Latin influence in

ENGLISH
Sections Introduction Periods Attitudes

▹ Loan words ▹ Old English ▹ Purists

▹ Learned words ▹ Middle English
▹ Age of the words ▹ Modern English
Introduction

3
• 1st 700 years: English was brought into contact with at least three other
languages:
the Celts, the Romans, and the Scandinavians

• From each of these contacts it shows certain effects additions to its

vocabulary

• English has always been particularly open to foreign influences.

 • The language of a highly regarded civilization the Anglo-Saxons wanted to learn it

• Contact with that civilization:

I. First commercial and military

II. Later religious and intellectual
III. Extended over many centuries
IV. Constantly renewed

• It began before the Anglo-Saxons came to England and continued throughout the Old English
period
• The Germanic tribes still occupying their continental homes

• Relations with the Romans they acquired a considerable number of Latin words

• They got to England and saw the evidences of the long Roman rule in the island

• Learned from the Celts additional Latin words that had been acquired by them

• Roman missionaries reintroduced Christianity into the island this new cultural influence
resulted in :

a extensive adoption of Latin elements into the language.

 Borrowings
When speakers imitate a word from a
foreign language, they are said to borrow
it, and their imitation is called a
borrowing or loanword

7
 Popular Learned
Loans ▹ Result of cultural
▹ Passed orally
influences

▹ Part of the vocabulary

of everyday life ▹ The main influence in
Old English times was
the Church.
▹ Who use these words:
not aware of the fact that
they are of foreign origin.

8
Periods

9
Old English

10
 Historical
background
43 A.D.
55 B.C

▹ Emperor Claudius sent a

▹ Julius Caesar made attempts
huge army to the island
to invade Britain

▹ A.D. 50:
▹ Not successful because the
local population resisted most of today’s England came
under Roman control
 Historical
background

▹ The Roman Empire ruled much of Britain until it collapse in

476

▹ The Roman Empire had great political power.

Consequences

▹ Latin was spoken in parts of Britain and the European

continent

▹ Great influence on Celtic and Germanic languages.

▹ More than 500 words of Latin origin in the Old English

word stock
 Borrowing from
Latin occurred
before the end of
the Old English
period

1st 2nd 3rd

14
1st Period

15
1st period
Before the migration of the Anglo-Saxons to England:

▹ The Germanic tribes living on the Continent came into contact with
the Romans.

▹ Roman merchants had travelled as far as Scandinavia.

▹ Resulted in a greater degree of communication between Germanic

and Roman tribes.

▹ Contact was not always peaceful in the beginning but it gradually

changed
1st period
▹ Germanic tribes joined the Roman army

▹ German soldiers and their families became familiar with Latin military
words.

camp ‘battle’ < L campus

weall ‘wall’ < L vallus

street ‘road, street’ < L strata

mil ‘mile’ < L mile

1st period
▹ Latin words denoting plants and animals

▹ Names of objects that were used in the camp

pine <pinus
aloes <aloe
balsam <balsamum
mule < mul
dragon < draca
peacock < pawa
1st period
▹ The Roman merchant followed the army

▹ Goods: dresses, ornaments, jewels, products and household vessels

▹ Wine trade was one of the most important commercial branches

pund ‘pound’ < L pondus

mynet ‘coin’ < L moneta.
win ‘wine’ < L vinum
must ‘new wine’ < L mustum.
1st period
▹ Domestic life and household articles

▹ Settlers introduced building terms.

cytel ‘kettle’ < L catillus

mese ‘table’ < VL mesa
teped ‘carpet, curtain’ < L ta- petum

belt ‘belt’ < L balteus chalk < cealc

cemes ‘shirt’ < camisia copper < copor
side ‘silk’ < VL seda pic ‘pitch’ < picem
strǣt ‘street’ <L strata
There are no written records from
this period because Proto-
Germanic was a spoken
language.

21
2nd Period

22
2nd period
During the settlement period after ca. 450 until the Christianization of the
Anglo-Saxons:

▹ The use of Latin began to decline

▹ Used by Britons from the upper classes and those who lived in the
cities and towns

▹ No opportunity for direct contact between Latin and Old English

▹ Latin words which came into Old English during this second period
arrived through Celtic transmission.
2nd period

ceaster < castra, cf. Chester, Manchester,

Winchester
port ‘harbour, town’ < portus, porta
wic ‘village’ < vicus

munt ‘mountain’ < mont-em

disc ‘dish’ < discus
trifetum ‘tributes’ < tributum
2nd period
▹ Christian words were not unknown to the people before their
conversion

▹ The word church is one of the earliest loans.

▹ In OE it was cirice, cyrice < Greek kuriakon ’(house) of the Lord’.

Minster, OE mynster < L monasterium

devil < L diabolus
Source of the loanwords of these first two
periods was Vulgar Latin

It differed from Classical Latin, which was

used for scholarly and religious
purposes

26
3rd Period

27
3rd period
▹ Latin loanwords from this period and their first occurrence in Old
English recorded in writing were divided into categories:

▹ words which have to do with religion and the Church

▹ Words about education and learning

engel (950) ‘angel’ < angelus

apostol (950) ‘apostle’< apostolus
candel (700) ‘candle’ < candela
mcegester (1000) ‘master’ < magister,
scol (1000) ‘school’ < schola,
titul (900) ‘title’ < titulus
3rd period
▹ Words related to household and clothing

▹ Words that denote plants, herbs and trees

fann (800) ‘fan’ < vannus, fant/font

sacc (1000) ‘sack’ < saccus
sioloc (888) ‘silk’ < sericus
socc (725) ‘sock’ < soccus
bete (1000) ‘beet’ < beta
ceder (1000) ‘cedar’ < cedrus
gingiber (1000) ‘ginger’ < gingiber
lilie (971) ‘lily’ < lilium
palma (825) ‘palm’ < palma
3rd period
▹ Words that have to do with foods

▹ Music and buildings

coc (1000) ‘cook’ (n) < cocus

crisp (900) ‘crisp’ < crispus
lopustre (1000) ‘lobster’ < locusta.
citere ‘cither’ < cithara
fipele ‘fiddle’ < VL vitula
orgel ‘organ’ < organum

fenester ‘window’ < fenestra

palentse ‘palace’ < VL palantium
3rd period
▹ Old English borrowed also a number of verbs and adjectives

aspendan (to spend; L. expendere)

bemutian (to exchange; L. mutare)

▹ A few loans show the phonological changes that were characteristic of

Vulgar Latin not present in Classical Latin vocabulary

▹ Loans reflect the kind of Latin that was spoken in the monasteries that
differed from Classical Latin.
3rd period
▹ Old English borrowed also a number of verbs and adjectives

aspendan (to spend; L. expendere)

bemutian (to exchange; L. mutare)

▹ A few loans show the phonological changes that were characteristic of

Vulgar Latin not present in Classical Latin vocabulary

▹ Loans reflect the kind of Latin that was spoken in the monasteries that
differed from Classical Latin.
Middle English

33
Middle English
▹ William the Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and ascended the
English throne

▹ He took French noblemen with him from Normandy

▹ A lot of French words came into English during this period

▹ Also a large number of Latin words.

▹ Latin words were generally introduced through the written language, and
they were not as popular as French loans.

▹ Ecclesiastics and men of learning spoke Latin among themselves

Middle English
▹ Impossible to tell whether a word is of French or Latin origin

 Words having to do with scholastic activities: simily, index, library.

 Words relating to science: dissolve, equal, essence, medicine.

 Administration and law: client, arbitrator, conviction.

▹ The 14th C and 15th C a great increase in the number of Latin

conspiracy, distract, frustrate, gesture, intellect, picture

Modern English

36
Modern English
▹ Largest number of foreign elements 1st part of early modern period
(especially 1530-1660)

▹ Reasons:

▹ English started to be used in fields that had been dominated by Latin before:
theology, philosophy and natural sciences

▹ Renaissance and the Reformation, vernaculars became important in various parts of

Europe desire for these languages to replace Latin

▹ Predilection for rhetoric embellishment in the 16th century that affected the
language.
Modern English
Loans:

▹ Area, compensate, decorum, education, fictitious

▹ Nouns: allusion, atmosphere, system

▹ Adjectives: agile, appropriate, expensive

▹ Verbs: adapt, eradicate, mediate

Modern English
▹ Synonym was increased

▹ Borrowed lexis gave new names for new concepts.

▹ Alternative ways of saying the same thing in different registers

Modern English
Modern English
Attitudes

42
Attitudes
Attempts to purify the language

▹ In the 15th century Humanists intended to re-establish Classical Latin

▹ They disapproved of the spoken variety of Latin

▹ Latin a dead language (clarify)

▹ The existence of Latin as a dead language and of French as fashionable

had important implications
Attitudes

▹ English could never be as perfect as a dead language like Latin

▹ The model for all grammatical systems

▹ Considered to be a perfect codified

Attitudes
▹ The English felt that their language was inferior

▹ Changes in the language in the 14th C

▹ Criticism increased enormously

▹ Bigger with invention of printing

Attitudes
▹ The English felt that their language was inferior

▹ Changes in the language in the 14th C

▹ Criticism increased enormously

▹ Bigger with invention of printing

Attitudes
▹ Barbarous nature

▹ It lacked the refinement of Latin and French

▹ It was not expressive

▹ The vocabulary it had was unsophisticated.

Attitudes
▹ Purist tendencies emerge when

“there is a recurrent phenomenon that speakers of a

language agree that the state of their language is in decline,
that it contains too many words from informal varieties, that
it is threatened by modernizing and foreign influences: in
short, that it was better in the olden days and that
nowadays something needs to be done to restore it to its
former glory. – Langer 2005
Attitudes

▹ English language reform was unsuccessful

▹ Loanwords could not be eliminated from the language

▹ Old words cannot be revived because loanwords have come into

general use in the English language