Friday 19 July 2013

Proto-English[edit]

The languages of Germanic peoples gave rise to the English language (the best known are the AnglesSaxonsFrisiiJutes and possibly some Franks, who traded, fought with and lived alongside the Latin-speaking peoples of the Roman Empire in the centuries-long process of the Germanic peoples' expansion into Western Europe during the Migration Period). Latin loan words such as wine,cup, and bishop entered the vocabulary of these Germanic peoples before their arrival in Britain and the subsequent formation of England.[1]
TacitusGermania, written around 100 AD., is a primary source of information for the culture of the Germanic peoples in ancient times. Germanics were in contact with Roman civilisation and its economy, including residing within the Roman borders in large numbers in the province of Germania and others and serving in the Roman military, while many more retained political independence outside of Roman territories. Germanic troops served in Britannia under Roman command. Except for the Frisians, Germanic settlement in Britain, according to Bede, occurred largely after the arrival of mercenaries in the 5th century. Most AnglesSaxons and Jutes arrived in Britain in the 6th century as Germanic pagans, independent of Roman control.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle relates that around the year 449 Vortigern, King of the Britons, invited the "Angle kin" (Angles allegedly led by the Germanic brothers Hengist and Horsa) to help repel invading Picts. In return, the Anglo-Saxons received lands in the southeast of Britain. In response "came men of Ald Seaxum of Anglum of Iotum" (SaxonsAngles and Jutes). The Chronicle refers to waves of settlers who eventually established seven kingdoms, known as the heptarchy. Modern scholars view Hengist and Horsa asEuhemerised deities from Anglo-Saxon paganism, who ultimately stem from the religion of the Proto-Indo-Europeans.[2]

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