Language timeline

By Kenzme
  • 400 BCE

    Start of old english

  • Period: 400 to 1150

    Old English

  • 700

    Beowulf's writing

  • 793

    Viking raids begin in England

  • 878

    Tready of Wedmore

    establishment of Danelaw
  • 1066

    Norman Conquest of England

  • 1150

    Start of Middle English period

  • Period: 1150 to 1500

    Middle English

  • Period: 1348 to 1350

    Black Death in England

  • 1387

    Chaucer's Canterbury Tales

  • 1450

    The Great Vowel Shift begins

  • 1476

    Printing press introduced to England

    By William Caxton
  • 1500

    Start of Modern English

  • Period: 1500 to

    Modern English

  • First English dictionary published

  • Shakespeare's First Folio

  • Samuel Johnsons's dictionary

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