Language Centre Resources

English belongs to the West Germanic group of the Indo-European language family. It was brought to England by the Anglo-Saxon invaders who came from Denmark and North Germany in the 5th century. The language was spoken in four main dialects: West Saxon, spoken in the Kingdom of Wessex, Kentish, spoken in the region of today's Kent, Mercian, spoken in the region of East Anglia and Humberside, and Northumbrian, spoken in north-east England and south-east Scotland. West Saxon, though, became the predominant dialect in which most of the Old English literature is written.

The Norman Conquest in 1066 brought Norman French as the dominant language, progressively marginalizing Old English. By the 12th century it was completely lost, giving way to the Middle English period, which spanned from the 11th to the 14th centuries.

Old English was first attested in the 7th century, but the most important manuscripts date from c. 1000 AD. They contain the heroic poem Beowulf, the most outstanding example of the period, but also some lyrics, prose works of Kind Alfred, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The language initially used the Runic script, but the Old English literature was spelt in the Roman alphabet. Two Runic letters remained to be used: þ and ð.