Talk:History of English

no alternate theories?
Are there alternate theories of the history of English? Actually I know there is at least one, that of M. J. Harper, as presented in The History of Britain Revealed (namely that English was spoken in Britain long before the Anglo-Saxons arrived, and that Beowulf is a good example of "not-English" rather than "proto-English"). So my question really is, is his theory so marginal that it shouldn't be mentioned at all? Or should it be mentioned to be refuted, or relegated to the loonybins of the English Department? Or is it legitimate to discuss? --Richardson mcphillips (talk) 22:19, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Not only are there are alternate theories, but there is little to no historical evidence of an "Anglo-Saxon" invasion or any sort of invasion by "German tribes." By the time the Frisian/Anglo/Saxon coastal dwelling peoples came over to the British Isles, they were themselves living very much in a settled agricultural society, based around towns and villages, with little to no evidence of "tribalism."  Further, there was no war-like invasion.  Frisian, Anglo and Saxon tradespeople and, especially, bureaucrats were *hired* by the local landowners to come and improve farming practices and feudal organization in early medieval England.  As a result, many of these Anglo-Saxons themselves became landed, married into the pre-existing clan system, and instituted what we now know today as "British monarchy."  There are even studies of the DNA of these people (and to call them "Germanic" is a stretch, as German is not yet a language and the so-called Teutonic languages have multiple places of origin/linguistic pumping, so it's certainly a biased term that linguists have taken under recent consideration).  At any rate, the Anglo-Saxons and Frisians did migrate to the Isles and began to take up administrative positions in what we would call the "upper" parts of society (Britain was much less class structured under the Celts).  New patterns of land use, imported from the Continent, pushed Celtic people further west, but obviously, the Welsh, the Gaels and the Celtic speakers in Ireland did not convert to Anglo-Saxon.  No one knows for sure how many Bretish/Pictish words still remained in the local vocabulary in, say, the year 900, but the entire region now known as England had been Romanized prior, so there was some linguistic displacement (both in syntax and in morphology/phonology) throughout the entire era.  Anyway, this article is no longer usable as a reasonable reference for the subject for high school or undergraduate students, it is further off base than it is on base.LeVeillé (talk) 22:57, 30 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I looked M. J. Harper's book up. Apparently his theory includes the idea that Modern English existed from medieval times, and that it gave rise to modern European languages. This seems highly implausible to me, and I haven't heard it before. — Eru·tuon 23:37, 21 March 2015 (UTC)
 * English is de facto a German dialect with several armies and navies, which was an important reason for both world wars. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.114.125.90 (talk) 13:33, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, that made no sense.LeVeillé (talk) 23:04, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not the top expert in this area, but I teach History of the English Language at the university level and have the strong sense that Harper's argument is highly marginal. The subtitle of his novel is sensationalizing ("the shocking truth about..."), the publisher is not an academic press, and the few reviews at amazon.com are very mixed. Jk180 (talk) 15:52, 22 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Totally WP:FRINGE, and should not be mentioned. Johnbod (talk) 16:13, 22 September 2015 (UTC)
 * an anonymous author (that's not his real name) who is also anti-evolution and a selfpublished book? No. Doug Weller (talk) 20:02, 22 September 2015 (UTC)
 * He's pro- book advances; I'm not sure more than that can be said with certainty! Johnbod (talk) 20:47, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

I must assert that I agree with the implications of this header "no alternate theories?". The whole of the page has been presented almost as "received wisdom" on the basis of the "fifth century hypothesis" without any consideration whatsoever of the broad and contentious nature of this area of research. This area is a very controversial area with many reputable university scholars (who are far better placed intellectually than I in this area) debating, and contributing peer-reviewed articles to, the origins of the English language. Many are now considering the possibility that English has linguistic roots which not only predate the so-called invasions of the fifth century but also the Roman occupation itself. In my sincere opinion, and with all due respect, the whole page needs completely revising because it reads like an account from an outdated text on the origins of the English people and their language. A passing reference to Oppenheimer's work but not even a mention of the obvious implications of the historiographical evidence in Caesar's 'Gallic Wars' that Germanic speech communities (and not necessarily of the Western Germanic branch but of a distinct branch) were already established in Britain alongside the Brythonic by the third century BCE. Anybody coming to this page for the first time as a rookie or greenhorn, so to speak, would certainly not be greeted by a balanced introduction which invites further interest and inquiry. Greengauge121 (talk) 11:20, 26 October 2015 (UTC) 1) "English is Not Normal" by John McWhorter, Professor at Columbia University poses the tantalizing concept that English has its roots in "Celtic" languages. 2) After seeing the DNA results of England (traces of the Anglo-Saxon 'invasion' are found in roughly 5% of the population) it's hard to believe the language is Germanic (the huge majority Celtic population would have been required to stop using their own language and switch to that of the small ruling minority...not very plausible.) 3) My nephew, who teaches German, does not believe English can be a Germanic language; not because of the words themselves, but because of the language structure. It appears to me there should be a mention of alternate theories.


 * I don't know any Celtic languages, but I speak fluent English and German and have taught both at the university level. English sure seems to me like a Germanic language, and not just because of the vocabulary. The verb forms (as you move from present to past to part participles) and the word order are extremely close in English and German. Celtic could certainly be more important to English than is currently recognized, but that claim would need extensive evidence and discussion by scholars. As far as I know, specific DNA markers and specific languages have no direct, meaningful connections, and languages have been adopted or abandoned for all sorts of reasons. Jk180 (talk) 16:55, 19 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Part of the problem is calling the entire group "Germanic" when there's no clear evidence about when "Germanic" diverged from PIE. Many DNA branches have specific linguistic affiliations (not sure where you're getting facts that would deny this; obviously, there are major exceptions but when there are, I can assure you that geneticists and geographers look for explanations and if possible, so do historians).  We might as well call the entire group of languages "Nordo-Anglo-Teutonic" rather than Germanic.  English has only a little in common with, say, Old Frankish (which is always classsified as Germanic).  The stem language from which Anglo, Saxon, Frisian, German, Dutch, Norse, etc all descend probably ought not to be called Germanic and would not have been named this had not German linguists been so much at the forefront of the 19th century discussion.  BTW, there *is* extensive debate about this among linguists at every linguistic meeting involving the topic.LeVeillé (talk) 23:04, 30 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I thought the surprising lack of vocabulary of Celtic origin in Old English was always something of a puzzle to scholars! This is still fringe nonsense. Johnbod (talk) 17:39, 19 March 2016 (UTC)


 * McWhorter does not say English has its roots in Celtic languages. He says "English started out as, essentially, a kind of German." He just says that the requirement of using "do" in yes/no questions comes from Celtic, that's it. --Beirne (talk) 21:58, 19 March 2016 (UTC)


 * I haven't followed McWhorter's argument about a possible Celtic origin of "do," but I know that "tun" (do) is used in German today even though it's viewed as incorrect. Elementary school children living near Frankfurt, Germany frequently use this construction very much like we do in English... until they are corrected by teachers and parents and told not to use it. A child might ask, for example, "Tust du essen?" (lit. Do you eat?) rather than the form that they are taught is correct: "Isst du?" (lit. Eat you?). Here's an English-language source that aligns with my observations of German children's use of "tun," but the author (David Briggs) connects it not to children but to specific modern dialects of German and cites a source explaining that the use of "tun" as an auxiliary verb was stigmatized in Early New High German: https://aeon.co/conversations/does-english-have-any-special-merits-that-set-it-apart-from-other-languages German speakers today sometimes continue to play with this "incorrect" use of the auxiliary verb form after they've grown up a bit. See, for example, the German-language exchanges at http://www.poppen.de/community/topic/25987-was-tust-du-essen/ It seems unlikely to me that small children and speakers of different German dialects are imitating English syntax; I think it's more likely that they're using analogy, drawing on other common question constructions that do use auxiliaries in German, such as "Hast du gegessen?" (lit. Have you eaten?). None of this has any direct bearing on what Old English and Old German were actually like, but it may every so slightly suggest that Germanic languages have always had the option of building questions with "do" and did not need to borrow that feature from Celtic. A possible Celtic origin is an interesting idea, of course, but I'm not yet convinced! Jk180 (talk) 01:26, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

In the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain Wikipedia page, the Celtic hypothesis (contents 5.2) is stated. I think it is fair to include this as an alternative theory. The hypothesis states that the Anglo-Saxon grammar was influenced by the Celts and gives evidence for the hypothesis. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 45.47.192.105 (talk) 02:09, 13 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Let's please stick to philologists specializing in historical Germanic linguistics here. Marginal theories outside of this discipline, including some espoused by McWhorter, are WP:UNDUE and should be treated as such. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 09:02, 13 April 2016 (UTC)


 * How about we stick to comparative linguistics and not philology at all? There are very few juried journals in philology dealing with this important topic.  Further, spoken and written language do not necessarily share the same history or evolution.LeVeillé (talk) 23:04, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

@Bloodofox: With all due respect, English philology does not deal exclusively with Germanic linguistics and alternative theories unrelated to Germanic origin should be welcome in this discussion. English is a mixture of languages (at least Latin and Germanic). The good evidence for a Celtic relationship (as I stated above) certainly should not be ignored. In regards to English origin, I think it is unanimously Germanic. However, this discussion is about the History of English not the origin of it. Regarding what you said about theories that are WP:UNDUE, the Celtic Hypothesis is not one of them. It is a growing idea based on sound evidence. Since the Celtic Hypothesis is already mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain page, it makes sense to include it in the history of English. 45.47.192.105 (talk) 13:01, 14 April 2016 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 45.47.192.105 (talk) 23:25, 13 April 2016 (UTC)


 * You wrote that the Celtic Hypothesis "is a growing idea based on sound evidence." If it is a growing idea, we should cite reliable sources that present it as such. If it's based on sound evidence, we should cite reliable sources that discuss that evidence. I don't think it's acceptable to argue that it should be mentioned on this page because it is mentioned on another page of Wikipedia. (I'm very skeptical of the idea that English could only have gotten the "do" of yes/no questions from Celtic. In an earlier contribution to this thread, I cited several sources demonstrating the use of "do" in yes/no questions in German.) Jk180 (talk) 21:40, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

This article looks as though it had been written in 1950! No one seems to have looked at the extensive citations (see below) used in the "Linguistic evidence" section of Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain. Taken as a whole, they seem to have more than adequate academic gravitas for the "Celtic Substrate" hypothesis to at least merit a mention here. I cannot imagine that all of these published authors are fringe theory pushers or lack academic credentials. For example 'The Oxford Handbook of the History of English' sounds like something that should be referenced here if nowhere else on Wikipedia. If a linguist can write a paper about the "re-evaluation of the Celtic hypothesis" then it has been around for long enough in academic circles to put this article to shame for not even mentioning it. Come on you linguists, earn your corn! Get hold of some recent research. Urselius (talk) 11:04, 4 October 2016 (UTC) Urselius (talk) 11:04, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Moravcsik, Edith. 1978. 'Language contact.' In Joseph Greenberg, Charles A. Ferguson and Edith Moravcsik (eds) Universals of human language, vol. I. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 93-123.
 * Thomason, Sarah Grey and Terrence Kaufman. 1988. Language contact, creolization and genetic linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press.
 * Coates, Richard. "Invisible Britons: The view from linguistics. Paper circulated in connection with the conference Britons and Saxons, 14–16 April. University of Sussex Linguistics and English Language Department." (2004)
 * Charles A. Ferguson, 'Diglossia', Word 15 (1959), 325–340; Joshua A. Fishman, 'Bilingualism with and without Diglossia, Diglossia with and without Bilingualism', Journal of Social Issues 23 (1979), 29–38.
 * Miller, D. Gary. External Influences on English: From its Beginnings to the Renaissance. Oxford 2012: Oxford University Press
 * Hickey, Raymond. Early English and the Celtic hypothesis. in Terttu Nevalainen & Elizabeth Closs Traugott(eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the History of English. Oxford 2012: Oxford University Press: 497–507.
 * Filppula, Markku, and Juhani Klemola, eds. 2009. Re-evaluating the Celtic Hypothesis. Special issue of English Language and Linguistics 13.2.
 * Poussa, Patricia. 1990. 'A Contact-Universals Origin for Periphrastic Do, with Special Consideration of OE-Celtic Contact'. In Papers from the Fifth International Conference on English Historical Linguistics, ed. Sylvia Adamson,.
 * Hickey, Raymond. 1995. 'Early Contact and Parallels between English and Celtic'. Vienna English Working Papers 4: 87–119.
 * Schrijver, P. (2013) 'Language Contact and the Origins of the Germanic Languages', Routledge ISBN 1134254490, pp. 60-71
 * Hans Frede Nielsen, The Continental Backgrounds of English and its Insular Development until 1154 (Odense, 1998), pp. 77–9; Peter Trudgill, New-Dialect Formation: The Inevitability of Colonial Englishes (Edinburgh, 2004), p. 11.
 * Peter Schrijver, 'The Rise and Fall of British Latin', in The Celtic Roots of English, ed. Markku Filppula et al., Studies in British Celtic Historical Phonology (Amsterdam, 1995) pp. 87–110.
 * Toon, T.E. (1983) The Politics of Early Old English Sound Change. New York

These are "disputes" among experts, on minute details of the phonology and grammar of Old English. There is no "alternate hypothesis" in the sense suggested here. From "Re-evaluating the Celtic Hypothesis" (2009): "The standard wisdom, repeated in textbooks on the history of English such as Baugh and Cable (1993), Pyles & Algeo (1993), and Strang (1970), holds that contact influences from Celtic have always been minimal and are mainly limited to Celtic-origin place names and river names and a mere handful of other words". The "impermeability of English against Celtic influences" is a fact and not under debate. What is under debate are possible reasons for this. The so-called "Celtic hypothesis", a neologism coined for the 2009 publication, does not challenge this; it is explicitly about reviewing minority proposals to the effect that some unexplained features of Old English might in fact be due to a Celtic substrate. Under WP:DUE, this does not deserve more than one or two sentences in this article, but of course anyone is welcome to build and improve the actual article on the topic, at present existing under the title of Brittonicisms in English. The problem is not with the 2009 publication, which is not "WP:FRINGE", but with the WP:SCUM attitude prevalent among uninformed editors on Wikipedia. Discussion of the various contributions to the 2009 volume would be perfectly at home in the Brittonicisms in English page, i.e.
 * McWhorter: periphrastic do may be due to Celtic
 * Schrijver speculates about possible phonological effects of a Celtic substrate; "He concedes that the evidence is very limited"
 * Laker: phonemicisation of voiced fricatives in Old English may be due to Celtic contact
 * Lutz: paradigm of "to be" in Old English may have been influenced by Celtic, following Keller (1925) ["This article looks as though it had been written in 1950!" indeed]
 * Poppe: Reflexives and intensifiers: "However, on closer examination they turn out to be typologically related, and do not therefore provide independent evidence for Celtic influence."
 * Filppula: cleft construction.
 * Klemola: unusual adverb + infinitive constructions in southwestern and West Midlands English  ("away to go").
 * Vennemann: answers to yes/no questions (ok, so this final one may be WP:FRINGE)

This hodge-podge of speculative (but perfectly scholarly) minutiae is dubbed, somewhat grandiosely, the "Celtic Hypothesis" by the editors. Yes, even historical linguists try to come up with catchy titles for their publications.


 * This is just your opinion. If a theory has backing from scholarly opinion and is not fringe (which if it is scholarly and has a relatively wide scholastic base it obviously is not) then mention of it should occur for completeness sake. Urselius (talk) 07:37, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

None of this has any place in the "history of English" page. Most of it would be too obscure or speculative even for dedicated "Old English phonology" or Old English syntax" articles. But people could work on a proper presentation in Brittonicisms in English instead of irrelevant cross-posting to this talkpage. Personally, what I find most promising here is the discussion of Welsh influence on West Midlands English. Needless to say, this is irrelevant to the "History of English" as a whole, as it concerns the continued contact between Welsh and English speakers along the Welsh borders throughout the medieval period. --dab (𒁳) 11:03, 18 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Again just your opinion; an encyclopaedia, even one as flawed as Wikipedia, should aim to be encyclopaedic. Schrijver states that the sound shift seen in Old English from away from its continental ancestor, from c.450 to c.700 is the result of contact with a substrate language, i.e. thorough Old English being spoken by the native speakers of another language. I believe that the majority of philologists are of the opinion that Old English was not merely an idiom transplanted directly from the continent. If, as most scholars assert, Old English was a product of insular processes then there should be some mention of what these processes may have been. There is far too much published material on the 'Celtic hypothesis' for it to be entirely ignored in the text of this article. Urselius (talk) 07:37, 19 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I do not believe that you are correct in repeatedly dismissing counter-arguments as "just your opinion." I teach History of English Language at the university level. The standard textbooks, written by experts, do not refer to a Celtic hypothesis. Baugh and Cable's History of the English Language talks about the "slight influence" of Celtic on English and focuses on vocabulary, not the periphrastic "do" or other alleged connections. You offer what look to me like unsupported assertions (such as "I believe that the majority of philologists are of the opinion that..."). Current, university-level textbooks are a reasonable place to find what actual linguistic consensus exists on the subject of Celtic influence on English. Jk180 (talk) 19:32, 8 October 2017 (UTC)

This is only a Talk question, but I wonder if it has been given any further thought by current linguists regarding the arrival of a Germanic tongue in Britain before Doggerland became submerged... long before the collapse of the Roman Empire? (209.121.229.91 (talk) 18:24, 1 November 2020 (UTC)).


 * Short answer: no. Mostly even the earliest Pre-Proto-Germanic language is not really thought to have existed at 6,000 BCE, still less on the North Sea coast. Not that anyone actually knows. Johnbod (talk) 23:27, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 31 July 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Withdrawn. Please do not list multiple discussions. I am neutral with the following titles except History of English. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 17:03, 31 July 2020 (UTC)


 * History of English → History of the English language
 * History of French → History of the French language
 * History of Portuguese → History of the Portuguese language
 * History of Greek → History of the Greek language (bolded on the lead)
 * History of German → History of the German language (bolded on the lead)
 * History of Polish → History of the Polish language (short description of the article)
 * History of Swedish → History of the Swedish language
 * History of Hindustani → History of the Hindustani language
 * History of Icelandic → History of the Icelandic language (bolded on the lead)
 * History of Romanian → History of the Romanian language (bolded on the lead)
 * History of Catalan → History of the Catalan language
 * History of Danish → History of the Danish language – I nominated the respective category for renaming to match the main article (link). However, it was opposed and I am currently requesting to do the reverse. Unless otherwise noted, I am neutral on other History of foo articles. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 12:28, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Caution – Before citing the WP:CONCISE to oppose the RM, please thoroughly read the policy on article titles. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 12:35, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Proposed just 4 months ago, & no consensus after a long discussion. What's different now? Johnbod (talk) 13:02, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Weak Oppose It looks like this was discussed a bit too recently to go through this all again. But this does not seem necessary -- without a word like "the" or another article, this does not seem a likely search term for other subjects, and for the few who use nonstandard phrasing there are hatnotes to resolve.--Yaksar (let's chat) 14:08, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose, if not procedure close. This is the third RM of this nature opened by the OP in the past five months (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Languages/Archive 14 in addition to the above). I recommend they consult the community such as WT:LANG on the possibility of consolidation before opening RMs like this and work towards a preliminary consensus. Otherwise this is starting to resemble forum-shopping/refusal to get the point. Nardog (talk) 14:48, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I just realized all but the English one were added by an IP. Is this in line with your intention? Nardog (talk) 16:59, 31 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment because it involve all RMs that include in History of foo format, I recommend for all users to discuss it at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Languages to discuss the possibility of consolidation before opening RMs and work towards a preliminary consensus. thanks. 36.77.92.128 (talk) 16:22, 31 July 2020 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

King James Version Alphabet
I tweaked the article with... In 1611, the Revised King James Version of the Bible was released using the 24-letter English Alphabet. It was the 1629 1st Revision King James Bible Cambridge that established the 26-letter Modern English Alphabet and English Gematria. 2603:3020:BE7:A000:5490:8C43:B4E5:7CA7 (talk) 15:59, 15 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Please cite a reliable published source per WP:RS. Thanks. BilCat (talk) 19:32, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Mention of King James Version (KJV) English Bible translation in the Early Modern-English section
I believe the Early-modern English section of the History of English page should include mention of the King James Version (KJV) English bible translation. Since it was written during this era in 1600's and is one of the most widely identified examples of Early Modern English with language, terms, and verses many people still read, use, and understand today. As a means of assisting readers with an understanding of what Early-Modern English is by providing a highly influential global example.

The far less widely known Beowulf manuscript, the Cantebury Tales and the Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson are mentioned in the Old English, Middle English and Modern English sections respectively. It may also be appropriate and beneficial to subsequently mention the New King James Version (NKJV) English Bible translation in the Modern English section. Since this English Bible translation was written during the Modern English Era in the 20th century and is also better known than mentioned examples, being one of the most universal English Bible translations. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kyle Steven4 (talk • contribs) 02:59, 18 November 2022 (UTC)