Did the English language get much Latin influence from the Roman occupation or is it more from 1066?

Question

I've heard about William the Conqueror's invasion bringing the then-current French language to Britain, but what about the fact that the Romans occupied Britain? In other words, what percent of the Latin in English came from the occupation of Rome, and what percent came from the Norman conquest?

Answer 1

Sources vary, but tend to agree that well over half of the current English words are of Latin origin. For that large fraction, there were two main conduits - Norman French and later borrowings directly from Latin.

The residual Latin from the Roman occupation of the island was virually nothing. The map was about the only place where Latin survived. All those English places ending in '-chester' got that from Latin 'castra' - they were places Romans had built a military camp, called 'castra' in Latin.

Again, sources vary, but a typical assessment of sources of Latin-based words would be something like 60% from Norman French, 30% from later borrowings, and 10% from all other sources combined. That last 10% would include later borrowings from French, borrowings from Spanish, Italian, and the other Romance languages, and even a few words that came into the original Anglo Saxon from Latin before the move to Britain.

Answer 2

The French language did not exist during the Roman era. Instead, people spoke various Latin vernaculars (popular, common versions of Latin) in places where the Romans held sway. Over the succeeding centuries, some of these developed into the various Romance languages, including French. In Britain, however, the Anglo-Saxon invasions after the Romans left meant that the British soon spoke the Germanic language that developed into Old English. Then, after the Norman Conquest of 1066, Norman French became the language of the upper classes and the courts and of course had some influence on the developing English language, which continued to be the popular tongue of the less exalted classes. Finally, in the late 14th century, Middle English (the language of Chaucer) became the court language, but French was still routinely learned and spoken by the educated and upper classes.

Answer 3

English is a polyglot language made up from many sources, french had a big influence, don't forget that England up to the time of Henry the eighth was basically a Catholic country, and at that time the Church,( usually strictly for exclusivity and to keep the peasants in their uncomprehending place), used Latin exclusively in both religious services and common speech so that language had a grass roots influence on the evolution of modern english.
The Spanish were also a dominant world sea power at the time so their language is also represented in basic English.
The you had the Vikings, so Scandinavian gets a mention etc etc. Hope this helps.

Answer 4

English is a mix of Latin, Anglo-Saxon and Norman French with fairly equal spread throughout. There are also Scandanavian influences.

Latin has less influence in English than in other European languages though due to the relatively short period of occupation, the majority of modern English comes from the other sources.

This is why, when you translate from English into, say French sometimes words are transposed ie: "parlez vous Anglais?" literally translated is "speak you English?" rather than "do you speak English?"- this is the Latin influence that English does not have so much of.

On another point the Norman French language didn't have an immediate effect on everybody in England after the invasion. Norman French became the accepted method of communication for the aristocracy but the peasantry took longer to influence hence why an animals name is different to the meat that comes from it.

Saxon farmers raised these animals for their Norman masters to eat but rarely got to eat them themselves hence -

Saxon origin-

Pig
Cow
Sheep

Norman Origin-

Pork (Porc)
Beef (Boeuf)
Mutton (Mouton)

Obviously there are other examples.

Interestingly almost all of the four letter swear words in the English language are Saxon and would have been perfectly acceptable in polite Saxon society but they became taboo due to the Normans disaproval of the use of the Anglo-Saxon language.

Answer 5

I would guess that most of it came from 1066.

Answer 6

I would say before 1066. From Christian missionaries.

Answer 7

THERE ARE MANY WORDS AND ROOT-WORDS BORROWED FROM LATIN IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE