
The Medieval Battle That Launched Modern English - diodorus
http://blogs.getty.edu/iris/the-medieval-battle-that-launched-modern-english
======
dghf
There is the theory (mentioned in this paper [0], for example) that the
critical event that pushed Old English on to the path of becoming modern
English was not the Norman Conquest but the Danish invasions about two hundred
years before.

As Germanic languages, Old English and Old Norse had a lot of similar
vocabulary (e.g OE _scirt_ , ON _skirt_ , both meaning a unisex knee-length
tunic, the former giving us the word 'shirt', the latter 'skirt'): but their
grammar, especially their inflections, were different. Middle English, so the
theory grows, developed from what was essentially a creole of Old English and
Old Norse, which is why modern English does not have the complexities of
inflection of, say, modern German.

[0]
[https://brage.bibsys.no/xmlui/bitstream/id/245485/Hanna%20Do...](https://brage.bibsys.no/xmlui/bitstream/id/245485/Hanna%20Dorthea%20Hellem%20oppgave.pdf)

------
alistoriv
There's a very interesting essay from 1989 written about basic atomic theory
while avoiding latin and otherwise non-germanic roots as much as possible
called "Uncleftish Beholding"

You can read it here:
[https://groups.google.com/forum/message/raw?msg=alt.language...](https://groups.google.com/forum/message/raw?msg=alt.language.artificial/ZL4e3fD7eW0/_7p8bKwLJWkJ)

~~~
xenadu02
If you want a taste of the linked article:

>At first is was thought that the uncleft was a hard thing that could be split
no further; hence the name. Now we know it is made up of lesser motes. There
is a heavy _kernel_ with a forward bernstonish lading, and around it one or
more light motes with backward ladings. The least uncleft is that of ordinary
waterstuff. Its kernel is a lone forwardladen mote called a _firstbit_.
Outside it is a backwardladen mote called a _bernstonebit_. The firstbit has a
heaviness about 1840-fold that of the bernstonebit. Early worldken folk
thought bernstonebits swing around the kernel like the earth around the sun,
but now we understand they are more like waves or clouds.

>In all other unclefts are found other motes as well, about as heavy as the
firstbit but with no lading, known as _neitherbits_. We know a kind of
waterstuff with one neitherbit in the kernel along with the firstbit; another
kind has two neitherbits. Both kinds are seldom.

>The next greatest firststuff is sunstuff, which has two firstbits and two
bernstonebits. The everyday sort also has two neitherbits in the kernel. If
there are more or less, the uncleft will soon break asunder. More about this
later.

It takes some effort but it _is_ understandable.

~~~
qwertyuiop924
This reads like an excerpt of some alternate universe version of _Thing
Explainer_ , from a world in which "up goer five" (which may well still have
been its name) was a little different in limitation.

~~~
schoen
If Randall Munroe wants to write a book of _Thinglore_ in this style, I'll be
happy to buy it!

~~~
qwertyuiop924
...or we could write it ourselves.

Somebody, build an allowed words and suffixes dictionary file, and I'll go
look up the emacs documentation for how to verify text in real time. Let's do
this!

~~~
abecedarius
[http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/Main_leaf](http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/Main_leaf)

~~~
qwertyuiop924
Well, then. If I could grab some wordbooks from this project, then I'd be set.

------
peterwwillis
The tapestry they talk about is quite famous for being the longest in the
world, and has survived really well. It's one of a couple sights worth seeing
in Bayeaux.

The Normans were perhaps one of the most fearsome dynasties the modern world
has known. They were birthed by a Viking Earl named Rollo, who basically
pillaged his way into northern France around 876 and was so fearsome that the
French actually gave him the lands he invaded in exchange for him not fucking
them up so hardcore anymore. His descendants included William the Conqueror,
and they ruled lands such as England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Sicily and
Antioch, and generally kicked ass for a few hundred years as feared warriors
and mercenaries. (Btw, if you want to see a statue of Rollo and don't want to
go all the way to Rouen, France, you can visit a replica in Fargo, North
Dakota)

Normandy was a powerful and independent region, even through its contested
ownership over the hundred years' war, up to about 1468 when it began to cede
its autonomy to Paris. Modern Normans are pretty proud of their heritage, and
there's still a friendly rivalry with the neighboring Bretons. What really
struck me was a kids theme park called Festyland outside Caen, sort of near
Rouen. Lots of rides and attractions surrounding the battle of hastings and
the Viking origins of the Normans. The billboards advertising Festyland shows
a bunch of little Viking kids carrying off a princess tied to a wooden pole.
Cute.

~~~
dmichulke
There's a TV series called "Vikings" that shows how Rollo (brother of Ragnar
Lodbrok, another famous Viking) got there.

Can't say much about the historical accuracy but it's certainly a good show
for the first few seasons.

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2306299/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2306299/)

~~~
peterwwillis
It's quite historically inaccurate. It's based on the mythical Saga of Ragnar
Lodbrok (who may or may not have been a real person) and peppered with
artistic license, like Aethelstan, Ragnar's Anglo-Saxon slave-turned-brother
monk, who just happens to have the name of the first English King who popped
up a few decades after the seige of Paris, and how the events in the show seem
to mirror real life events that occurred across a 200-year timeline. And their
lack of any battle armor. But it's a fantastic show.

------
mc32
There's something to be said for the vigor injecting new vocabulary and
throwing the language into the great vowel shift had on the language, but at
the same time, woe onto us the untidy spelling that came about and the loss of
declension.

I wonder some times if Winstanley had a point --along modern day French, when
he decried the assault of a foreign language on the indigenous culture. Never
the less, I think we are better off for it.

~~~
mc32
And a window into some of his feelings towards the Normans --they were not
sugar coated but were quite eloquent[1]

[1][https://books.google.com/books?id=_cnrjlrzUE4C&pg=PA148#v=on...](https://books.google.com/books?id=_cnrjlrzUE4C&pg=PA148#v=onepage&q&f=false)

------
m_myers
An illustrative quote from the first chapter of Sir Walter Scott's historical
novel _Ivanhoe_ (published 1820, available from Project Gutenberg at
[http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/82](http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/82)):

\---

“Truly,” said Wamba, without stirring from the spot, “I have consulted my legs
upon this matter, and they are altogether of opinion, that to carry my gay
garments through these sloughs, would be an act of unfriendship to my
sovereign person and royal wardrobe; wherefore, Gurth, I advise thee to call
off Fangs, and leave the [swine] herd to their destiny, which, whether they
meet with bands of travelling soldiers, or of outlaws, or of wandering
pilgrims, can be little else than to be converted into Normans before morning,
to thy no small ease and comfort.”

“The swine turned Normans to my comfort!” quoth Gurth; “expound that to me,
Wamba, for my brain is too dull, and my mind too vexed, to read riddles.”

“Why, how call you those grunting brutes running about on their four legs?”
demanded Wamba.

“Swine, fool, swine,” said the herd, “every fool knows that.”

“And swine is good Saxon,” said the Jester; “but how call you the sow when she
is flayed, and drawn, and quartered, and hung up by the heels, like a
traitor?”

“Pork,” answered the swine-herd.

“I am very glad every fool knows that too,” said Wamba, “and pork, I think, is
good Norman-French; and so when the brute lives, and is in the charge of a
Saxon slave, she goes by her Saxon name; but becomes a Norman, and is called
pork, when she is carried to the Castle-hall to feast among the nobles; what
dost thou think of this, friend Gurth, ha?”

“It is but too true doctrine, friend Wamba, however it got into thy fool’s
pate.”

“Nay, I can tell you more,” said Wamba, in the same tone; “there is old
Alderman Ox continues to hold his Saxon epithet, while he is under the charge
of serfs and bondsmen such as thou, but becomes Beef, a fiery French gallant,
when he arrives before the worshipful jaws that are destined to consume him.
Mynheer Calf, too, becomes Monsieur de Veau in the like manner; he is Saxon
when he requires tendance, and takes a Norman name when he becomes matter of
enjoyment.”

“By St Dunstan,” answered Gurth, “thou speakest but sad truths; little is left
to us but the air we breathe, and that appears to have been reserved with much
hesitation, solely for the purpose of enabling us to endure the tasks they lay
upon our shoulders. The finest and the fattest is for their board; the
loveliest is for their couch; the best and bravest supply their foreign
masters with soldiers, and whiten distant lands with their bones, leaving few
here who have either will or the power to protect the unfortunate Saxon.”

~~~
pjc50
_Ivanhoe_ is a great read, Scott's pastiche of age-of-chivalry novels, but
modern readers will probably find the treatment of the Jewish character Isaac
to be glaringly bad antisemitism. (Oddly, his daughter Rebecca is far less
presented as a stereotype and more as one of Scott's "strong female
characters")

------
strlen
For those who are more curious, I found that "The English and their History"
talks in depth about the post-Conquest society and emergence of the written
English language, and some of the more distinctive English (and later Anglo-
American) institutions: [https://www.amazon.com/English-Their-History-Robert-
Tombs-eb...](https://www.amazon.com/English-Their-History-Robert-Tombs-
ebook/dp/B00TWEME40/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1476751166&sr=8-1)

------
Ericson2314
And I expected something from tje hundred years war on the middle–modern
transition. Hah!

