英語語言發展史，英語語言發展史概述

英語學習網
2024-01-05

英語語言發展史？1、盎格魯――撒克遜時期。從公元前55年到公元五世紀，羅馬人兩次入侵不列顛，對其統治達400年之久，當時英語還存在只有凱爾特人的語言――凱爾特語。公元410年，羅馬人由于應付自己國家局勢的變化，被迫離開了不列顛，那么，英語語言發展史？一起來了解一下吧。

簡述英語發展史

簡述英語的發展史如下：

1、古英語時期約5世紀-11世紀。

古英語是從盎格魯-撒克遜人的日耳曼語言演化而來的。這個階段的英語受到了盎格魯-撒克遜人、丹麥人和諾曼底人的影響。主要文獻作品有《貝奧武夫》和《英國人的歷史》等。英語詞匯中的許多基礎詞匯（如house、mother）可以追溯到古英語時期。

2、中英語時期約11世紀-15世紀。

中英語是由諾曼底人的法語和古英語混合而成的。在這個時期，英語逐漸成為國內使用的主要語言，并在普通人之間流行起來。著名的中英語文學作品包括《坎特伯雷故事集》和《亞瑟王傳說》。

3、現代英語時期約15世紀至今。

在16世紀，英語開始發生了重大變化，其中包括語法和發音的規范化，引入了大量拉丁語和希臘語的詞匯。隨著英國的殖民擴張，英語開始在全球范圍內傳播，成為國際通用語言。英語的不同變體如美式英語和英式英語逐漸形成。

學習英語的好處：

1、溝通能力。

英語是全球通用的語言，在國際交流和商務領域中非常重要。通過學習英語，你可以更容易地與來自不同國家和文化背景的人進行溝通。

2、工作機會。

掌握英語可以為你創造更廣泛的職業機會。

英語語言的三個時期

答案如下:

(一) 古英語時期 (Old English Period, 450-1150); 這是最早居住在不列顛 (Britain) 的民族塞爾特人所說的塞爾特語(Celtic)，他們雖然最早到英國，但留下來的事跡不多，現在威爾斯、蘇格蘭高地仍有人說塞爾特語。公元前43年凱撒大帝征服不列顛，羅馬人統治不列顛人，同時也將當時羅馬人使用的拉丁語傳入，但并未被一般老百姓采用。公元410年羅馬帝國自英國撤離，這時，來自英國北方的皮刺人 (Picts) 和蘇格蘭人分別從南部和西北侵擾，不列顛無力抵抗，只好求救于往昔經常困擾羅馬軍隊的日耳曼人。根據大英民族編年史的記載，日耳曼民族于公元449年在英格蘭，將日耳曼語帶到英國，而發展成現在的英語，因此，英語是屬于印歐語系Indo-European 日耳曼語族的語言。

(二) 中古英語時期 (Middle English Period, 1150-1500): 始于亨利二世王朝，止于亨利八世王朝。英語在公元十一世紀時已發展成一種成熟的語言，但往后三百年卻沒有成為英格蘭的語言，因為公元一O六六年，來自法國的征服者威廉一世(William the Conqueror) 所領導的諾曼人在戰役中擊敗英軍，從此，法語成為英國上流社會的語言，這些法語借字幾乎涵蓋了所有上流社會的生活用語和抽象概念。

英語語言學的地位

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英語歷史與發展大全

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有古代至現代、英國英語至洋涇浜英語，有著以下的文章：

英語歷史

英語史

古英語

中古英語

近代英語

基本英語

河口英語

現代英語

英語借詞

英語方言

標音符號

英語口語

英語語法

英語測驗

英美英語的差異

GMAT

GRE

IELTS

LSAT

TOEFL

大學英語考試

英語專業四級

英語專業八級

中式英語

洋涇浜英語

日式英語

和制英語

美國英語

英國英語

加拿大英語

港式英語

新加坡英語

新西蘭英語

澳大利亞英語

巴布亞皮欽語

http://jlp.moonlightchest.com/default.asp

英語語言發展史古英語翻譯

http://www.iselong.com/english/0001/1124.htm(英語簡史(English Version))

A Brief Look at the History of English

The history of English is conventionally, if perhaps too neatly, divided into three periods usually called Old English (or Anglo-Saxon), Middle English, and Modern English. The earliest period begins with the migration of certain Germanic tribes from the continent to Britain in the fifth century A. D., though no records of their language survive from before the seventh century, and it continues until the end of the eleventh century or a bit later. By that time Latin, Old Norse (the language of the Viking invaders), and especially the Anglo-Norman French of the dominant class after the Norman Conquest in 1066 had begun to have a substantial impact on the lexicon, and the well-developed inflectional system that typifies the grammar of Old English had begun to break down. The following brief sample of Old English prose illustrates several of the significant ways in which change has so transformed English that we must look carefully to find points of resemblance between the language of the tenth century and our own. It is taken from Aelfric's "Homily on St. Gregory the Great" and concerns the famous story of how that pope came to send missionaries to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity after seeing Anglo-Saxon boys for sale as slaves in Rome:

Eft he axode, hu e?re eeode nama w?re te hi of comon. Him w?s geandwyrd, t?t hi Angle genemnode w?ron. Ta cw?e he, "Rihtlice hi sind Angle gehatene, for ean ee hi engla wlite habbae, and swilcum gedafenae t?t hi on heofonum engla geferan beon."

A few of these words will be recognized as identical in spelling with their modern equivalents -- he, of, him, for, and, on -- and the resemblance of a few others to familiar words may be guessed -- nama to name, comon to come, w?re to were, w?s to was -- but only those who have made a special study of Old English will be able to read the passage with understanding. The sense of it is as follows: "Again he [St. Gregory] asked what might be the name of the people from which they came. It was answered to him that they were named Angles. Then he said, 'Rightly are they called Angles because they have the beauty of angels, and it is fitting that such as they should be angels' companions in heaven.' " Some of the words in the original have survived in altered form, including axode (asked), hu (how), rihtlice (rightly), engla (angels), habbae (have), swilcum (such), heofonum (heaven), and beon (be). Others, however, have vanished from our lexicon, mostly without a trace, including several that were quite common words in Old English: eft "again," eeode "people, nation," cw?e "said, spoke," gehatene "called, named," wlite "appearance, beauty," and geferan "companions." Recognition of some words is naturally hindered by the presence of two special characters, t, called "thorn," and e, called "edh," which served in Old English to represent the sounds now spelled with th.

Other points worth noting include the fact that the pronoun system did not yet, in the late tenth century, include the third person plural forms beginning with th-: hi appears where we would use they. Several aspects of word order will also strike the reader as oddly unlike ours. Subject and verb are inverted after an adverb -- ta cw?e he "Then said he" -- a phenomenon not unknown in Modern English but now restricted to a few adverbs such as never and requiring the presence of an auxiliary verb like do or have. In subordinate clauses the main verb must be last, and so an object or a preposition may precede it in a way no longer natural: te hi of comon "which they from came," for ean ee hi engla wlite habbae "because they angels' beauty have."

Perhaps the most distinctive difference between Old and Modern English reflected in Aelfric's sentences is the elaborate system of inflections, of which we now have only remnants. Nouns, adjectives, and even the definite article are inflected for gender, case, and number: e?re eeode "(of) the people" is feminine, genitive, and singular, Angle "Angles" is masculine, accusative, and plural, and swilcum "such" is masculine, dative, and plural. The system of inflections for verbs was also more elaborate than ours: for example, habbae "have" ends with the -ae suffix characteristic of plural present indicative verbs. In addition, there were two imperative forms, four subjunctive forms (two for the present tense and two for the preterit, or past, tense), and several others which we no longer have. Even where Modern English retains a particular category of inflection, the form has often changed. Old English present participles ended in -ende not -ing, and past participles bore a prefix ge- (as geandwyrd "answered" above).

The period of Middle English extends roughly from the twelfth century through the fifteenth. The influence of French (and Latin, often by way of French) upon the lexicon continued throughout this period, the loss of some inflections and the reduction of others (often to a final unstressed vowel spelled -e) accelerated, and many changes took place within the phonological and grammatical systems of the language. A typical prose passage, especially one from the later part of the period, will not have such a foreign look to us as Aelfric's prose has; but it will not be mistaken for contemporary writing either. The following brief passage is drawn from a work of the late fourteenth century called Mandeville's Travels. It is fiction in the guise of travel literature, and, though it purports to be from the pen of an English knight, it was originally written in French and later translated into Latin and English. In this extract Mandeville describes the land of Bactria, apparently not an altogether inviting place, as it is inhabited by "full yuele [evil] folk and full cruell."

In tat lond ben trees tat beren wolle, as togh it were of scheep; whereof men maken clothes, and all ting tat may ben made of wolle. In tat contree ben many ipotaynes, tat dwellen som tyme in the water, and somtyme on the lond: and tei ben half man and half hors, as I haue seyd before; and tei eten men, whan tei may take hem. And tere ben ryueres and watres tat ben fulle byttere, tree sithes more tan is the water of the see. In tat contré ben many griffounes, more plentee tan in ony other contree. Sum men seyn tat tei han the body vpward as an egle, and benethe as a lyoun: and treuly tei seyn soth tat tei ben of tat schapp. But o griffoun hath the body more gret, and is more strong, tanne eight lyouns, of suche lyouns as ben o this half; and more gret and strongere tan an hundred egles, suche as we han amonges vs. For o griffoun tere wil bere fleynge to his nest a gret hors, 3if he may fynde him at the poynt, or two oxen 3oked togidere, as tei gon at the plowgh.

The spelling is often peculiar by modern standards and even inconsistent within these few sentences (contré and contree, o [griffoun] and a [gret hors], tanne and tan, for example). Moreover, in the original text, there is in addition to thorn another old character 3, called "yogh," to make difficulty. It can represent several sounds but here may be thought of as equivalent to y. Even the older spellings (including those where u stands for v or vice versa) are recognizable, however, and there are only a few words like ipotaynes "hippopotamuses" and sithes "times" that have dropped out of the language altogether. We may notice a few words and phrases that have meanings no longer common such as byttere "salty," o this half "on this side of the world," and at the poynt "to hand," and the effect of the centuries-long dominance of French on the vocabulary is evident in many familiar words which could not have occurred in Aelfric's writing even if his subject had allowed them, words like contree, ryueres, plentee, egle, and lyoun.

In general word order is now very close to that of our time, though we notice constructions like hath the body more gret and three sithes more tan is the water of the see. We also notice that present tense verbs still receive a plural inflection as in beren, dwellen, han, and ben and that while nominative tei has replaced Aelfric's hi in the third person plural, the form for objects is still hem. All the same, the number of inflections for nouns, adjectives, and verbs has been greatly reduced, and in most respects Mandeville is closer to Modern than to Old English.

The period of Modern English extends from the sixteenth century to our own day. The early part of this period saw the completion of a revolution in the phonology of English that had begun in late Middle English and that effectively redistributed the occurrence of the vowel phonemes to something approximating their present pattern. (Mandeville's English would have sounded even less familiar to us than it looks.) Other important early developments include the stabilizing effect on spelling of the printing press and the beginning of the direct influence of Latin and, to a lesser extent, Greek on the lexicon. Later, as English came into contact with other cultures around the world and distinctive dialects of English developed in the many areas which Britain had colonized, numerous other languages made small but interesting contributions to our word-stock.

The historical aspect of English really encompasses more than the three stages of development just under consideration. English has what might be called a prehistory as well. As we have seen, our language did not simply spring into existence; it was brought from the Continent by Germanic tribes who had no form of writing and hence left no records. Philologists know that they must have spoken a dialect of a language that can be called West Germanic and that other dialects of this unknown language must have included the ancestors of such languages as German, Dutch, Low German, and Frisian. They know this because of certain systematic similarities which these languages share with each other but do not share with, say, Danish. However, they have had somehow to reconstruct what that language was like in its lexicon, phonology, grammar, and semantics as best they can through sophisticated techniques of comparison developed chiefly during the last century. Similarly, because ancient and modern languages like Old Norse and Gothic or Icelandic and Norwegian have points in common with Old English and Old High German or Dutch and English that they do not share with French or Russian, it is clear that there was an earlier unrecorded language that can be called simply Germanic and that must be reconstructed in the same way. Still earlier, Germanic was just a dialect (the ancestors of Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit were three other such dialects) of a language conventionally designated Indo-European, and thus English is just one relatively young member of an ancient family of languages whose descendants cover a fair portion of the globe.