Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/421

Rh ENGLISH LANGUAGE 401 carried out zealously by Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte, Mr A. J. Ellis, and the Rev. W. W. Skeat, to whom is due the foundation of a Dialect Society for the investiga tion of this branch of philology. The researches of Prince L. L. Bonaparte and Mr Ellis have resulted in the classi fication and mapping of the existing dialects. 1 They recog nize a Northern dialect lying north of a line drawn from Morecambe Bay to the Humber, which, with the kindred Scottish dialects (already investigated and classed), 2 is the direct descendant of early northern English, and a South-ivestern dialect occupying Somerset, Wilts, Dorset, Gloucester, and western Hampshire, which, with the Devonian dialect beyond it, are the descendants of early southern English and the still older West-Saxon of Alfred. This dialect must in the 14th century have been spoken everywhere south of Thames ; but the influence of London caused its extinction in Surrey, Sussex, and Kent, so that already in Puttenham it had become &quot; far western.&quot; An East Midland dialect, extending from south Lincolnshire to London, occupies the cradle-land of the standard English speech, and still shows least variation from it. Between and around these typical dialects are ten others, representing the old Midland proper, or dialects between it and the others already mentioned. Thus &quot; north of Trent &quot; the North-tcefstern dialect of soutli Lancashire, Cheshire, Derby, and Stafford, with that of Shropshire, represents the early West Midland English, of which several specimens re main; while the North-eastern of Nottingham and north Lincolnshire represents the dialect of the Lay of Have- Ink. With the North Midland dialect of south-west Yorkshire, these represent forms of speech which to the modern Londoner, as to Puttenham, are still decidedly northern, though properly intermediate between northern and midland, and preserving interesting traces of the midland pronouns and verbal inflexions. There is an Eastern dialect in the East Anglian counties ; a Midland in Leicester and Warwick shires ; a Western in Hereford, Worcester, and north Gloucestershire, intermediate between south-western and north-western, and representing the dialect of Piers Plowman. Finally, between the east midland and south-western, in the counties of Buckingham, Oxford, Berks, Hants, Surrey, and Sussex, there is a dialect which must have once been south-western, but of which the most salient characters have been rubbed off by proximity to London and the East Midland speech. In east Sussex and Kent this South-eastern dialect attains to a more distinctive character. The Kenlidi form of early Southern English evidently maintained its existence more toughly than that of the counties immediately south of London. If we can trust the fidelity of the dialect attributed to Edgar in Lear, it was still strongly marked in the days- of Shakespeare. In the south-eastern corner of Ireland, in the baronies of Forth and Bargy, in county Wexforcl, a very archaic form of English, of which speci mens have been preserved, 3 was still spoken in the pre sent century. In all probability it dated from the first English invasion. In many parts of Ulster forms of Lowland Scotch dating to the settlement under James I. are still spoken ; but the English of Ireland generally seems to represent 16th and 17th century English, as in the pronunciation of tea, wheat (tay, ichait), largely affected of course by the native Celtic. Beyond the limits of the 1 See description and map in Trans, of Phil ol. Soc., 1875-6, p. 570. 2 The Dialect of the Southern Counties of Scotland, its Pronunci ation, Grammar, and Historical Relations, with an Appendix on the present limits of the Gaelic and Lowland Scotch, and the Dialectal Divisions of the Lowland Tongue ; and a Linguistical Map of Scot land, by James A. H. Murray, London, 1873. 3 A Glossary (with some pieces of Verse) of the Old Dialect of (he English Co 7 ony of Forth and Jiargy, collected by Jacob I oole, edited by AV. Barnes, B.D., London, 1867. British Isles, English is the language of extensive regions, now or formerly colonies. In all these countries the presence of numerous new objects and new conditions of life has led to the supplementing of the vocabulary by the adoption of words from native languages, and special adaptation of English words. The use of a common literature, however, prevents the overgrowth of these local peculiarities, and also makes them familiar to Englishmen. It is only in the older states of the American Union that anything like a local dialect has been produced ; and even there the so-called Yankee dialect, and Americanisms, are much more archaic English forms which have been lost or have become dialectal in England than a develop ment of the American soil. The steps by which English, from being the language of a few thousand invaders along the eastern and southern seaboard of Britain, has been diffused by conquest and colonization over its present area form a subject too large for the limits of this article. It need only be remarked that within the confines of Britain itself the process is not yet complete. Representatives of earlier languages survive in Wales and the Scottish Highlands, though in neither case can the substitution of English be remote. In Ireland, where English was introduced by conquest much later, Irish is still spoken in patches all over the country : though English is understood, and probably spoken after a fashion, everywhere. At opposite extremities of Britain the Cornish of Cornwall and the Norse dialects of Orkney and Shet land died out very gradually in the course of last century. The Manx, or Celtic of Man, is even now in the last stage of dissolution: and in the Channel Isles the Norman patois of Jersey and Guernsey have largely yielded to English within the last thirty years. The accompanying table (page 402) will graphically repre sent the chronological and dialectal development of English. 4 Various names have been proposed for the different stages ; it seems only necessary to add to those in the table the de scriptive names of Dr Abbott, who has proposed (Hoiv to Parse, p. 298) to call the Old English, or Anglo-Saxon, the &quot; Synthetical or Inflexional Period ;&quot; the Old English Tran sition (Late Anglo-Saxon of Mr Skeat), the &quot; Period of Con fusion ;&quot; the Early Middle English, &quot;Analytical Period&quot; (1250-1350) ; the Late Middle English, &quot; National Period ; (1350-1500); the Tudor English, &quot; Period of Licence;&quot; and the Modern English, &quot; Period of Settlement.&quot; As the study of English has made immense advances within the last twelve years, it is only in works recently published that the student will find the subject satisfactorily handled. Among those treating of the whole subject or parts of it may be mentioned A History of English Rhythms, by Edwin Guest, London, 1838; the Philological JSssays of Richard Garnett [1835-1848], edited by his son, London, 1859; The English Language, by K. G. Latham, 5th eel., London, 1862; Origin and History of the English Lan guage, by G. P. Marsh, London, 1862; Lectures on the. English Language, by the same, New York and London, 1863; ffistorische Grammatik dcr cnglischcn Sprachc, by C. F. Koch, Weimar, 1863, &c. ; Englischc Grammatik, by Eduard Matzner, Berlin, 1860-65 (an English translation by C. J. Grece, LL.B., London, 1874); The Philology of the English Tongue, by John Earle, M. A., Oxford, I860; Comparative Grammar of the Anglo-Saxon Language, byF. A. March, New York, 1870; Historical Outlines of EngliKh Accidence, by the Rev. R. Morris, LL.D., London, 1873; Elementary Lessons in Histo- by A. J. Ellis, London, 1869-75, and still in progress; The History of English Sounds, by Henry Sweet, London, 1874; King Alfred * Translation of Gregory s Pastoral Care, by the same, Early Eng. Text Soc., 1871-72; On Dialects and Prehistoric Forms of English, by the same, Philolog. Soc., 1877; as well as many separate papers by various authors in the Transactions of t/w Philological Society, and the publications of the Early English Text Society. 4 Brought before the Philological Society in January 1876. VTTT. --51