English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic settlers and auxiliary troops under Roman tutelage from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the Northern Netherlands.Initially,Old English was a group of dialects reflecting the varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of England.One of these dialects,West Saxon,eventually came to dominate.The original Old English language was then influenced by two waves of invasion.The first was by language speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family; they conquered and colonized parts of Britain in the 8th and 9th centuries.The second was the Normans in the 11th century,who spoke a variety of French.These two invasions caused English to become "mixed" 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 enrichment of the Anglo-Frisian core of English; the later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of the European languages.This Norman influence entered English largely through the courts and government.Thus,English developed into a "borrowing" language of great flexibility and with a huge vocabulary.
Modern English is often dated from the Great Vowel Shift which took place mainly during the 15th century.English was further transformed by the spread of a standardised London-based dialect in government and administration,and by the standardising effect of printing.By the time of William Shakespeare (mid-late 16th century) the language had become clearly recognizable as Modern English.
English has continuously adopted foreign words,especially from Latin and Greek since the Renaissance.As there are many words from different languages,and English spelling is variable (to be charitable),the risk of mispronunciation is high,but remnants of the older forms remain in a few regional dialects,most notably in the West Country.
In 1755 Samuel Johnson published the first significant English dictionary,his Dictionary of the English Language.
