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English is West Germanic Language that originated in Anglo-Saxon English. As a result of
military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire during the
18th, 19th and 20th centuries of the United States. Since the late 19th century, it has become the
Lingua Franca (Frankish language) in many parts of the world. It is used extensively as a
Second Language and as an Official Language in commonwealth countries and many
international organizations.
Historically, English originated from several dialects, now called Old English (Anglo-Saxon;
an early form of English language that was spoken and written in parts of what are now
England and South-eastern Scotland between the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century)
which were brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon Settlers (Anglo-Saxon is the term used
to describe the Germanic-speaking tribes in the South and east of Great Britain from their
arrival in the 5th to 6th centuries and throughout the Early Middle Ages. Their Anglo-Saxon
language derives from ³Ingvaeonic´ [Ingvaeonic is also known as North Sea Germanic. It is a
postulated grouping of West Germanic language that would fork into Old English, Old
Frisian and Old Saxon, and according to some of dialects of West-Flanders] West Germanic
dialects and transforms into Middle English from the 11th century. Anglo-Saxon was divided
into four main dialects that are West Saxon, Mercian, Northumbrian and Kentish) beginning
in the 5th century. The language was heavily influenced by Old Norse language of Viking
invaders. After the Norman Conquest, Old English developed into Middle English, borrowing
heavily from the Norman (Anglo-French) vocabulary and spelling conventions. Modern
English develop from there and continues to adopt foreign words from a variety of languages,
as well as coining new words. A significant number of English words, especially technical
words, have been constructed based on roots from Latin and ancient Greek.

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English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian and Lower
Saxon dialects brought to Britain by Germanic Settlers and Roman Auxiliary Troops from the
Northern Netherland in the 5th century. One of these Germanic tribes was the Angles, who
may have come from Angeln, and Bede wrote that their whole nation came to Britain, leaving
their former land empty. The names England or ³Aenglaland´ and English are derived from
the name of this tribe. The Anglo-Saxon began invading around 449 AD from the regions of
Denmark and Jutland. Before the Anglo-Saxon arrived in England the native population
spoke Brythonic, a Celtic language. Although the most significant changes in the dialect
occurred after Norman Invasion of 1066, the language retained its name and the pre-Norman
invasion dialect is now known as Old English.
Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting the varied origins of the
Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Great Britain. One of these dialects, Late West Saxon, eventually
came to dominate. The original Old English language was influenced by two waves of
invasions. The first was by language speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic
family; the conquered and colonized parts of the British Isles in the 8th and 9th centuries. The
second was the Normans in the 11th century who spoke Old Norman and developed an
English variety of this called Anglo-Norman. (Over the centuries, this lost the significally
Norman element under the influence of Parisian French and, later, of English, eventually
turning into a distinctive dialect of Anglo-French.) These two invasions caused English to
become ³mixed´ to some degree (though it was never a truly mixed language in the strict
linguistic sense of the word; mixed languages arise from the cohabitation of speakers of
different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication). Cohabitation
with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical
supplementation of the Anglo-Frisian core of English; the later Norman occupation led to the
grafting onto that Germanic core of a more elaborate layer of words from the Italic branch of
European languages. This Norman influence entered English largely through courts and
government. Thus, English developed into a ³borrowing´ language of great flexibility and
with a huge vocabulary. The emergence and spread of British Empire as well as the
emergence of United States as a superpower helped to spread English language around the
world.

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