English

Foot Prints to the English Language

By emely.ramos14
  • 450

    First Old English Inspriptions

    First Old English Inspriptions
    The first example of Old English was first written in a British church, but no one can read it. The 500-year-old inscription was found on a wall in Salisbury Cathedral, Wiltshire, hidden behind a monument dedicated to an aristocrat.
  • May 19, 1150

    First manuscripts in Middle English

    First manuscripts in Middle English
    "Middle English" is the term applied to the several forms of the English language used between the 11th and the 15th centuries. Trinity College Library has a collection of around 50 such manuscripts, mostly dating from the later Middle Ages.
  • May 19, 1348

    English replaces Spanish in most schools

    English replaces Spanish in most schools
    All Romance languages are descended from Latin, and many words based on Latin are found in other modern languages such as English. It is said that 80% of scholarly English words are derived from Latin. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, Latin evolved into the various Romance languages. These were for many centuries only spoken languages, Latin being still used for writing.
  • May 19, 1400

    Great Vowel shift

    Great Vowel shift
    Around the time we started speaking modern English, the time of Shakespeare, English underwent a dramatic change known as the Great Vowel Shift that was partly responsible for our odd, unintuitive English spelling. Prior to the time of Queen Elizabeth I and Shakespeare, English speakers pronounced the vowels about the same as other speakers, and not too differently from the way the Romans would have pronounced Latin
  • May 19, 1564

    William Shakespere

    William Shakespere
    William Shakespeare was born in April, 1564 in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, about 100 miles northwest of London. According to the records of Stratford's Holy Trinity Church, he was baptized on April 26. It was customary to baptize infants within days of their birth, so the traditional birth date of Shakespeare is April 23rd, St. George's day, the patron saint of England.
    William Shakespeare died in Stratford on April 23, 1616 and was buried on April 25, 1616.

  • Table Alphabeticall

    Table Alphabeticall
    Although the work is important in being the first collection of its kind, it was never deemed a particularly useful work. At only 120 pages, it listed 2,543 words along with very brief (often single-word) definitions.
    A Table Alphabeticall was published in London. The 1604 edition was printed by "I. R." (I. Roberts) for Edmund Weaver ("Edmund Weauer"). The books are marked with a note that they "are to be sold at his shop at the great North dore of Paules Church, 1604".

  • First English newspaper.

    First English newspaper.
    Daily Courant, the first English daily newspaper, started in March 1702 . It contained foreign intelligence, translated from foreign newspapers, It lasted till 1735.

  • Noah Webster Dictonary

    Noah Webster Dictonary
    The 1828 Webster's Dictionary of the English language is based upon God's written word, for Noah Webster used the Bible as the foundation for his definitions.

  • Oxford English Dictonary

    Oxford English Dictonary
    On this date in 1928, the final volume of the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary was published. The original estimate was that the complete four-volume set would take ten years, but he took five. Many editors were suprised.