Negocios

THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH
More people are trying to learn English than any other language in the world. English is the language of political negotiations and international business. It has become the international language of science and medicine. International treaties say passenger airplane pilots must speak English. English is the major foreign language taught in most schools in South Americaand Europe. School children in the Philippines and Japan begin learning English at an early age. English is the official language of more than seventy-five countries including Britain, Canada, the United States, Australia, and South Africa. In countries where many different languages are spoken, English is often used as an official language to help people communicate. India is a good example.English is the common language in this country where at least 24 languages are spoken by more than one million people. Where did the English language come from? Why has it become so popular? To answer these questions we must travel back in time about 5,000 years to an area north of the Black Sea in southeastern Europe. Experts say the people in that area spoke a language called Proto-Indo-European. Thatlanguage is no longer spoken. Researchers do not really know what it sounded like. Yet, Proto-Indo-European is believed to be the ancestor of most European languages. These include the languages that became ancient Greek, ancient German and the ancient Latin. Latin disappeared as a spoken language. Yet it left behind three great languages that became modern Spanish, French and Italian. AncientGerman became Dutch, Danish, German, Norwegian, Swedish and one of the languages that developed into English. The English language is a result of the invasions of the island of Britain over many hundreds of years. The invaders lived along the northern coast of Europe. The first invasions were by a people called Angles about 1,500 years ago. The Angles were a German tribe who crossed the EnglishChannel. Later two more groups crossed to Britain. They were the Saxons and the Jutes. These groups found a people called the Celts, who had lived in Britain for many thousands of years. The Celts and the invaders fought. After a while, most of the Celts were killed, or made slaves. Some escaped to live in the area that became Wales. Through the years, the Saxons, Angles and Jutes mixed theirdifferent languages. The result is what is called Anglo-Saxon or Old English. Old English is extremely difficult to understand. Only a few experts can read this earliest form of English. Several written works have survived from the Old English period. Perhaps the most famous is called Beowulf. It is the oldest known English poem. Experts say it was written in Britain more than 1,000 years ago. The name ofthe person who wrote it is not known. Beowulf is the story of a great king who fought against monsters. He was a good king, well liked by his people. The next great invasion of Britain came from the far north beginning about 1,100 years ago. Fierce people called Vikings raided the coast areas of Britain. The Vikings came from Denmark, Norway and other northern countries. They were looking tocapture trade goods and slaves and take away anything of value. In some areas, the Vikings became so powerful they built temporary bases. These temporary bases sometimes became permanent. Later, many Vikings stayed in Britain. Many English words used today come from these ancient Vikings. Words like "sky," "leg," "skull," "egg," "crawl," " lift" and "take" are from the old languages of the farnorthern countries. The next invasion of Britain took place more than 900 years ago, in 1066. History experts call this invasion the Norman Conquest. William the Conqueror led it. The Normans were a French-speaking people from Normandy in the north of France. They became the new rulers of Britain. These new rulers spoke only French for several hundred years. It was the most important language in the...