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1、 英文发展史 简版English is a member of the Indo-European (印欧语系) family of languages. This broad family (广大的家庭） includes most of the European languages spoken today. The Indo-European family includes several major branches: Latin and the modern Romance languages (French etc.); the Germanic languages （日耳曼语）
2、(English, German, Swedish etc.); the Indo-Iranian 印度伊朗语系 languages (Hindi 印地语, Urdu 乌尔都语, Sanskrit 梵文 etc.); the Slavic languages 斯拉夫语 (Russian, Polish, Czech 捷克语 etc.); the Baltic 波罗的海 languages of Latvian 拉脱维亚语 and Lithuanian 立陶宛语 ; the Celtic 凯尔特语 languages (Welsh 威尔士语, Irish Gaelic etc.盖尔语); Gre
3、ek. 希腊语。The influence of the original Indo-European language can be seen today, even though no written record of it exists. The word for father, for example, is vater in German, pater in Latin, and pitr in Sanskrit 梵文. These words are all cognates 同族的, similar words in different languages that share
4、 the same root. By the second century BC-公元前（ Before Christ ）, this Common Germanic language had split into（分裂成） three distinct （不同的）sub-groups 子群: East Germanic was spoken by peoples who migrated back to southeastern Europe. No East Germanic language is spoken today, and the only written East Germa
5、nic language that survives is Gothic. North Germanic evolved into 演变成 the modern Scandinavian languages 斯堪的纳维亚语 of Swedish, Danish 丹麦语, Norwegian 挪威语, and Icelandic 冰岛语 (but not Finnish, which is related to Hungarian 匈牙利语 and Estonian 爱沙尼亚语 and is not an Indo-European language). West Germanic is the
6、 ancestor of modern German, Dutch, Flemish 佛兰德, Frisian 弗利然语, and English. (ancestornsest 祖先Old English (500-1100 AD) - 公元 (Anno Domini)West Germanic invaders from(被入侵） Jutland 日德兰半岛 and southern Denmark丹麦: the Angles 盎格鲁人(whose name is the source of the words England and English), Saxons 撒克逊人, and
7、Jutes 朱特人, began to settle in the British Isles 不列颠群岛in the fifth and sixth centuries AD. They spoke a mutually intelligible 互通的 language, similar to modern Frisian - the language of the northeastern region of the Netherlands 尼日利亚 - that is called Old English. Four major dialects 方言 of Old English e
8、merged应运而生 显现, Northumbrian 诺森伯兰郡方言 in the north of England, Mercian 莫西亚方言 in the Midlands, West Saxon 西撒克逊方言 in the south and west, and Kentish 肯特方言 in the Southeast. These invaders（入侵者） pushed the original, Celtic-speaking inhabitants out of what is now England into Scotland, Wales 威尔士, Cornwall 康
9、沃尔, and Ireland, leaving behind a few Celtic words. These Celtic languages survive today in the Gaelic 盖尔语 languages of Scotland and Ireland and in Welsh. Cornish 康沃尔语, unfortunately, is, in linguistic terms, now a dead language. (The last native Cornish speaker died in 1777) Also influencing Englis
10、h at this time were the Vikings 维京人. Norse invasions and settlement, beginning around 850, brought many North Germanic words into the language, particularly in the north of England. Some examples are dream, which had meant joy until the Vikings imparted its current meaning on it from the Scandinavia
11、n cognate draumr, and skirt, which continues to live alongside its native English cognate shirt. The majority of words in modern English come from foreign, not Old English roots. In fact, only about one sixth of the known Old English words have descendants 后代 surviving today. But this is deceptive 欺
12、诈的; Old English is much more important than these statistics would indicate 指出. About half of the most commonly used words in modern English have Old English roots. Words like be, water, and strong, for example, derive （派生出） from Old English roots. Old English, whose best known surviving example is
13、the poem Beowulf, lasted until about 1100. Shortly after the most important event in the development and history of the English language, the Norman Conquest 诺曼征服. The Norman Conquest and Middle English (1100-1500) William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy, invaded and conquered England and the An
14、glo-Saxons in 1066 AD. The new overlords （最高统治者 霸主）spoke a dialect of Old French known as Anglo-Norman. The Normans were also of Germanic stock (Norman comes from Norseman) and Anglo-Norman 盎格鲁诺曼语 was a French dialect that had considerable Germanic influences in addition to 除之外 the basic Latin roots
15、. Prior to 先于 the Norman Conquest, Latin had been only a minor influence on the English language, mainly through vestiges 残余遗迹 of the Roman occupation and from the conversion of Britain to Christianity 基督教 in the seventh century (ecclesiastical 教会的 terms such as priest, vicar, and mass came into the
16、 language this way), but now there was a wholesale（大规模的 批发的） infusion （灌输 输液）of Romance (Anglo-Norman) words. The influence of the Normans can be illustrated 举例说明 by looking at two words, beef and cow. Beef, commonly eaten by the aristocracy 贵族, derives from the Anglo-Norman, while the Anglo-Saxon commoners, who tended the cattle, retained 留存 the Germanic cow. Many legal terms, such as indict 起诉, jury 陪审团 , and verdict 裁决have Anglo-Nor
