Grammar
There is no difference at all between Old English and Anglo-Saxon. Anglo-Saxons were the people who spoke Old English in parts of what we know today as England and south-western Scotland thus we sometimes refer to Old English as Anglo-Saxon. The term Old English, however, is often informally used to refer to other historical forms of English such as Early Modern English/Renaissance English (Shakespeare), Middle English (Chaucer) and in the strict historical sense this is not the right terminology. The Present-Day English is the term we use to describe Modern English and is the language as spoken today.
Old English is a West Germanic language. Danish and Norwegian settlers in Britain spoke Old Norse language that influenced Old English and reduced in time the number of inflections originally occurring in Anglo-Saxon which similarly to modern German had endings indicating words’ roles in the sentences, their grammatical gender and number. After the Norman Conquest of 1066 the large number of Latin-based words influenced Old English and further resulted in the temporary dominance of French. By 1150 Old English was no longer used.
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There are about four times as many speakers of American English as there are of British English. The differences between the two include vocabulary and idiomatic phrases but the most obvious and easily noticeable is probably in the accents. As a result...
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I have written an article on word formation processes in the past and the topic has been always close to my heart. I recently tried to do a little research on borrowings and particularly English borrowings in the Polish language. Although I haven’t...
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Modern English vocabulary is the result of the mixture of five major linguistic influences: 1. Old English (Anglo-Saxon)2. French (after 1066)3. Norse (Vikings)4. Latin and Greek (mostly from the late Middle Ages onwards)5. Miscellaneous words borrowed...
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- Some Random Thoughts About -ise And -ize Verbs In British English.
As a change from writing grammar exercises for foreign students, I've decided with this post to make a small contribution to the debate on the position of -ise/-ize verbs in Britain. It is rather long and quite detailed, and illustrated with...
Grammar
What’s the difference between Old English and Anglo-Saxon?
There is no difference at all between Old English and Anglo-Saxon. Anglo-Saxons were the people who spoke Old English in parts of what we know today as England and south-western Scotland thus we sometimes refer to Old English as Anglo-Saxon. The term Old English, however, is often informally used to refer to other historical forms of English such as Early Modern English/Renaissance English (Shakespeare), Middle English (Chaucer) and in the strict historical sense this is not the right terminology. The Present-Day English is the term we use to describe Modern English and is the language as spoken today.
Old English is a West Germanic language. Danish and Norwegian settlers in Britain spoke Old Norse language that influenced Old English and reduced in time the number of inflections originally occurring in Anglo-Saxon which similarly to modern German had endings indicating words’ roles in the sentences, their grammatical gender and number. After the Norman Conquest of 1066 the large number of Latin-based words influenced Old English and further resulted in the temporary dominance of French. By 1150 Old English was no longer used.
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- American English
There are about four times as many speakers of American English as there are of British English. The differences between the two include vocabulary and idiomatic phrases but the most obvious and easily noticeable is probably in the accents. As a result...
- Both A Borrower And A Lender Be
I have written an article on word formation processes in the past and the topic has been always close to my heart. I recently tried to do a little research on borrowings and particularly English borrowings in the Polish language. Although I haven’t...
- How Baby Words Are Made.
Modern English vocabulary is the result of the mixture of five major linguistic influences: 1. Old English (Anglo-Saxon)2. French (after 1066)3. Norse (Vikings)4. Latin and Greek (mostly from the late Middle Ages onwards)5. Miscellaneous words borrowed...
- A Ten-minute Walk, Ten Minutes' Walk - Expressions With Two Nouns
Expressions with two nouns to talk about time, distance and other forms of measurement Two basic patterns In this post we take a look at using expressions of time, distance, money etc when we use a number with a noun, before another noun, for...
- Some Random Thoughts About -ise And -ize Verbs In British English.
As a change from writing grammar exercises for foreign students, I've decided with this post to make a small contribution to the debate on the position of -ise/-ize verbs in Britain. It is rather long and quite detailed, and illustrated with...