-
600 BCE
THE CELTS
The first languages we know about in the British Isles are the Celtic ones like Welsh and Scottish Gaelic.
These people probably settled here about
600BC, that is more than 2500 years ago. -
Period: 600 BCE to
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
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55 BCE
The romans
In 55BC there was an invasion by the Romans who spoke Latin.
They gave Latin names to places and some of these names are still used today. -
450
The anglo - saxons
The first people who spoke English
conquered England in about the Year 450.
These people were known as Anglo-Saxon
and their language is also often called
Anglo-Saxon or Old English. -
450
The english language appears
-
800
The Vikings
From about 800 the Vikings started to invade Britain.
The Vikings came from countries like Denmark and
Norway and spoke a language which later developed
into Norwegian and Danish -
1066
The Normans
In 1066 Normans invaded England from Normandy in France.
They spoke an earlier version of French and this became the high status language in England. -
1476
The printing press
Books have been written in English since the 9th century, but it was with the introduction of the printing press by Thomas Caxton in 1476 that publishing really took off.
With the printing also came an interest
in a standard way of writing English. -
Kingdom of England
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Kingdom of Scotland
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Kingdom of Ireland
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Great Britain incorporates Ireland
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British occupy Cape Colony
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The first dictionary
