Old Norse may have had a more profound impact on Middle and Modern English development than any other language. The eagerness of Vikings in the Danelaw to communicate with their Anglo-Saxon neighbours resulted in the erosion of inflection in both languages. Both Old English and Old Norse (as well as the descendants of the latter, Faroese and Icelandic) were synthetic languages with complicated inflections.
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The influence of Old Norse aided the development of English from a synthetic language with relatively free word order, to a more analytic language with a stricter word order.
The transition from Late Old English to Early Middle English occurred at some point during the 12th century. During the 14th century, a new style of literature emerged with the works of writers including John Wycliffe and Geoffrey Chaucer, whose Canterbury Tales remains the most studied and read work of the period. Little survives of early Middle English literature, due in part to Norman domination and the prestige that came with writing in French rather than English. Significant changes in pronunciation took place, particularly involving long vowels and diphthongs, which in the later Middle English period began to undergo the Great Vowel Shift. Conventional English vocabulary remained primarily Germanic in its sources, with Old Norse influences becoming more apparent. Middle English also saw considerable adoption of Norman vocabulary, especially in the areas of politics, law, the arts, and religion, as well as poetic and emotive diction.
Noun, adjective and verb inflections were simplified by the reduction (and eventual elimination) of most grammatical case distinctions. Scots developed concurrently from a variant of the Northumbrian dialect (prevalent in northern England and spoken in southeast Scotland).ĭuring the Middle English period, many Old English grammatical features either became simplified or disappeared altogether. Middle English was succeeded in England by Early Modern English, which lasted until about 1650. This largely formed the basis for Modern English spelling, although pronunciation has changed considerably since that time. By the end of the period (about 1470) and aided by the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg in 1439, a standard based on the London dialects (Chancery Standard) had become established. The more standardized Old English language became fragmented, localized, and was, for the most part, being improvised. Examples of writing from this period that have survived show extensive regional variation. Writing conventions during the Middle English period varied widely. Middle English saw significant changes to its vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and orthography. This stage of the development of the English language roughly followed the High to the Late Middle Ages. Scholarly opinion varies, but the Oxford English Dictionary specifies the period when Middle English was spoken as being from 1150 to 1500. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English period. Middle English (abbreviated to ME ) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman Conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century.
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