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Crystal - The Stories of English

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A history of the English language draws on the diversity of dialects and regional accents around the world, as well as the dialects that appear in a variety of literary classics, to explain the significance of the language.;The origins of Old English : the Celtic language puzzle -- The Old English dialects : the rise and fall of West Saxon -- Early lexical diversity : understanding Danes -- Stylistic variation in Old English : grammatical transition -- The transition to Middle English : two Peterborough Chronicles -- A trilingual nation : Lay Subsidy dialects -- Lexical invasions : the first dialect story -- Evolving variation : well well -- A dialect age : where did the -s ending come from? -- The emerging standard : complaining about change -- Printing and its consequences : the first English dictionary -- Early modern English preoccupations : choosing thou or you -- Linguistic daring : avoiding transcriptional anaemia -- Dialect fallout : a beggarly portrayal -- Stabilizing disorder : delusions of simplicity -- Standard rules : glottal stops -- New horizons : tracking a change : the case of yall -- Linguistic life goes on : the grammatical heart of nonstandard English -- And dialect life goes on : dialect in Middle Earth -- Times a-changin -- Appendix: The location of the towns and counties of England referred to in this book.

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First published in the United States in 2004 by The Overlook Press Peter Mayer - photo 1

First published in the United States in 2004 by
The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

141 Wooster Street

New York, NY 10012

www.overlookpress.com

For bulk and special sales, please contact sales@overlookny.com

Copyright 2004 by David Crystal

All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

ISBN 978-1-46830-617-0

The Caistor rune

An extract from an Old English manuscript: The Dream of the Rood, in the Vercelli Book

Line 56 of The Dream of the Rood in runic lettering on the Ruthwell Cross

The opening page of The Wanderer

Manuscript of the oldest known rota (round) in English

Writ issued by William I in 1067

A page from Bullokars abridged grammar, illustrating his reformed orthography

A page of Cawdreys dictionary

An extract from a courtroom clerks record (1615)

The entry for dialect in Dr Johnsons Dictionary (1755)

Punch cartoon: Poor letter H

The general direction of the fifth-century Germanic invasions

Early domains of Anglo-Saxon power (seventh century)

Factors influencing Old English dialects in the eighth and ninth centuries in England

The distribution of q-, wh-, and w- spellings in personal names and place-names in East Midlands Lay Subsidy Rolls

Major Middle English dialect areas

Known locations of words for church in England during the Middle English period

Known locations of words for church in northern East Anglia during the Middle English period

The city of London c. 1400

The distribution of wealth in England and Wales in 1334

Some US regional dialect items

A family-tree representation of the way English has spread around the world

Locations in the British Isles referred to in this book

In fact, the book has two introductions, because there are two stories to be told.

On there is an outline of the history of English, as often recounted. The past century has seen dozens of books which have presented the language in such terms, describing stages in the emergence of what has come to be called Standard English. A standard is a variety of a language which has acquired special prestige within a community. It is an important focus of study, and one which will be routinely encountered as the chronology of the present book unfolds. But an account of the standard language is only a small part of the whole story of English. The real story is much, much bigger.

Accordingly, beginning on , there is an introduction to this real story, which is what this book is largely about. Real stories would be more accurate, for in the history of something as multifaceted as a language, there are always several trends taking place simultaneously. A richness of diversity exists everywhere, and always has, over the languages 1,500-year history; but the story of Standard English has hitherto attracted all the attention. The other stories have never been given their rightful place in English linguistic history, and it is time they were.

Telling several stories simultaneously is not something which suits the linear expository method of a book, so to convey this message I have had to adopt a somewhat unorthodox structure. The main sequence of chapters provides a chronological narrative from Old English to Modern English, focusing on the interaction between standard and nonstandard; but they are separated by Interludes illustrating topics to do with nonstandard English which fall outside the time framework. Also, within chapters, I have used panels to illustrate the nature of the nonstandard dimension, thereby emphasizing the dynamic tension which always exists between nonstandard and standard varieties.

It is a patchwork quilt of a book, as a result; but that is inevitable, given the constraints faced by any historian of nonstandard language. It is not easy to obtain data on the various kinds of nonstandard English, or even on what informal spoken Standard English was really like, in the years before broadcasting, tape-recorders, camcorders, and the Internet gave voices to daily personal interaction in all its regional and cultural diversity. Standard English presents us with no such problem because, as the communitys prestige written form, it has been the medium of authorial expression over several centuries. The other varieties do not fare so well.

If the recorded linguistic echoes of the past are predominantly White and Anglo-Saxon, as they seem to be, how much will we ever learn about the language of the ethnic minorities which form an important part of British history? If past echoes are predominantly male, will we ever discover what role women played in the history of English? And if these echoes are all so closely tied to the standard dialect, with writers dismissing regional dialects as sadly battered and mutilated or quaint and eccentric, will we ever discover our real sociolinguistic heritage?

The Stories of English is an exploration of this heritage.

The standard story

The standard history of the English language usually goes something like this.

In the year 449 Germanic tribes arrived in Britain from the European mainland, and displaced the native British (Celtic) population, eventually establishing a single language which was Anglo-Saxon in character.

Most writings of the period are shown to be preserved in the West Saxon dialect, the language of King Alfred, spoken in the politically and culturally dominant region of southern England around Winchester. Descriptions of the language, known as Anglo-Saxon or Old English, therefore reflect this dominance.

Fundamental changes began to affect Old English grammar during the later Anglo-Saxon period, and these, along with changes in pronunciation, innovative spelling conventions, and a huge influx of new words after the Norman Conquest, led to the language evolving a fresh character, known as Middle English.

During the Middle English period, the literary language began to evolve, culminating in the compositions of Chaucer, and we see the first signs of a Standard English emerging in the work of the Chancery scribes in London.

The introduction of printing by Caxton in 1476 brought an enormous expansion in the written resources of the language, and was the major influence on the development of a standardized writing system. Spelling began to stabilize, and thus became less of a guide to pronunciation, which continued to change.

Further changes in pronunciation and grammar, and another enormous increase in vocabulary stimulated by the Renaissance, led to the emergence of an Early Modern English. Its character was much influenced by Elizabethan literature, notably by Shakespeare, and by the texts of many Bibles, especially those of Tyndale (1525) and King James (1611).

The unprecedented increase in the languages range and creativity brought a reaction, in the form of a climate of concern about the unwelcome pace and character of language change. This led to the writing of the first English dictionaries, grammars, and manuals of pronunciation, in an attempt to bring the language under some measure of control.

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