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The british Isles were invaded by Angles, Saxons and Jutes from Germany, Jutland and Denmark.
Invasions made linguistically a big cut in the language, actually it nearly obliterated the original languages. This is how English, as we know it today, began. -
The old runic alphabet was replaced by roman letters.
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Danish Vikings raided and later settled as farmers in Britain. Their language, Norse, influenced the language alongside Latin which came with the Christian missionaries and scholars.
The new words that became a part of the English language was words like: Altar, demon, egg and history. Of course there were a lor more words that just these four. -
The vikings established the Danelaw making the influence of the language Norse longlasting.
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The Normans invaded Britain. This had a huge impact on the english language. For an example at the beginning of their invasion 90% of the words came from Old English. However, when their invasion ended the percentage had shrunk to only 75%. This meant that a lot of new loan words had entered the English language.
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Translation of the BIble resulted in several thousand Latin words entered the language.
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Unknown parts of the world were explored, scientific discoveries were made and Greek and Roman literatures had their reanissance. This meant the English language missed terms for new things and a lot of loan words entered the language.
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King James Bible introduced a lot of words and indiomatic phrases into the English language that have stayed ever since.
