Assess the Latin influence on the English language.
Latin is one of the languages that has most influenced English since its birth as a language. In this essay we are going to approach the Latin influence in vocabulary along the periods of the English language to see if, without the Latin influence it would be as rich as it is now with it and if the language would be impoverished or not.
In its beginnings, Old English did not have the large number of words borrowed from Latin and French that now form part of English vocabulary. Old English was a very flexible language capable of using old words and giving them new uses.
Latin is one of the languages that has most influenced English since its birth as a language. In this essay we are going to approach the Latin influence in vocabulary along the periods of the English language to see if, without the Latin influence it would be as rich as it is now with it and if the language would be impoverished or not.
In its beginnings, Old English did not have the large number of words borrowed from Latin and French that now form part of English vocabulary. Old English was a very flexible language capable of using old words and giving them new uses.
Latin
has been the second great influence on English. It was the language of an
educated and sophisticated civilization from which the Saxon peoples wanted to
learn. The contact between these people was at first commercial and military
but then it also became religious and intellectual. Before going to England the
Germans had already had contact with the Romans and of course, from this
contact they acquired some Latin words. When Christian was introduced in
England, the people living there adopted many Latin elements.
English
borrowings from Latin came in three waves that extended the resourced of their
vocabulary.
“A
connection between Latin and English is indicated by such correspondences as pater
with English father, or frāter with brother, although the difference in the
initial consonants tends somewhat to obscure the relationship” (Baugh, Cable
1993:18)
Albert
Baugh and Thomas Cable, in their book ‘A history of the English language'
divide the Latin influences in the vocabulary in three stages: The continental
borrowing, the Latin through Celtic transmission and the Latin influence of the
second period and the Norman Conquest.
