc.
 Religion – baptism, cathedral, chaplain, clergy, communion, confess, immorality,
convert, prayer, salvation, saviour, sermon, temptation, theology, virtue etc.
 From Military we have: ambush, army, besiege, captain, lieutenant, battle, navy, peace,
retreat, sergeant, soldier, spy, etc.
 From Food and Drink - appetite, beef, biscuit, cream, dinner, feast, fruit, fry, herb, lemon,
orange, plate, pork, etc.
 Some general nouns such as action, affection, adventure, age, country, courtesy, labour,
marriage, noise, number, ocean, opinion, sign, sound, reason, rage, river, etc are French
words.
 Some adjectives and verbs are also of French origin. Examples are: active, amorous,
calm, certain, natural, nice, original, perfect, poor, precious, real, honest, scarce, advise,
arrange, close, cry, delay, prove, prefer, receive, remember, refuse, save, travel, wait
deceive, etc.
 During the 14th and 15th centuries several thousands of Latin words, were introduced
into English most of which came through French. Most of these words were technical
terms belonging to religion, medicine, law, and literature.
 Other sources of new words in Middle English include the Scandinavian words. There
were also a few evidences of loan words from Dutch, Russian, and Arabic resulting from
commercial and maritime contacts.

Middle English Spellings

Factors that influenced English spelling
1. The social and linguistic impact of the French invasion.
2. The continued process of sound change that began in the Anglo-Saxon times.
3. The considerable growth and movement in population during the medieval period.
 All these were responsible for the marked difference between the spelling irregularity that
were evident earlier in the development of English and the more stable system of spelling
which began to appear in the 15th century, especially in the works of William Caxton.

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  In Middle English, there was no standard convention for spelling, which led to some
variations.
 A writer‟s spelling reflected the dialect he happened to speak, thus, a number of spelling
forms were introduced by Middle English writers.
 Norman scribes in particular adopted spelling conventions of the French language. Some
of them include:
 sh replaced sc in words like OE scip (ship)
 qu replaced cw in words like OE cwen (queen)
 gh replaced h in words like OE riht (right)
 ch replaced c in words like OE cin (chin)
 wh replaced hw in words like OE hwаet (what)
 c replaced s in words OE is (ice)
 ou replaced u in words like OE wund (wound)
 These changes helped some to solve problems associated with having two different
sounds for one phoneme.
 For example, the first sounds of „c‟ in Old English „cin‟ (chin) and cyning (king) were
not the same, with the adoption of „ch‟, it became easy to differentiate between „chin‟ and
cyning (i.e. king).
 Also the adoption of „ou‟ helped to indicate a long vowel without having to use double u
as was the case in Old English.
 The advent of printing with William Caxton in 1476 was a significant step towards the
standardization of spelling, which provided a national standard for written English. It was
an important factor that suggested the beginning of Modern English.
 Printing made it possible to promote a standard in spelling with a vast amount of reading
materials.

Middle English Speech Sounds

 A new system of pronunciation was equally emerging in Middle English era.
 There was never a regular correspondence between phonemes or speech sounds with the
letters that represent them.
 A word like „twa‟ (two) in OE was pronounced with the “w” sounding, unlike in Modern
English.
 Words in Modern English sword, answer, walk, half, wreck, write, gnarl, gnaw, know,
knight ( the w is silent)
 English adopted the Roman alphabet, i.e. Latin.
 Today English has over 40 phonemes, but only 26 letters represent those phonemes. In
particular there are 24 vowels sounds in English, but only five vowels letters.
 In the Middle English period several sounds altered. Some took on different value, while
some disappeared completely. The Old English vowel system was reconstructed. Original
diphthongs became pure vowels and new diphthongs emerged.

THE RISE OF STANDARD ENGLISH; THE SPREAD OF THE LONDON DIALECT

The Rise of Standard English

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  The variety that is now called Standard English came out of the local dialects of the
Middle English, towards the end of the 14th century and won general acceptance in the
course of the fifteenth century.
 The part of England that contributed most to the development of the standard was the
East Midland district.
 The East Midland English dialect was the dialect of the London metropolis.

Factors that contributed to the development of the Standard English

 As a Midland dialect of English, it occupied a middle position between the extreme North
and South. It was said to be less conservative (i.e. has more tendency to admit change)
than the Southern dialect and less “radical” than the North. In its sounds and inflections it
represented a kind of compromise, sharing some of the communication bridge which the
dialect provided between the North and South.
 The East Midland district was the largest and most populous of the major areas. Places
like Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk within the district were significant prosperous
agricultural areas. Also the prominence of Middlesex, Oxford and Norfolk in the political
affairs of England throughout the Middle English period gave the East Midland district
the importance that could have enhanced its influence.
 The presence of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge could have had some
influences on standardization process. Cambridge in particular could have exerted some
influence in support of the East Midland dialect. In the 14th century the monasteries no
more played important roles in disseminating information, while the two universities
development into prominent intellectual centres.
 A regional standardized literary language evolved in the latter part of the 14th century,
which tended towards the Central Midland districts, especially Northamptonshire,
Huntingdonshire, and Bedfordshire. This was evident in the large number of manuscripts
by Wycliff a notable Christian writer, including sermons, prayers, poems and different
versions of the Wycliffe Bible. Though this variety was spread widely, increasing its
status as standard, it could not compete favourably with the large volume of written
materials from the capital London.
 The development of printing gave rise to the emergence of a Southern literary standard.
This resulted in the spread of a single norm over most of the country, so much that during
the 16th century it was no longer easy to identify through some linguistic features a
particular dialect in which a literary work was written.
 The emergence of London as the political and commercial capital of the country.
Particularly the administrative offices of the London Chancery (political administrative
office) were important and Chancery scribes adopted a standard practice. These practices
interacted with those used by other London copy writers and spelling gradually became
stabilized, affecting other kinds of materials including literary texts.
The Spread of the London Dialect
 Towards the close of the 15th century, the London Standard had been accepted in writing
in most parts of England.
 The introduction of printing in 1476 as we have mentioned earlier, had an immense
contribution towards the spread of the standard London Dialect.
 London had been the English centre of book publishing and Caxton, the English printer
used the London dialect in his numerous works. Most translations and that of those after

21
 him gave currency to the London English which showed that it had been adopted as the
standard.
 In the 16th century the use of London dialect had become a matter of precept and practice
since poets were advised to use “the usual speech of the court, and that of London.

EARLY MODERN PERIODS (1500-1750): SOME CHARACTERISTICS; THE

RENAISSANCE ENGLISH; CHANGES IN GRAMMAR

Some Characteristics of Early Modern Periods (1500-1750)

Printing Presss
 Printing technology had a significant impact on English. In England, manuscript books
(hand written) were completely replaced by printed ones.
 Printing made a rapid progress that before the end of 1500, printed books in Europe
reached about 35,000.
 Though majority of these were in Latin, the effects of printing on modern languages like
English was no doubt overwhelming. By 1640 over 20,000 titles appeared in English,
ranging from pamphlets to large texts.
 Books were no longer an exclusive luxury of the upper class. Everyone had access to it
now because it was possible to reproduce a thousand copies or more of one book exactly
like the other.
 Printing was a powerful force for promoting a standard and a uniform language.
 It also provided a means of spreading the language throughout the lands where the
language was understood.

Popular Education
 A feature of the early modern period was the rapid growth of popular education. Literacy
became widespread.
 In the latter part of the Middle Ages, a good number of the people of the middle class
could read and write and this helped in the rapid spread of standards and uniformity in
language use.
 In the later 17th and 18th centuries, education became much more accessible, with
increase in the number of available schools and colleges.
 Journalism developed, featuring men, like Daniel Defoe, and it was also the period of the
rise of the novel.
 With this kind of progress in education, the printing press was able to exert an
unforgettable influence on language as well as learning. Not just in the early modern
period alone, it is noticeable that the influence of commerce, transportation and rapid
means of communication has had a great impact on language.
Modern technological developments
 Modern Technology enhanced easy travel, communication, and social contacts, people
and places which had been isolated during the earlier times were now brought together.
This again enhanced the development of language.
Social consciousness
 This means people‟s general tendency to identify with certain social or economic groups.

22
  Speakers of English made some efforts to adopt the standards of grammar and
pronunciation of the people of this new class. They became careful of their speech,
manners, tastes and general comportment. This has helped the English language to
sustain a uniform standard.
Effects of the social characteristics of Early Modern English period
The effects are discussed under the next sub-headings
The Renaissance Period
Two forces to be identified here are:
(1) A radical force to produce a change in the vocabulary of English, and
(2) A conservative force which aimed at preserving the existing status of the English grammar.

 The printing press, new reading habits and the spread of ideas, which came with growth
in communication all promoted the extension of vocabulary, while these same factors
together with social consciousness as we described above, worked actively towards the
maintenance of standards especially in grammar and usage.
 Education promoted grammar, spelling and pronunciation.
 The general interest in the English of the Renaissance focused on vocabulary. The period
from the time of Caxton (1476) until around 1650 was called the Renaissance – a time of
great change in Europe.
 During the 16th century, following the development of printing there was a flood of new
publications in English as a result of renewed interest in classical languages and literature
and in the rapid growing fields of science, medicine and the arts.
 As new concepts, techniques and inventions were being experienced in Europe, words in
the languages were either insufficient or not available at all to express these new ideas, so
writers began to borrow new terms.
 Most of the words that came into English at this time were taken from Latin, French,
Greek, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. And as the period of world-wide exploration
came underway, words from over 50 other languages including indigenous languages of
North America, Africa and Asia came into English.

Changes in Grammar and Pronunciation

 By the time of the Renaissance, major shifts in English grammatical structure had already
taken place. Words had already lost most of their inflections.
 Few changes in English syntax could still be noticed. For example several features of the
verb use show a marked difference today.
(i) my life is run his compass (Julius Caesar) where today we should say my life
has run its compass.
(ii) verbs developed wider use of auxiliaries e.g. speak he the truth?(does he
speak the truth? Is he speaking the truth?)What makes you? (What are you
making?) It judges me (I judge…) It benefits me not (It does not benefit me) etc.
Me thinks he did (I think he did).
(iii) Sentences tend to be too long, loose and linear, with repeated „and‟ and „then‟
coordination, mostly introduced by „which‟ or „that‟. Here is an example from
Caxton‟s prologue to Golden
Legend:

23
And I shal praye for them vnto Almightly God that he of his benygne grace rewarde them etc.
and that it prouffyte to alle them that shal rede or here it redde, and may encrease in them virtue
and expelle uyce and synne that by the ensanmple of the holy sayntes amend theyr lyuyng here in
thys shorte lyf that by their merytes they and I may come to everllastyng and blysse in heuen.
(iv) There were constructions involving a double negative e.g. I cannot do no
wrong
(v) A number of verbs inflections (speaketh, pleaseth, know‟st, spake etc) fell out
of standard use
(vi) Adjectives lost their inflections, though not completely. Expressions like most
unkindest or more longer, were no more in use
(vii) Pronouns like „thou‟ „thee‟ „thine‟ „thy‟ „thyself‟ „ye‟ fell into disuse except
in poetry; „you‟ was substituted for „ye‟ normative; „its‟ came into use as the
possessive of it.
(viii) The pronoun „who‟ as a relative pronoun developed in the 16th century.
(ix) The „s‟ plural became general
(x) Some unchanged plural remained e.g. Sheep, Swine.
(xi) New conjunctions emerged: „because‟ for example first appeared in Chaucer,
but „for‟ and „that‟ remained the normal way of expressing cause until the early
17th century.
THE PROBLEM OF SPELLING; THE INKHORN CONTROVERSY; FUTHER
ENRICHMENT OF VOCABULARY
The Problem of Spelling
 In the Early Modern Period of English, there was no generally accepted system of
spelling and it was neither fixed nor phonetic.
 It was not possible to match spelling with speech, though old and Middle English tried it
with fair success.
 Norman scribes created some confusion in spelling by writing English words the French
way.
 This created more problems when certain spellings became conventional and
pronunciation gradually changed.
 Discrepancies between sound and symbol increased when certain symbols which
represented actual sounds in Latin were inserted in the English words.
 An example is „b‟ in debt or doubt from Latin debitum and dubitare. In English the „b‟ is
silent. The „gh‟ in English words like night, delight, light, tight, fight, knight etc.
represents actual sounds in Latin words.
 The 16th century spelling was so unstable that it became varied from writer to writer,
depending on education, temperament and purpose.
 An individual could adopt his own spelling and be consistent with it. An example is Sir
John Cheke for example doubled long vowels, e.g. maad, staar, haat etc.; he discarded
final –e, in giv; belev, recev etc.; he used „I‟ instead of „y‟ e.g. mighti, beuti, dai etc.
 Richard Stanyhurst adopted his spelling to soothe his translation of Latin poetry e.g.
woorde, yeet, mee, thee (the), too (to) etc.
 There was then a very great need to device a means of achieving some kind of agreement.
 Scholars began to attempt to draw up some rules and to devise new systems. Thomas
Smith for instance published a Dialogue Concerning the Correct and Emended Writing of

24
 the English Language in 1568. He increased the English alphabet to 34 letters and
marked the long vowels.
 His reform however did not receive significant acceptance, as it was moreover written in
Latin.
 John Hart in 1570 published A Method or Comfortable Beginning for All Unlearned,
whereby they May Be Taught to Read English. Again this work did not win any favour
despite some special characters (or phonemes) he used for ch, sh, th, ek. Another attempt
at phonetic reform was made in 1580 by William Bullokar in his Booke at Large, for the
Amendment of Orthography for English Speech.
 This work applied much of vowels and consonants sounds based on old letters of
English. The author also introduced new characters, accents and apostrophes which
almost brought English spelling and accents to resemble that of French.
 The most important of these reform efforts was Elementaire (1582) by Richard
Mulcaster. Mulcaster viewed spelling as right writing and felt that spelling problem could
not be solved by a radical bending of spelling to fit sounds of words. He believed that the
same letter can be used to represent different sounds just as we use one word in different
senses.
 Mulcaster did not adopt any form of phonetic reform since he opted for custom and
usage. This means that he considered acceptability, ease and convenience in writing as
the most important thing. Popular approval must be the final authority. These were his
contributions:
(i) He got rid of extra letters in words e.g. putt, grubb, ledd, became put, grub,
led,etc.
(ii) He retained„t‟ as necessary letters in words like fetch, scratch, hatch etc.
(iii) He allows double consonants when they belong to separate syllables e.g. wit-
ting sit-ting etc.
(iv) Words ending in – ss; he wrote-sse e.g. glasse, confesse, proffesse, impresse
ed,
(v) Final – e used to indicate long vowel, making a difference between made and
mad, stripe and strip, bite and bit
(vi) „y‟ used to represent „loud‟ and „sharp‟ sound of „i‟ e.g. cry, deny, fry, try
(vii) If we spell „hear‟ we should also spell fear, tear, dear etc.

 At the end of his book, Mulcaster gave a „General Table‟ giving the recommended
spelling for some 7,000 common English words.
 Though Mulcaster‟s spelling could not be said to be the model that was eventually
adopted, it is clear that English spelling developed along his recommendations.
 During the first half of the 12th century, spelling tended towards uniformity and this
tendency increased with Dr Johnson‟s dictionary.

The Inkhorn Controversy

 Inkhorn terms were used by critics of foreign terms mainly from French and Latin to
describe words indiscriminately introduced into English.
 Such critics - one of them Thomas Wilson called it “outlandish English” which were
merely “counterfeiting Kings English.” Some of the critics considered the use of these
words as too pedantry (bookish) and strange.

25
 The strongest objection which Wilson represented believed that words such as affability,
ingenious, mundaine, celebrate, extol, magnificent, dexterity, scholastic; relinquish,
intelligence, compendious were essentially obscure, and therefore should be thrown out.
 Sir Thomas Chalouer (1549) said they were “disused words of antiquitee” borrowed from
“strange languages” out of “wrotten pamphlets.”
 These oppositions were at their heights during the middle of the 16th century.
 By this time borrowing had become excessive and the procedure for borrowing was
simply being abused.
 Those who defended borrowing argued that it was simply a means of enriching the
English language just as Latin and French had enriched themselves. It was a means of
getting acquainted with new things, which as great novelties would be quite entertaining
when they have been fully integrated in the new language.
 So borrowing actually gave credit to the English language and new words were linguistic
legacies for posterity.
 Some scholars however, thought that compromise should be reached. Writers should
beware of indiscriminate borrowings of inkhorn terms, but must also give room to
borrowing when such became inevitable.
 One of the scholars, by name Puttenham who had earlier moved against inkhorn terms
defended such words as scientific, significative, methodical, placation, function,
audacious, compatible, subtiling, refining, compendius, proflixe, figurate, inveigle,
penetrate, indignite etc. Note that these words were inkhorn terms.
 Some of the words Puttenham justified did not survive the test of time but some of them
like methodical, function, audacious, compatible etc have become part of English lexicon
today.
 Most of the „inkhorn terms‟ that were vehemently opposed during the 16th century are of
common use today. Nouns such as allurement, allusion, atmosphere, autograph, capsule,
denunciation, dexterity, disability, disrespect, excursion, expectation, and jurisdiction
were as difficult and strange as to become subject of controversy.
 Others were adjectives like agile, appropriate, conspicuous, dexterous, expensive,
external, habitual, hereditary, impersonal, insane, and malignant. Some verbs like adapt,
alienate, benefit, consolidate, disregard, emancipate, eradicate, erupt, excavate,
extinguish, harass, meditate, were also described as inkhorn terms.
 Most of the words in the list are Latin words. But some of them like anachronism,
atmosphere, autograph, antipathy, chaos, chronology, climax, crisis, critic, dogma,
emphasis, enthusiasm, epitome, parasite, parenthesis, pathetic, scheme, skeleton, system,
tactics, were acquired by Latin from Greek.
 During the Renaissance, there was a renewed study of Greek which led to the
introductions of more Greek words such as anonymous, catastrophe, criterion,
ephemeral, idiosyncrasy, lexicon, polemic, tonic, tantalize and thermometer.
 As these words came into the English language, some retained their forms and meanings,
while some lost aspect of their forms in the process of adaptation. Words like climax,
appendix, epitome, exterior, delirium, and axis retain their Latin form.
 Some lost their Latin endings e.g. consult (L. consult-are) exclusion (L. exclusion-em)
and exotic (exoticus).

26
  Some others went through some different forms of change e.g. conspicuous (L. conspicu-
us), external (L. externus) brevity (L. brevitos). Many English verbs borrowed from Latin
usually end in –ate (e.g. create, consolidate, eradicate, educate etc.)
 Some of the words had been borrowed more than once, thus assuming different
meanings. For example, the Latin words episcopus and discus was borrowed in Old
English as bishop and dish and later appeared during the Renaissance as episcopal and
disc.

Further Enrichment of Vocabulary

 Foreign borrowing of words in the 16th century was not limited to learned words taken
from Latin and Greek but from more than fifty languages (Baugh &Cable 2001), the most
prominent being French, Italian and Spanish.
 The English vocabulary of this time showed words adopted from French such as alloy,
bigot, bizarre, bombast, chocolate, comrade, detail, duel, entrance, equip, essay, explore,
genteel, mustache, naturalize, probability, progress, retrenchment, shock, surpass, ticket,
tomato, vogue, volunteer.
 Italian words: algebra, balcony, caprice, design, granite, pizza, stanza, violin, volcano.
 Some of these Italian words were introduced through French or adopted to French forms,
such as battalion, bankrupt, brigade, carat, charlatan, gala, gazette, grotesque, infantry,
rebuff, etc.
 Spanish/Portuguese: alligator, apricot, armada, banana, barricade, bravado, brocade,
cannibal, canoe, cocoa, embargo, hurricane, maize, mosquito, mulatto, Negro, potato,
renegade (renegade) tobacco, yam, etc.
 With the new spirit of exploration and adventure characterized the Renaissance, a great
deal of impact on the English vocabulary became quite evident.
 The method through which these words entered the English vocabulary was generally
through writing. Latin especially was through churchmen and scholars.
 Even words borrowed from Romance languages (French, Italian, and Spanish) in the 16th
century often came through books and writers.
 It is believed that one notable English writer- Sir Thomas More introduced words like
absurdity, acceptance, anticipate, combustible, compatible, comprehensive,
congratulatory, contradictory, denunciation, dissipate, endurance, exit, exaggerate,
exasperate, explain, fact, frivolous, impenitent, implacable, indifference, insinuate,
monopoly, necessitate, obstruction, paradox, etc.
 Another scholar - Sir Thomas Elyot added the following words: accommodate,
adumbrate, analogy, animate, beneficence, encyclopedia, excerpt, exhaust, experience,
exterminate, frugality, infrequent, irritate, modesty etc.
 Sir John Cheke first used adapt, alienate, assassinate and benefit.
 John Milton introduced consolidate, disregard, while Sir Philip Sidney brought in
emancipation, eradicate, erupt, excavate, exert, exhilarate, exist, extinguish, harass,
meditate, etc.
 More and Elyot were sometimes referred to as “makers of English” because of their
contributions in the 16th & 17th centuries by introducing or helping to establish many
new words in English.
 Most of the words that came into the English vocabulary during the Renaissance came
from sources outside, England.

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  A good number were to come from native sources, either through development of words
through old roots or through a revival of expressions that had gone out of use. At least
this was the thought of someone like John Cheke. Cheke was so strongly opposed to
borrowing from Latin or Greek that he sought English native equivalents from whatever
source.
 In his translation of the gospel of St. Matthew, he attempted to change Greek words with
English equivalents as much as possible. For instance he used mooned for lunatic, toller
for publican, hundreder for centurion, foresayer for prophet, byword, for parable,
freshmen for proselyte, crossed for crucified and gainrising for resurrection.
 Poets on their own part tried to revive old words especially words they learned from
Geoffrey Chaucer. This revival was sometimes referred to as “Chaucerism”, which was
about a conscious use of old words to enlarge the vocabulary of poetry. One of the most
prominent poets in this movement was Spencer.
 These poets revived old words like astound, blameful, displeasance, enroot, doom, forby
(past, empight ,(fixed), natheless, whilere (a while before). Others were askew, filch,
flout, freak.

THE EMERGENCE OF DICTIONARIES; SHAKESPEARE AND THE WORLD OF

WORDS; THE KING JAMES BIBLE

The Emergence of Dictionaries

 The very first attempt to produce a comprehensive list of all the words in the English
language was Nathaniel Bailey‟s Universal Etymological English Dictionary published in
1721.
 The earliest English dictionaries were those that merely explained difficult words.
 The first of this was A Table Alphabetical of Hard Words written by Robert Crawdrey,
and published in 1604. It explained some 3,000 terms.
 This was followed in 1616 by John Bullkar‟s English Expositor, while Henry Cockeram
published the English Dictionaries in 1623.
 Again in 1658, Edward Philips published New World of Words.
 All these dictionaries and later compilations only treated difficult words.
 A new wave of dictionaries was to be experienced in the first half of the 19th century in
order to keep pace with increases in knowledge and terminologies that were the result of
the industrial revolution and progress in science and medicine.
 However, Dr. Samuel Johnson‟s dictionary of 1755 was the first to account for the
extensive additions that had been made to the language and helped to enhance their
adoption into general use.
Shakespeare and the World of Words
 Shakespeare had more influence in vocabulary than pronunciation, syntax and usage
 His plays and poems also illustrated the way English was developing during the latter
part of the 16th century and early 17th century - the time he lived (1564-1616).
 Shakespeare had the largest vocabulary of any English writer and this is due to his
resourceful use of words and his acceptance of new words.
 He freely used some of the words that some people rejected as inkhorn terms.
 The following words which were first used by Shakespeare were all new to English in the
latter half of the 16th century: agile, allurement, antipathy, catastrophe, critical,

28
 demonstrate, dire, discountenance ,emphasis, emulate, extract, hereditary, horrid
,meditate, modest, pathetic, prodigious, vast, armada, barricade, cavalier, mutiny,
palisade, renegade etc., (Baugh and cable 2001).
 Shakespeare‟s use of certain words became their earliest occurrence in English language
e.g. accommodation, apostrophe, assassination, barefaced, countess, courtship, dwindle,
eventful, lacklustre, dexterously, dislocate, frugal, misanthrope, laughable, obscene,
pedant, premeditate, reliance, submerge etc.
 Shakespeare used some of these words in some sense that was in fact closer to their
original Latin meaning than the sense in which we use them today. For example
Shakespeare‟s communicate means to share rather than to exchange information as we
know it today.
 His liberal attitude towards foreign borrowing enhanced his stock of words. And as he
creatively used them in his works, he showed how foreign words can enrich the English
vocabulary and function effectively in practical terms.
 Some of his words (i.e. first recorded in Shakespeare) have not survived as the ones listed
above. About a third of his coinages from Latin fall into this category. Some examples
are: abruption, appertainments, cadens, exsufficate, persistive, protractive, questrist,
soilure, tortive, ungenitured, unplausive, vastidity.
 One aspect of Shakespeare‟s lexicon, which we must mention here are his use of
hyphenated compound words. Many of these coinages were peculiarly his, some which
again did not survive in modern English.
 Examples of Shakespeare‟s hyphenated compounds are Arch-heretique, baby-eyes, bare-
pickt, breake-vow, canker-sorrow, faire-play, giant-world, halfe-blown, heauen-mouing;
ill-turned, kindre-action, pale-visag‟d, pell-well, vile-concluded, widow-comfort.
 William Shakespeare‟s works demonstrate his contributions and his indispensable place
in the history of the English language.

The King James Bible

 The King James Bible or Authorised Version as it was also called was published in 1611.
 It was not authorized by any process of parliament but the Bible‟s title page stated that it
was appointed to be read in churches throughout the United Kingdom and this was to
determine its influence on the population and far more on the language
 The Bible was translated by 54 university scholars.
 The project was approved by King James himself following a recommendation by some
750 reformers from within the Church of England.
 The preliminary version which took four years was submitted to the bishops for revision.
 The translators were divided into companies each working on a section of the bible. The
final version took nine months.
 The panel followed a number of guidelines. They were to use the bishops Bible where
possible and were permitted to consult the Tyndale Version and other earlier versions
where necessary.
 They were also to maintain recognized chapter divisions and proper names. Translations
by one member of a group were to be submitted by other members for approval and each
group was to send its materials to the others for final agreement. Disagreements were to
be discussed formally and outside opinions sought if necessary.

29
  The project was successful due to the personal enthusiasm and intellectual quality of the
translators.
 In their language choices, they did not introduce new items of vocabulary or change the
grammatical structure of the language.
 Frequently, they introduced old use of words from the Tyndale version, and also used
quite a number of idioms.
 In fact there were many phrases in the King James Bible which have entered the general
idiom of the language, sometimes with minor grammatical changes.
 Here are some examples: my brother‟s keeper (Genesis 4); eye for eye (Genesis 15); the
apple of his eye (Deuteronomy 32); a man after his own heart (1 Samuel 13), how are the
mighty fallen (2 Samuel 1); a root of the matter (Job 19); salt of the earth (Math 5); new
wine in old bottles (Matthew 7); physician heal thyself (Luke 4) etc.

CHANGES IN PRONUNCIATION; THE GREAT VOWEL SHIFT; SOME FEATURES

OF GRAMMAR

Changes in Pronunciation
 Some sounds in English have not had any changes like others. For example, the short /e/
has remained unchanged since the old English times. The O.E bedd is still bed today;
whereas the â in O. E stân (store) became a sound like / ‫כ‬:/ as in law towards the end of
Old English, and later changed to ō similar to its current pronunciation o (store). Changes
in pronunciation however varied according to regions.
 Changes in consonant sounds had been insignificant compared to changes in vowel
sounds. Though some voiced consonants in Old English, became voiceless or
occasionally lost in Middle English, consonant have remained fairly as stable as they
been in Old English (O.E).
 Most short vowels in Old English; like è, ì, ô, ú passed on to Middle English unchanged.
The long ý developed as the short ý. The O.E brýd became brìde (M.E) and bride in
modern English; O.E fýr became fire (M.E) and fire in modern English.
 The quality Old English vowels did not change much in passing to Middle English but
their length were considerable altered. Old English long vowels for example were
shortened early in the Middle English period when followed by double consonants.
Compare Middle English grèt with Old English great.
 All Middle English long vowels went through extensive alteration in passing to Middle
English, but short vowels that occur where syllables are accented remained fairly stable.
 Short vowels like a and u went through important changes. M.E a became / æ/ in the 16th
century, pronounced as cat, thank, mat, flax, almost returning to the Old English ǽ as in
at, apple, back. The u in Middle English became what is known as unrounding in M.E.
The vowel was pronounced as u as in full or pull.
 In early modern English u became u as in cut, but, sun, love. As far as short vowels are
concerned a modern speaker of English will have no difficulty in understanding the
English of any period in history. But this situation is quite different when we consider
long vowels. The notable change in pronunciation involving long vowels is known as The
Great Vowel Shift.

The Great Vowel Shift

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The Great Vowel Shift affected the seven long vowels in English. In Middle English they were ī,
e, e O, o _.
Ī pronounced as i: e.g. / fi:f / became /fair/ five
e pronounced as e e.g. /me:də/ became /mi:d / mead
e pronounced as ε: e.g. /kl ε:nə / became /kle:n/ clean
a pronounced as a : e.g. /na:mə / became / ne:m/ name
O pronounced as ‫כ‬: e.g. /g ‫כ‬:tδ / became /go:t/ goat
o pronounced as o: e.g. /ro:tδ/ became /ru:t/ root
û pronounced as u: e.g. /du:n/ became /daun/ down
 Notice that i and u became diphthongs ai and au. And you can see that most of the
vowels had almost acquired their present pronunciation by the 16th century, through the
Great Vowel Shift.
 You will also notice that the Middle English e has changed to /i:/.
 In the early modern period (of Shakespeare) e was pronounced as in lane, or name but
now it sounds as lean, clean, bean. The change occurred at about the end of the 17th
century.
 The Great Vowel Shift is responsible for the random use of vowel symbols in English
spelling.
 Spelling had already become fixed before the shift and therefore did not change when the
quality of the long vowels changed.
 As a result vowel symbols no longer correspond with the sounds they once represented in
Old English.

Some Features of Grammar

The English grammar of the late 16th century and early 17th century is marked by some
characteristics which had since disappeared, especially the few parts of speech that retained their
old forms. We shall examine some of them.

The Noun
 In the 16th century some old weak plurals like – n survived. Most of them gave way to
the – s plural, such as fon (foes) kneen (knees) fleen (fleas).
 Shakespeare for example had some forms like eyen (eyes), shoon (shoes), and kine,.
 Some mixed plurals like children, oxen, brethren, and some internal change of vowels
like mice, feet, survived.
The Adjective
 Since the adjective lost its inflectional endings that marked gender, number and case
distinctions, the only forms it retained during the 16th and 17th centuries were the
comparative and superlative degrees.
 The two common endings –er (comparative) and – est (superlative) with the adverb more
and most had been in use since the Old English period.
 Shakespeare used double comparative or superlative such as more large, most boldest; or
most unkindest.
 These are no longer in use today. In modern times only one syllable (monosyllable)
words take the –er, -est suffixes like fine-finer-finest; tall-taller-tallest etc.
 Words with more than one syllable take more and most e.g. beautiful -more beautiful -
most beautiful; active -more active -most active; careful –more careful l-most careful etc.

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The Pronoun
 During the 16th century the pronouns thou, thy, thee were dropped except where the
Authorised Version or Shakespeare is still read. You was substituted for ye, while its was
introduced as the possessive of it.
 During the Middle English the singular forms thou, thy, and thee were used among
friends and colleagues and for addressing superiors.
 In the 16th century ye, your, you became pronouns of direct address irrespective of rank or
closeness, while the singular forms disappeared. However, the Authorised Version of the
Bible and Shakespeare still used them.
 The formative of its as possessive marker was one interesting thing of the early modern
period.
 his was still used as the proper form of the possessive. E.g. if the salt has lost his savor;
little candles throw his beams etc.
 In the 16th century the use of who as a relative pronoun developed.
 In Old English there were no relative pronouns, rather definite articles (se, seo,þoet) were
used as relative.
Sometimes the article þe was added (se, þe, which, that) and sometimes þe was used alone. In the
Middle English this was replaced by þoet (that). In the 15th century which and that began to be
alternated. It was not until 16th century that the relative pronoun who came into use.
The Verb
 Verbs were commonly used without auxiliaries in interrogative statements.
 A question in Shakespeare‟s Macbeth says Goes the king hence today? Normally we
would say: Is the king going out today? Or Does the king go out?
 Another noticeable difference is the omission of progressive forms. It is common to hear
or read: Where goes he? or What do you read? Rather than where are you going? or what
are you reading? The increase in the use of progressive forms is a modern development.
 Impersonal use of verbs was much more common in the 16th and 17th centuries. A
construction like it pleases me not, it dislikes me, it repents me, are familiar expressions
in Shakespeare and the King James Bible, which in more recent English have been
replaced by personal constructions like It doesn‟t please me; I don‟t like it or I repent.
 The regular ending of the third person singular –eth, was universal right from the 14th
century and all through the Middle English period, thus goeth, giveth, lieth, saith, doth,
speaketh became the standard forms.
 Forms like goes, gives, lies, says, does are also a modern development of English. This
however made some occasional appearances in the 15th century.

THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN THE 18TH CENTURY: AN ENGLISH ACADEMY AND

JOHNSON’S DICTIONARY

The 18th Century English

 The first half of the 18th century is often referred to as the Augustan Age in England.
 It was a period of English prose writing which invariably affected the course of the
English language.
 This age was characterized by a search for stability in language use.

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  There was a strong sense of order and great desire for a system that would enhance
efforts towards conformity to certain standards of good writing.
 There was also a drive towards correctness and attempts were made to formulate rules
and principles to define correctness and to achieve correctness.
 This was characteristic of the spirit of rational science and philosophy that started with
the Renaissance.
 Latin was looked upon as a classical standard for literature.
 Concerns for English soon began to take a new turn.
 Questions were then asked whether the language was at all worthy to be used for writing,
where Latin had been the tradition; whether the extensive additions being made to the
vocabulary were justified, and whether a better system of spelling could be introduced.
 For the first time, it was discovered that English had no grammar. What was grammar
did not follow any generally accepted pattern.
 The result was that English did not have any rules. People did not know when they were
wrong or right.Everything was uncertain. Even among the educated people there was so
much variation on matters of grammar.
 Latin remained an authoritative example in which one was told how to use language.
People began to feel that this problem could be solved by an English Academy that could
legislate on matters of language.
 The popular idea was that English was being corrupted and needed to be refined and
corrected. Necessary reforms should be in place after which the language should be fixed
permanently and protected from regular changes.
In a nutshell the 18th century sought to:
(i) reduce the language to rule and set up a standard of current usage;
(ii) refine the language – that is, to remove supposed defects and introduce certain
improvements; and
(iii) fix it permanently in the desire form (Baugh & Cable 2001).

Attempts to Purify the Language

 Right from the 17th century people were conscious that English lacked standards - the
fact that the language did not have rules to determine right or wrong in its usage.
 Writers were particularly worried that writing was more of a guess work; individuals
wrote according to their choices of words and how best they felt they could express
themselves, not guided by any particular standard.
 This led to further corruption of the language, as some people thought.
 The feeling that English was being corrupted and unchecked gave rise to some attempts
to clean up the language and rid it of some supposed imperfections.
 One of such attempts was Swift‟s proposal of 1712, titled: A Proposal for Correcting,
Improving, and Ascertaining the English Tongue. Swift was not comfortable with the
spate of scientific enquiry and revolutions that favoured careless use of language.
 Innovations such as clipping and shortening of words like mob, taxi, rep or phone was
not acceptable to Swift.
 A later publication Philosophy of Rhetoric by George Campbell (1776) also condemned
this practice.
 In fact Campbell described it as „barbarism‟ in language use.

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  Another innovation that Swift opposed was the tendency to contract verbs like „rebuk‟d,‟
„disturb‟d‟ or „perturb‟d‟.
 He condemned this practice and argued that leaving out a vowel to save a syllable makes
such contracted forms very difficult to pronounce.
 Again Swift condemned some new words that kept coming into the English language.
Words such as sham, banter, mob, bubble, bully, shuffling, or palming, that were
becoming the vogue among people of fashion and even among preachers were rejected.
 But Swift desired and hoped that like Latin and Greek, English could be rendered stable.
But it is a mistaken notion that these languages never had times when they struggled with
the process of stability like English at this period.
 However Swift and others who believed that the problems that English - that of
standardizing, refining, and „fixing‟ were to consider what happened in Italy and France.
Each of these countries had an academy that defined standards in language and monitored
the processes that sustained these standards.
 England did not have any Academy that performed similar functions.

An English Academy
 An English Academy was then suggested following the Italian and French example. In
1660, a volume was published titled New Atlantis… continued by R.H Esquire.
 The author formally pictured an academy that would be charged with purifying the
English language and regulating its grammar and vocabulary.
 Not long, the idea of an academy received supports from influential intellectuals,
including John Dryden (a poet), and John Evelyn among others.
 Evelyn, who was a member of the Royal society, proposed that a grammar of language be
formulated with some spelling reforms to be followed by a collection of all „pure‟
English words with their meanings.
 He further suggested collections of technical words, dialects, expressions and archaic
words that might be revived and possibly translating some of the best of Greek and Latin
literatures as models of elegance and style.
 The Royal Society was established for scientific research and had no real interest in
language matters, so nothing was done about Evelyn‟s proposals.
 Dryden‟s efforts also in this direction did not attract any significant attention.
 Towards the end of the century however, Daniel Defoe (a novelist) in his Essay upon
Projects (1697) again raised the issue of an English Academy and devoted a whole article
to the subjects of academies.
 Swift‟s Proposal of 1712, as we noted earlier, marked the heights of the movement for an
English Academy.
 Already public opinion had been in its favour following the efforts of Dryden, Evelyn
and others, for more than fifty years.
 Once again the idea of an Academy suffered a set-back following a publication of
Reflections on Dr Swift‟s Letter to the Earl of Oxford about the English Tongue by John
Oldmixon, in the same year that Swift Proposal appeared.
 Oldmixon (a lawyer) writing in the name of the legal profession totally attacked the idea
of standardizing the language, arguing that it was impossible to prevent a language from
responding to change.

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  While he did not protest against the idea of an Academy, he ridiculed the person of Swift
and his proposal and nothing subsequently came out of Swift‟s Proposal, which was
indeed the closest England ever came to having an Academy.
 Subsequent talk of an Academy in England was soon received with skepticism. There
were now doubts of the results of the French Academy. Some came to think that the
Academy came to fix French but ended up spoiling it.
 The claim that a language could be fixed was the platform upon which the idea of an
Academy was built, now it began to decline and popular feeling began to favour the
notion that nothing can stop a language from changing, not even Latin or Greek could
resist change.
 When it was clear that Swift‟s Proposal had failed the only means was to work out a
substitute for an academy and that would demand working directly on the public.
 Individuals sought to provide reforms that they believed necessary and to set up standards
that would be accepted by every body.
 Thus, in 1724 an anonymous publication appeared under the title: The Many Advantages
of a Good Language to Any Nation: with an Examination of the Present State of our
Own.
 This re-echoed the old complaints that English was full of too many monosyllables, used
too many contractions, and had no adequate grammar or dictionary.
 It then called upon the public to take part in the discussion on matters of language and
proposed a series of weekly or monthly publications on grammar and other topics on
language.
 Some other publications also emerged calling for reforms on grammar and spelling.
All these publications identified two greatest needs of the English language
(i) standard grammar
(ii) a dictionary
The need for a dictionary was met by Johnson‟s dictionary of 1755 and the one of
grammar by early grammarians in the latter part of the 18th century.

Johnson’s Dictionary
 Dr. Johnson‟s dictionary of 1755 was the first of its kind to exhibit English vocabulary in
a more fully and extensive manner.
 It offered quotations to illustrate the use of words.
 It became the first dictionary to record language usage. And this was to aid understanding
where the explaining of meanings became inadequate. The dictionary also gave a guide to
pronunciation.
 The purpose of this dictionary was a kind of standard in spelling and use of words and to
refine the English language and ensure grammatical purity; to clear it from colloquial
barbarism, licentious idioms and irregular idioms” (Baugh & Cable 2001: 273
 At another place he said it was to fix the English language, preserve its purity and
ascertain the meaning of English idioms.
 This was like performing the functions of an Academy; and in fact, the Johnson‟s
dictionary could compare favourably with similar works of an Academy in France or
Italy.
 The dictionary however had its defects. For instance, it was said to include many words
that did not belong to English, and its history of words was not perfect.

35
 Some of its explanations of places were incorrect and full of prejudice and his definitions
were sometimes discriminatory.
 Though laden with its inadequacies scholars still believed that Johnson‟s dictionary is the
foundation of all meaningful efforts towards the standardization of the English language.
Dr.Samuel Johnson himself is considered as the founder of the modern English
dictionary.

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