Old English

Ancient English

What is Old English, and how do we decide where it begins and ends? Let's start with a simple definition:

The Old English period began following the invasion of the Anglo-Saxons.

Fig 1. The pattern of migration from northern Europe to parts of modern-day England.

The Anglo-Saxon invasion began following the Roman evacuation of England in AD410. All Roman soldiers were ordered back to Rome to help with the ongoing battles taking place there, leaving England undefended and ready to be conquered. By 450, the Anglo-Saxons had a strong foothold across all of England, and with it spread the earliest known version of the English language, a West Germanic language closely related to Old Frisian and Old Saxon.

The rule of the Anglo-Saxons lasted for over 600 years, during which Old English underwent many drastic changes.

After the successful invasion of the Normans marked an end to the reign of the Anglo-Saxons in 1066, the Old English language transitioned into what we now know as Middle English. This new version of the English language was grammatically simpler than its predecessor and had a fixed word order that helped to standardise the language.

Let's look in more detail at the changes in the Old English language over time.

Old English: language

In the hundreds of years before the Anglo-Saxon invasion, much of England's population spoke either a variation of Celtic or some form of Latin introduced by the Roman Empire. After the evacuation of the Romans in 410AD, the stage was set for a new dominant language to be introduced.

During the invasion, native Britons were driven away to Scotland, Ireland and Wales. This left the Anglo-Saxons to inhabit the region now known as England.

Old English dialects differed depending on geographic regions. The four main dialects at the time were Mercian, West Saxon, Kentish and Northumbrian. The Mercian and West Saxon dialects played an especially crucial role in the development of Old English and its evolution into Middle English.

This diagram shows the distribution of the four major dialects of England during the Anglo-Saxon reign.

Fig 2. Old English dialects were split up into four regions: Northumbrian, Mercian, Kentish and West Saxon.

Old English: characteristics

Compared with later variants of English, Old English is characterised by a large number of inflexions which alter the meaning of words. The language takes a unique approach to verbs, nouns, grammar and punctuation, to the extent that understanding it today without further study is impossible. Take a look at this line from the 'Lord's Prayer' first in Old English and then in Modern English:

Although the two examples hold many similarities (Fæder/father), (eart/art), translating Old English without research would be challenging.

Old English: literature

The first traceable examples of Old English literature date back only to the seventh century and coincide with the introduction of Christianity to the Anglo-Saxon people. In this sense, the Christianisation of the Anglo-Saxons is regularly portrayed as the most important event in Old English history and certainly one of immeasurable cultural significance.

Among other things, Christianity brought the idea of writing large manuscripts on parchment in Latin. In the 300 years of Anglo-Saxon rule before this, writing went no further than short messages inscribed in runic letters on stone and wood.

Without Christianity, it's possible that our understanding of Anglo-Saxon life and literature would be incomplete. Nearly all remaining manuscripts from the Old English period are religious and derive from the Church. Without the Latin literary culture that Christianity brought, it's likely that many surviving manuscripts would never have been written.

Poetry

The earliest work of English Poetry that still survives, 'Cædmon's Hymn', was composed between 658 and 680 but wasn't written down until the eighth century. Cædmon (flourished 658AD–680AD) legitimised Old English verse by using it to write about Christian themes. He is now recognised as the earliest known English poet.

Many poets from the Old English period are anonymous. Only four named poets: Bede (672/3AD-735AD), Cædmon, Alfred (848AD-899AD) and Cynewulf (flourished 9th century AD), have any work that survives today. Let's look in more detail at some defining examples from the period.

Beowulf

Undoubtedly the most famous example of Old English literature is the epic 3182-line poem Beowulf, believed to be composed between 700 and 750AD and committed to writing sometime in the eleventh century. The poem was originally passed down and performed as part of an oral storytelling tradition but was eventually preserved by two scribes. Despite the poem's pagan origins, Christian themes were added to the poem by the scribes, reiterating the prevalence of religion within all the period's written texts.

The poem tells the story of Beowulf, a Scandinavian hero who vanquishes Grendel, a dark monster descended from Cain. He also defeats Grendel's mother and, later in his life, a dragon. The narrative deals with themes like family, fame, pride, Christianity and warriors.

The Exeter Book

The Exeter Book (c.960-80) is a large codex containing a wide range of Old English poems. It is believed to have been collated in the 10th century AD, though many of the poems were likely passed down orally for generations. In recent times it has been recognised as one of the foundational volumes of English Literature and is seen as one of the world's most important cultural artefacts. It contains some of the most famous anonymous Old English poems, including 'The Wanderer', 'The Seafarer' and 'The Wife's Lament'. These poems are known as early examples of elegies:

For example, In 'The Wanderer', a man meditates on the meaning of life now that he has lost everything important to him. He is journeying to find a new life while reminiscing on past memories. The speaker reminds himself that God is the only solution to his problems, reemphasising the Christian themes present in many traditional Germanic narratives.

Prose

The number of surviving prose documents is far greater than that of poetry. This is partly due to the administrative nature of much of Old English prose writing. Charters, wills, medical documents, translations and religious scriptures were all commonly written to uphold legislation and thus were an important part of daily life.

Scholars put in a huge amount of work to translate Latin texts into Old English, both for religious and educational purposes. Other works chronicled key events, important laws and historical information. Let's look in more detail at the most important surviving example of historical prose in Anglo-Saxon history.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle was compiled in 890 in an effort to document Anglo-Saxon history. It was created during the reign of King Alfred the Great (971-899). and is the first significant effort to chronicle English history year by year, making it invaluable to scholars studying the period. Especially enlightening are its recounts of Danish invasions and opinions regarding the reigns of specific kings.

Old English: words

Many common words that we use every day derive directly from Old English! For a bit of fun, let's look at some modern words, compare them to their old English counterparts, and detail where the Old English word originates.

You may notice that some words have multiple spellings (piper/pipor). This is because spelling in Old English wasn't standardised, meaning that different people may have written the same word differently.