The History of the English Language Project

By jordanellison
  • Period: 400 to 1100

    Old English

  • St. Augustine arrives in Britain
    500

    St. Augustine arrives in Britain

    Augustine and his companions landed in Kent
  • Suspected date of Beowulf's writing
    580

    Suspected date of Beowulf's writing

    The author was an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet
  • 600

    Anglo-Saxon language covers most of modern-day England

    Their language began to develop its own distinctive features in isolation from the continental Germanic languages
  • Approximate date of the earliest manuscript records of Old English
    700

    Approximate date of the earliest manuscript records of Old English

  • 800

    Old English epic poem "Beowulf" composed

  • 1000

    The oldest surviving manuscripts of Beowulf dates from the period

  • The Norman Invasion
    1066

    The Norman Invasion

    The 11th century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Normans, Bretons, Flemish, and men from other French Provinces
  • 1086

    "Domesday" book was created

    After the Norman invasion and conquest of England the Domesday Book was commissioned
  • Period: 1100 to 1500

    Middle English

  • King John loses the province of Normandy of France
    1200

    King John loses the province of Normandy of France

  • 1300

    English is used in English Parliament for the first time

  • 1400

    Great Vowel Shift began

    A series of changes in the pronunciation of the English language
  • The invention of the Printing Press
    1436

    The invention of the Printing Press

    A mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium
  • 1500

    Start of English Renaissance

    An era of cultural revival and poetic evolution
  • Period: 1500 to

    Modern English

  • Robert Cawdrey publishes the first permanent English dictionary

    The first single-language English dictionary ever published
  • Publication of Shakespeare's first folio

    Publication of Shakespeare's first folio

    The first published collection of Shakespeare's plays seven years after his death

  • Publication of the first daily English-language newspaper

    Elizabeth Mallet of Fleet Street published the first edition of The Daily Courant

  • The American Revolution

    The Loyalists and the Patriots

  • Lewis and Clark document exploration of routes to American West

    They mapped uncharted land, rivers, and mountains
  • Second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary published

    Second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary published

    An amalgamation of the text of the First Edition with that of the Supplement produced in 1972-1986
  • The fifth volume of the Dictionary of American Regional English is published

    The fifth volume of the Dictionary of American Regional English is published

    Published by Belknap Press of Harvard University Press