At the time of the Norman invasion of England, nearly 1,000 years ago, what language was spoken in England? Would a modern day English speaker have been able to make themselves understood?

peasypod

Old English? A conversation would have been tough, but you probably would have been able to find out where the bathroom was. Here is a link showing words from modern english to old english. http://www.mun.ca/Ansaxdat/vocab/wordlist.html Mar 02 05, 2:45 AM

Arpeggionist

But the Norman invasion is when Old English really began to be spoken. Before then they would have spoken something a little closer to Frisian or Danish or Celtic. Mar 02 05, 3:01 AM

picqero

Thanks for the interesting reference peasy, though with bathroom = burnsele I'm not sure if I'd have been able to find it - except of course by the smell! Mar 02 05, 3:09 AM

Stew54

Try this link for something in Old English of around that vintage that you might be familiar with in more modern (or at least 1611) English. http://www.georgetown.edu/faculty/ballc/oe/paternoster-oe.html Mar 02 05, 5:49 AM

mibmob

It would have been Anglo Saxon which is not the same as Old English. Mar 02 05, 6:33 AM

Stew54

I understood Old English and Anglo Saxon to be the same thing, being the language spoken in England from about 500 to around 1200. It is a West Germanic language, far more heavily inflected than more modern forms of English, and related to old forms of languages such as Frisian and Saxon with which it shares much vocabulary. From 1200 or so until about 1500 Middle English as spoken, which is a form of Old English that had adopted many forms and words from old French after the invasion. Early Modern English came to be spoken after c1500. Mar 02 05, 7:07 AM

Baloo55th

It's easier to understand some of the Old English words when they are printed than when spoken. There has been a considerable shift in pronunciation since even the days of Shakespeare. Also, A modern English speaker would find it hard to avoid using words that are not of French and Latin derivation that would be unknown and incomprehensible to an Old English speaker. Anglo-Saxon used to be the more commonly used term for what is now more commonly called Old English. Mar 02 05, 8:29 AM

Buck540

This site gives good insight on the topic at hand, and as for the bathroom I'd just go behind a tree: http://www.omniglot.com/writing/oldenglish.htm Mar 02 05, 9:12 AM