Latin is one of the linguistic communications that have most influenced English since its birth as a linguistic communication. In this essay we are traveling to near the Latin influence in vocabulary along the periods of the English linguistic communication to see whether without the Latin influence it would impoverished or non.
In its beginnings, Old English did non hold the sum of words borrowed from Latin and Gallic that now form portion of English vocabulary. Old English was a really flexible linguistic communication capable of utilizing old words and giving them new utilizations.
Latin has been the 2nd great influence on English. It was the linguistic communication of an educated and sophisticated civilisation from which the Saxon peoples wanted to larn. The contact between these people was at first commercial and military but so it besides became spiritual and rational. Before traveling to England the Germans had already had contact with the Romans and from this contact they acquired some Latin words. When Christian was introduced in England, the people populating at that place adopted many Latin elements. Latin adoptions came in three moving ridges that extended the resourced of English vocabulary.
The precedency of a word is normally analysed by agencies of pronunciation. For illustration, “ a connexion between Latin and English is indicated by such correspondences as pater with English male parent, or frA?ter with brother ” ( Baugh, Cable 1993:18 )
In their book ‘A history of the English linguistic communication ‘ , Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable divide the Latin influences in the vocabulary of English in three phases: The Continental adoption, the Celtic transmittal, the Latin influence of the 2nd period and the Norman Conquest. But we are traveling to see the influence of the Latin in English in these all its periods and what sort of words were borrowed.
During the Continental adoption, a figure of words were introduced in English because of the contact the German folk had had with the Romans on the continent. Some of these words were already present in the early Germanic idioms thanks to the trade with the Romans. The Germans coming back from the imperium brought with them goods but besides words. The words they adopted indicated new constructs related with things they did non cognize or for which they did non hold footings. The Germans in the imperium dedicated themselves to agriculture and war, as some words like cantonment ( conflict ) , segn ( streamer ) , weall ( wall ) , pytt ( cavity ) , strA“t ( route, street ) , mA«l ( stat mi ) and miltestre ( concubine ) show. Owing to this commercial relationship most words are related to merchandise. One of the things they traded was wine and we can detect words like wA«n ( vino ) or eced ( acetum ) . They besides traded domestic and family articles and vesture. An illustration is the word cytel ( kettle L.Catillus ) . As respects the art of edifices and building there were words like copor ( Cu ) , pic ( pitch ) or tigele ( tile ) . The words the Germans borrowed reflected the sort of relationships they had.
During the Celtic transmittal and because of their hapless influence on old English the Latin influence during the Roman business was limited excessively. The extent to which the state had been Romanised and the usage of Latin by the population were non influential. Some footings could be found in topographic point names but a direct contact between Latin and old English was non possible because Latin words came thought the transmittal of the Celts and the Celtic interaction with old English was weak. Wordss like ceaster ( L. castra. Camp ) which today signifiers English topographic point names as Manchester or Doncaster or words like port ( harbour, gate, town ) from Latin portus and orifice ; munt ( mountain ) from Latin montem were introduced. The influence of the linguistic communication in the first period was the slightest of all.
The Latin influence of the 2nd period and the greatest of all was the Christianizing of Britain that started in 597. From this minute until the terminal of the old English period around 500 old ages subsequently words made their manner into English thanks in most instances to monasteries. It is gratuitous to state that most of the footings introduced had to make with the new faith. Some words like church or bishop already belonged to the linguistic communication because they had been introduced before but the huge bulk of footings holding to make with churches and their services are from this period. Some illustrations are abbot, deacon, adherent, angel, althar, anthem, buddy, Catholic Pope or Psalm. But the church did non merely influence people and linguistic communication in footings of faith, some footings related to the domestic life of people, apparels, nutrient, trees, workss, instruction, literature or assorted things were introduced. Wordss like cap or silk, lentil or greater omentum ( chou ) , pine or lily, the word works itself, school, maestro, grammatic ( Al ) , meter, notary, ground tackle, sponge, elephant, calend or endowment. There was a great influence in the early old ages of Christianity in England. As the Latin influence ever came and went manus in manus with the church new words appeared with the Benedictine reform. The imports were different now and they expressed scientific and learned thoughts although some words like Antichrist, apostle or devil were still related to spiritual affairs.
The predominating words this period were the literary and erudite 1s. Some illustrations are accent, history, paper, rubric. Plant names like Chinese parsley, Cucumis sativus, ginger. Trees like cypress or laurel, some footings related to medical affairs like malignant neoplastic disease, palsy and some others related to animate beings like Scorpio, tiger. Despite the debut of all these words English did non ever follow them to show a new construct. An old word was by and large applied to a new object or thing with a little version in order to convey new significances. The Anglo-saxons, for illustration, did non borrow the words for which they already had a term.
Harmonizing to Baugh, as a consequence of the Christianizing of Britain some 450 Latin words appear in English Hagiographas before the stopping point of the English period ( Baugh, Cable 1993:86 ) . In malice of this, some words were non used until subsequently, when they were reintroduced. Others were to the full accepted and incorporated into the linguistic communication so.
Before the Norman Conquest, Latin was the linguistic communication used by the church and the one of scholarship, international communicating and disposal but after the conquering it was replaced by French.
The Norman Conquest was the period in which a larger figure of Latin adoptions were introduced. In this period we include the words borrowed from French ( a linguistic communication derived from Latin ) and those straight borrowed from Latin itself, although they were less popular that the Gallic and normally obtained their admittance through written linguistic communication.
In the 13th and 14th centuries England could hold spoken three linguistic communications: English, Gallic and Latin. Latin was besides the chief channel through which Greek words reached English. The 14th and 15th were truly fecund in Latin adoptions. Some of them were confederacy, distract, frustrate or history among many other common footings used in mundane address. In Middle English the inflow of Gallic words predisposed English talkers to borrow words from other linguistic communications.
As Barbara Strang mentioned in her book ‘A history of English ‘ it remains to observe that from this ace abundant wealth English has discarded a figure of points picked up, jackdaw-wise, more for glister than for usage and that this was peculiarly noticeable among the Latin words of the 16c. ( Strang 1989:129 )
The Renaissance in the sixteenth century and the resurgence of classical acquisition made the figure of Latin adoptions addition. The peak period occurred between 1580 and 1600. During the Renaissance around 10,000 to 12,000 words entered the English vocabulary, including the word vocabulary. Some of those words were: allusion, democratic, enthusiasm or fanciful. Many of these words came by agencies of Gallic because in Middle English Romanic elements were Gallicized but in Modern English they came straight from Latin. In relation to this, Barbara Strang said that “ we can non ever be certain whether a word is a direct loan from Latin or mediated by Gallic ” ( Strang 1989:186 ) .
During the industrial age in the 17th and 18th centuries many words were borrowed from Latin to depict the new developments and finds and some words were besides created from Latin roots. Despite this, there was besides a Latin enunciation, a purist motion which rejected the usage of loans and promoted the creative activity of new proficient footings from native elements. That motion involved the authors that had been brought up in the tradition of the classics who glorified and made stronger the Saxon component of the linguistic communication. For them, the Latin and Gallic words were really literary and abstract and they rejected them.
Robertson and Cassidy say that English has been exposed to Latin influence throughout its history but the Latin adoptions found in our yearss are far smaller than might hold been expected ( Robertson and Cassidy 1954:152 ) .
In our yearss it is of import to advert that the most portion of the modern and technique words in English, those related to computing machines, derive from Latin roots and non from Germanic roots. For illustration, the word computing machine is a derivation of the Latin verb computare which means count or calculate. The word delete, which means ‘to erase what is written in a computing machine ‘ , comes from the Latin verb delere, which means to wipe out. Curiously, those people who have studied Latin know that the 2nd individual of the jussive mood of the verb delere is delete.
Robertson and Cassidy besides recognise this influence and say that ‘in present twenty-four hours proficient and scientific English, Latin portions with Greek the beginning of a host of new mintages, or of few applications of words already adopted ‘ ( Robertson and Cassidy 1954:155 ) .
To cognize precisely how many Latin words have been borrowed into English is impossible. What we can cognize is how many of them are portion of the linguistic communication and are more used. Robertson and Cassidy once more back up this and said that this is non a affair simply of the figure of words borrowed, for in that regard, Latin, at least, is in front of French. What it means is that far more of the Gallic words have become a portion of the indispensable nucleus of modern English ” ( Robertson and Cassidy 1954:155 )
After all these accounts about the Latin influence throughout the English linguistic communication history we come to the point in which we have to make up one’s mind whether English would be an destitute linguistic communication without Latin.
After taking into history that the huge bulk of influence upon English has come from Gallic -a Romanic linguistic communication that is derived from Latin- and Latin itself, we can state that English would be a hapless linguistic communication in these yearss if Latin had non existed or had any sort of presence in England. Without Latin, English would non hold either the Greek influence which came by agencies of the Gallic linguistic communication nor the existent footings related to engineering, medical specialty and those which have been in usage for so many old ages now. Given this, if we take a expression at lexicons around 80 % of the entries are adoptions. Most of them are likely to come from Latin, and of those words more than half are bound to hold come through French. Another of import figure will hold come straight or indirectly through Latin from Greek. Thankss to these influences McCrum. R, Cran. W and MacNeil. R have stated that:
The statistics of English are amazing. Of all the universe ‘s linguistic communications ( which now figure some 2,700 ) , it is arguably the richest in vocabulary. The compact Oxford English Dictionary lists about 500,000 words ; and a farther half-million proficient and scientific footings remain uncatalogued. Harmonizing to traditional estimations, adjacent German has a vocabulary of about 185,000 and French fewer than 100,000, including such Franglais as le snacque-barre and le hit-parade. ( McCrum. R, Cran. W, MacNeil. R 1992:1 )
In decision I think that English would be an destitute linguistic communication without the influence of Latin because I consider that the figure of Latin or Latinate words used in the linguistic communication in our period is rather of import despite the fact that many Latin footings introduced in other periods stopped being used or were substituted by others. The issue of the permutation of Latin elements for other can besides be discussed because some of them were adapted and given an English signifier and others were readapted after the influence of French and once more an indirect influence of Latin.
Without sing Gallic as a manner through which Latin has influenced I would besides state that the Latin influence in the English vocabulary would be of import and it without it it would be impoverished excessively but in a minor manner.
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SOURCES
Baugh, A.C, and Cable, T. ( 1993 ) A history of the English linguistic communication. Padstow: TJ Press
Charles Barber, Joan C. Beal and Phillip A.Shaw ( 2009 ) The English Language: A Historical Introduction. New York: Cambridge.
McCrum. R, Cran. W, MacNeil. R ( 1992 ) The Story of English. New York: Penguin.
Robertson, S. And Cassidy, F.G ( 1954 ) The Development of Modern English. Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : Prentice-Hall INC.
Strang, Barbara ( 1989 ) A History of English. Cambridge: Routledge.
ELECTRONIC RESOURCES
An English History and its Development: web site at hypertext transfer protocol: //www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/4197/ ? letter=E & A ; spage=4.
Latin Influence in English: web site at hypertext transfer protocol: //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_influence_in_English.
The influences of Old English: web site at hypertext transfer protocol: //www.orbilat.com/Influences_of_Romance/English/RIFL-English-Latin-The_Inflluences_on_Old_English.html.
