最新英语的发展史(中英文版)

]

，

orang-outang[

马来语，猩猩

]

，

padd y[

马来语，

稻

]

。

与此同时，由于与法国一直保持着密切关系，法语词 仍然源源不断地传入英语。这一时期

传入英语的法语词很多保留了法语在发音和拼写上的 特征，如

prot

é

g

é，被保护人，

chaise

两轮马车。

在构词法方面，截短单词和混成词迅速增加。依靠元音交替构成新词的方 法被逐渐废弃了。

在这一时期，英语被带到了英国以外的一 些地区、国家。成为那里的通用语言。这里应特

别提到的美国英语。随着时间的推移，大 西洋两边的盎格鲁

-

萨克森人使用的英语尽管基本

相同，但在语言，拼写和语法方面都开始出现一些区别。

二十世纪以来，英美的科学文化有了很大的发展，各式各样的宣传媒介越来越普及，又发

生了两次世界大战，从们之间的交往越来越多，英语的词汇也随着越来越丰富。词汇量有

了成倍的增加。英语作为一种国际的语言，是英国，美国，澳大利亚，新西兰，加拿大等

国的国语。使用人口过三亿四千万以上，是在国际上使用最广泛的语言，在国际交往中起

着重要的作用。

经过

15 00

年的变迁，英语从几个日耳曼部族的语言发展为今天具有重大国际影响的语言，

这固然有政治，经济，社会的原因，但英语本身也有其它主要语言所没有的长处。词汇的

国际性便是他的优点之一。从本单元简略地回顾中可以看出英语善于吸收外来词。一方面

英语属于日尔曼语族，有日尔曼语的共同词语，另一方面又长期与法语及其它罗曼语族语

言的联系密切，同时吸收了大量古典词语。可以说，英语把代表欧洲主要文化的词语兼收

并蓄于一身，这在欧洲各语言中间是独特的。从语法角度看，英语词尾变化简单，没有复

杂的性数格变化。英语正在不断向分析性语言的方向发展，向简化的方向发展，英语的词

序起的作用越来越大，这也使英语比较容易学习，特别是容易入门了。

英语也有他的弱点。最容易察觉的便是拼读不统一，造成的拼写混乱。此外，同义 词、惯

用语特别多，这固然使其表现力强，但同时也给英语学习者带来了不少的因难。< /p>

English is a member of the Indo-European family of languages. This broad family

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 (English, German, Swedish etc.); the Indo-Iranian languages

(Hindi, Urdu, Sanskrit etc.); the Slavic languages (Russian, Polish, Czech etc.); the Baltic

languages of Latvian and Lithuanian; the Celtic languages (Welsh, Irish Gaelic etc.);

Greek.

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. These words are all cognates, similar words in different

languages that share the same root.

By the second century BC, this Common Germanic language had split into three distinct

sub-groups:

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East Germanic was spoken by peoples who migrated back to southeastern Europe. No

East Germanic language is spoken today, and the only written East Germanic language

that survives is Gothic.

North Germanic evolved into the modern Scandinavian languages of Swedish, Danish,

Norwegian, and Icelandic (but not Finnish, which is related to Hungarian and Estonian

and is not an Indo-European language).

West Germanic is the ancestor of modern German, Dutch, Flemish, Frisian, and English.

Old English (500-1100 AD)

West Germanic invaders from Jutland and southern Denmark: the Angles (whose name

is the source of the words England and English), Saxons, and Jutes, began to settle in

the British Isles in the fifth and sixth centuries AD. They spoke a mutually intelligible

language, similar to modern Frisian - the language of the northeastern region of the

Netherlands - that is called Old English. Four major dialects of Old English emerged,

Northumbrian in the north of England, Mercian in the Midlands, West Saxon in the south

and west, and Kentish in the Southeast.

These invaders pushed the original, Celtic-speaking inhabitants out of what is now

England into Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, and Ireland, leaving behind a few Celtic words.

These Celtic languages survive today in the Gaelic languages of Scotland and Ireland and

in Welsh. Cornish, unfortunately, is, in linguistic terms, now a dead language. (The last

native Cornish speaker died in 1777) Also influencing English at this time were the

Vikings. 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 Scandinavian 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 surviving

today. But this is deceptive; Old English is much more important than these statistics

would indicate. About half of the most commonly used words in modern English have Old

English roots. Words like be, water, and strong, for example, derive from Old English

roots.

Old English, whose best known surviving example is 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.

The Norman Conquest and Middle English (1100-1500)

William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy, invaded and conquered England and the

Anglo-Saxons in 1066 AD. The new overlords spoke a dialect of Old French known as

Anglo-Norman. The Normans were also of Germanic stock (

influences in addition to the basic Latin roots.

Prior to the Norman Conquest, Latin had been only a minor influence on the English

language, mainly through vestiges of the Roman occupation and from the conversion of

Britain to Christianity in the seventh century (ecclesiastical terms such as priest, vicar,

and mass came into the language this way), but now there was a wholesale infusion of

Romance (Anglo-Norman) words.

The influence of the Normans can be illustrated by looking at two words, beef and cow.

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