How far back in time can you understand English?
An experiment in language change
A man takes a train from London to the coast. He’s visiting a town called Wulfleet. It’s small and old, the kind of place with a pub that’s been pouring pints since the Battle of Bosworth Field. He’s going to write about it for his blog. He’s excited.
He arrives, he checks in. He walks to the cute B&B he’d picked out online. And he writes it all up like any good travel blogger would: in that breezy LiveJournal style from 25 years ago, perhaps, in his case, trying a little too hard.
But as his post goes on, his language gets older. A hundred years older with each jump. The spelling changes. The grammar changes. Words you know are replaced by unfamiliar words, and his attitude gets older too, as the blogger’s voice is replaced by that of a Georgian diarist, an Elizabethan pamphleteer, a medieval chronicler.
By the middle of his post, he’s writing in what might as well be a foreign language.
But it’s not a foreign language. It’s all English.
None of the story is real: not the blogger, not the town. But the language is real, or at least realistic. I constructed the passages myself, working from what we know about how English was written in each period.1
It’s a thousand years of the English language, compressed into a single blog post.
Read it and notice where you start to struggle. Notice where you give up entirely. Then meet me on the other side and I’ll tell you what happened to the language (and the blogger).
You’re reading The Dead Language Society, where 35,000+ readers explore the hidden history of the English language. I’m Colin Gorrie: PhD linguist and your guide through 1,500 years of English being weird.
I publish every Wednesday. Paid subscribers get every issue, the full archive, and the content I’m most proud of: practical guides to reading historical texts yourself, honest takes on how language really works, and live book clubs where we read texts like Beowulf and (up next!) Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
2000
Well, I finally got to the town everyone has been talking about lately. Wulfleet. And let me tell you, it was not easy to get here. It’s ridiculous how close this place is to London, and yet how hard it is to get here. I took a train to some place whose name I can’t pronounce, and then from there I had to hop on a bus. The whole day was shot just getting here.
Not going to lie though: so far, it’s totally worth it.
Yes, it’s the typical English coastal town: the seagulls, the cobblestone streets, the works. But there’s something about it that just makes me want to dress up in a cape and walk around like I’m in a Gothic novel. Although, let’s be honest, do I really need an excuse to do that? :)
Everyone seems really nice here, although I did have one really weird encounter on the way to the B&B. A guy was following me for a while. It kind of freaked me out. Anyway, if you go to Wulfleet, just watch out for this one weird guy who hangs out near the bus stop. I know, real specific. But anyway, that was just a bit odd.
Speaking of which, the B&B is also… interesting. LOL. It has separate hot and cold taps and everything. I’m about to see how the “bed” portion works. I’ll update you on the “breakfast” tomorrow morning. If I can find an internet cafe around here, that is.
1900
My plans for an untroubled sleep were upset, however, when I woke with a start before dawn. The window had, it seemed, come open in the night, though I was perfectly certain I had fastened it. I sprang up from the bed to see what was the cause, but I could see nothing in the darkness — nothing, that is, that I could satisfactorily account for. I closed the window again but was entirely unable to fall asleep due to the shock. I am not, I hope, an easily frightened man, but I confess the incident left me not a little unsettled.
When dawn finally came, I went downstairs to find a well-appointed dining room in which there was laid out a modest but perfectly adequate meal. After I ate, and thanked the landlady — a respectable woman of the kind one expects to find in charge of such an establishment — I decided to take a stroll around the town. The sea air did something to revive me after the events of the previous day, not to mention the night, although a question still weighed on me. Do windows simply burst open in the night? Or was there something else afoot? I resolved to make enquiries, though of whom I was not yet certain.
1800
After spending the day wandering around the environs of the town, and, finding myself hungry, I sought out an inn, where I might buy some supper. It was not difficult to find one, and, sitting alone, I called for supper from what the publican had to offer. I confess I gave no great thought to the quality of the fare. Hunger, that great leveller, makes philosophers of us all, and renders even the meanest dish agreeable.
The place was adequately charming. The tables were covered with guttering candles, and the local rustics seemed to be amusing themselves with great jollity. Reader, I am not one of those travellers who holds himself above the common people of the places he visits. I saw fit rather to join in with their sport and we whiled away the hours together in good cheer. I found them to be as honest and amiable a company as one could wish for.
The only thing that disturbed my good humour was when I thought, for a brief moment, that I saw the man who accosted me yesterday among the crowd. But it must have been a mere fancy, for whatever I thought I saw vanished as quickly as it had appeared. I chided myself for the weakness of my nerves, and took another draught to steady them.
When, at long last, the entertainment was spent, I undertook to return to my lodgings; however, finding myself quite unable to find my way, a fact which owed something to having imbibed rather immoderately in the hours prior — and here let me caution the reader against the particular hospitality of country innkeepers, which is liberal beyond what prudence would advise — I soon found myself at the harbour’s edge.
1700
When I was firſt come to Wulfleet, I did not see the harbour, for I was weary and would ſooner go to the inn, that I might ſleep. It is a truth well known to travellers, that wearineſs of body breeds a kind of blindneſs to all things, however remarkable, and ſo it was with me. But now that I beheld the ſight of it, I marvelled. In the inky blackneſs I could see not a ſtar, nor even a ſliver of the moon. It was indeed a wonder that I did not ſtumble on my way, and periſh in a gutter, for many a man has come to his end by leſs.
Finally, with my mind much filled with reflection, I found my way through dark ſtreets to a familiar alley. This was a welcome sight, as an ill foreboding was lately come into my mind. I entertained for a moment such unmanly thoughts as are far from my cuſtom, and which I ſhould be aſhamed to ſet down here, were it not that an honeſt account requires it. I felt eſpecially that I was purſued by ſome thing unknown to me. I glanced backwards, to ſee if I might eſpy that man. But there was no one, or at least no one that I could diſcern.
At laſt, I found the doorway of the inn, as much by chance as by deſign, and retired to ſleep with a mind addled half by drink and the other half by a fear for which I could not well account. I commended myſelf to Providence, and reſolved to think no more on it.
1600
That night I was vntroubled by such euents as I had vndergone the night before, for I had barred the door ere I ſlept, and so fortified, that so no force might open it. This town of Wulfleet was paſſing ſtrange, as ſtrange I dare ſay as any place whereof Plinie wrote, or any iland discovered in the voyages of Sir Walter Raleigh. But I was bound to my taſk, and would not flinch from it. I would record the occurrents in Wulfleet, howeuer ſtrange they might ſeem, yea, though they were ſuch things as would make a leſſer man forſake his purpoſe.
But I ſoon forgot my earlier dread, for the morning brought with it ſo fair a ſight as to diſpel all feare. The people of the town had erected ouernight a market of ſuch variety and abundance as I haue not ſeen the like. Animals walked among men, and men among animals, a true maruel!
As I looked on this aſſembled throng, greatly pleaſed and not a little amazed, a man approached me. He ſtartled me, but I quickly saw he was nothing but a farmer come to hawke his wares. “Would you haue a fowl, sir?” ſaid he, “My hens are fat and luſty, and you may haue them cheap.”
I said in reply, “No, I thanke thee,” He was a churliſh fellow, rude of ſpeech and meane of aſpect, and I felt no ſhame at thouing ſuch a man as that.
1500
I went forthe among the people, and as I paſſed throughe the market and the ſtretes of the towne, euer lokyng aboute me with grete care, leſt I ſholde agayn encountre ſome peryl, thee appeared, from oute of the prees that ſame man whom I ſo dredde. And he was passyng foule was of vyſage, as it ſemed to me, more foule than ony man I had ſene in al my lyf.
He turned hym towarde me and ſayd, “Straunger, wherefore art thou come hydder?”
And I anſwerd hym nott, for I knewe nott what I ſholde ſaye, ne what answere myght ſerue me beſt in ſuche a caas.
Than hee asked me, “Was it for that thou wouldeſt ſee the Maiſter?”
And verely this name dyd me ſore affright, for who was this Maiſter wherof he ſpake? And what maner of man was he, that his very name ſholde be ſpoken wyth ſuche reuerence and drede. I wolde haue fledde but he purſued me and by myn avys he was the ſwifter, for he caught me full ſoone.
I sayd to him, “What meaneſt thou? Who is the Maiſter?”
And he sayd, “I ſhall brynge the vnto hym, and thou ſhalt ſee for thy ſelf what maner of lorde he is.”
But I wolde not, and cryed out ayenſt hym with grete noyſe, leſt he ſholde take me thyder by violence and ayenſt my wille.
1400
Bot þe man wolde me nat abandone þer, ne suffre me to passen forþ. I miȝt nat flee, for hys companiouns, of whom þer were a gret nombre, beſet me aboute, and heelden me faſt þat I ne scholde nat ascapen. And þei weren stronge menn and wel douȝti, of grymme contenaunce and fiers, and armed wiþ swerdes and wiþ knyues, so þat it were gret foly for eny man to wiþstonden hem.
So þei bounden me hond and foot and ledden me to þe one þei callede Maiſter, of whom I hadde herd so muchel and knewe so litel.
Þe sayde Maiſter, what that hee apperid bifore me, was verely a Deuill, or so me þouȝte, for neuer in al my lyf hadde I beholden so foule a creature. Hee bore a blak clok þat heng to þe grounde, and ſpake neuer a worde. Bot his countenaunce was hidous and so dredful þat my blood wexed colde to loken on hym. For he hadde nat þe visage of a man bot of a beest, wiþ þe teeþ and ſnoute of a wulf, scharpe and crueel. And his eres weren longe eres, as of a wulf, and bihynde him þer heng a gret tayl, as wulf haþ. And hys eyen schon in þe derknesse lyke brennyng coles.
“What wolden ȝe wiþ mee, ȝe heþene?” aſked I, þouȝ myn voys quaked and I hadde litel hope of eny merci.
Bot þei maden no answer, neyþer good ne yuel. Þei weren stille as stoon, and stoden about me as men þat wayte on þeir lordes commandement.
1300
Þanne after muchel tyme spak þe Maiſter, and his wordes weren colde as wintres is. His vois was as þe crying of rauenes, scharpe and schille, and al þat herde hym weren adrade and durst nat speken.
“I deme þe to þe deeþ, straunger. Here ſchaltou dyen, fer fram þi kynne and fer fram þine owen londe, and non ſchal knowen þi name, ne non schal þe biwepe.”
And I sayde to hym, wiþ what boldenesse I miȝte gaderen, “Whi fareſt þou wiþ me þus? What treſpaas haue I wrouȝt ayeins þe, þat þou demeſt me so harde a dome?”
“Swie!” quoþ he, and smot me wiþ his honde, so þat I fel to þe erþe. And þe blod ran doun from mi mouþe.
And I swied, for þe grete drede þat was icumen vpon mee was more þan I miȝte beren. Mi herte bicam as stoon, and mi lymes weren heuy as leed, and I ne miȝte namore stonden ne spoken.
Þe euele man louȝ, whan that he sawe my peine, and it was a crueel louȝter, wiþouten merci or pitee as of a man þat haþ no rewþe in his herte.
Allas! I scholde neuer hauen icumen to þis toune of Wuluesfleete! Cursed be þe dai and cursed be þe houre þat I first sette foot þerinne!
1200
Hit is muchel to seggen all þat pinunge hie on me uuroȝten, al þar sor and al þat sorȝe. Ne scal ic nefre hit forȝeten, naht uuhiles ic libbe!
Ac þer com me gret sped, and þat was a uuif, strong and stiþ! Heo com in among þe yuele men and me nerede fram heore honden.
Heo sloȝ þe heþene men þat me pyneden, sloȝ hem and fælde hem to þe grunde. Þer was blod and bale inouȝ And hie feollen leien stille, for hie ne miȝten namore stonden. Ac þe Maister, þe uuraþþe Maister, he flaȝ awei in þe deorcnesse and was iseon namore.
Ic seide hire, “Ic þanke þe, leoue uuif, for þu hauest me ineredd from dæðe and from alle mine ifoan!”
1100
Þæt ƿif me andsƿarode and cƿæð, “Ic eom Ælfgifu gehaten. Þu scalt me to ƿife nimen, þeah þe þu hit ne ƿite gyt, for hit is sƿa gedon þæt nan man ne nan ƿif ne mote heonon faren buten þurh þone dæð þæs Hlafordes.”
“Ac þær is gyt mare to donne her, forþi ƿe nabbaþ þone Hlaford ofslagenne. He is strong and sƿiðe yfel, and manige gode men he hæfð fordone on þisse stoƿe.”
“Is þæt soð?” cƿæþ ic, forþon þe ic naht ne ƿiste. “Ic ƿende þæt ic mihte heonon faren sƿa ic com.”
“Gea la,” cƿæð heo. “Hit is eall soð, and ƿyrse þonne þu ƿenst.”
1000
And þæt heo sægde wæs eall soþ. Ic ƿifode on hire, and heo ƿæs ful scyne ƿif, ƿis ond ƿælfæst. Ne gemette ic næfre ær sƿylce ƿifman. Heo ƿæs on gefeohte sƿa beald swa ænig mann, and þeah hƿæþere hire andƿlite wæs ƿynsum and fæger.
Ac ƿe naƿiht freo ne sindon, for þy þe ƿe næfre ne mihton fram Ƿulfesfleote geƿitan, nefne ƿe þone Hlaford finden and hine ofslean. Se Hlaford hæfþ þisne stede mid searocræftum gebunden, þæt nan man ne mæg hine forlætan. Ƿe sindon her sƿa fuglas on nette, swa fixas on ƿere.
And ƿe hine secaþ git, begen ætsomne, ƿer ond ƿif, þurh þa deorcan stræta þisses grimman stedes. Hƿæþere God us gefultumige!
The blog ends there. No sign-off, no “thanks for reading.” Just a few sentences in a language that most of us lost the ability to follow somewhere around the thirteenth century.
So, how far did you get?
Let me take you back through it.
The calm after the storm (1700–2000)
Written English has been remarkably stable over the last 300 years. Spelling was standardized in the mid-1700s, and grammar has barely changed at all. This means that, if you can read Harry Potter (1997–2003), you can read Robinson Crusoe (1719), which is good news to fans of the English novel.
What has changed is the voice.
Blog post became diary entry became travel letter. The format changed much faster than the language. Compare the very first line, “Well, I finally got to the town everyone has been talking about lately” with the line from the 1800 section, “Hunger, that great leveller, makes philosophers of us all, and renders even the meanest dish agreeable.”
They’re both performances of a sort: the 2000s protagonist is performing for his blog’s audience, so the tone is chatty and personal. The 1800s protagonist, with the mind of a Georgian diarist, is performing for posterity, so he philosophizes.
The one visible change in the language itself is the appearance, in the 1700 passage, of the long s (ſ). This wasn’t a different letter, just a variant form of s used in certain positions within a word. It disappeared fully from English printing in the early 19th century, although its use was dwindling even before that, which is why it does not appear in the 1800 passage. It’s a typographic change rather than a linguistic one, but it’s the first unmistakable sign that the text is getting older.2
Slowly, then all at once (1400–1600)
This is where the ground starts to move under our feet.3
Before the mid 1700s, there was no such thing as standardized spelling. Writers spelled words as they heard them, or as they felt like spelling them, which is why the 1500s and 1600s sections look so alien, even when the words, underneath the surface, are ones you know.
For another difficulty, take the word vntroubled from the 1600 section. This is our familiar untroubled, but the u is replaced by a v, because u and v were not yet considered separate letters. They were variants of the same latter, used to represent both sounds. The convention was to write v at the beginning of words and u in the middle, which give us spelling like vnto (unto), euents (events), ouernight (overnight), and howeuer (however). It looks weird at first, but once you know the rule, the words become much more readable.
Another new arrival — or, more accurately, late departure — from the language is the letter thorn (þ), which first appears in the 1400 section. Thorn is simply th. That’s it. Wherever you see þ, read th, and the word will usually reveal itself: þe is the, þei is they, þat is that. If you’ve ever seen a pub called “Ye Olde” anything, that ye is actually þe, an attempt by early printers to write a thorn without having to make an expensive new letter.
Thorn’s companion, yogh (ȝ), is more complicated. It represents sounds that modern English spells as gh or y — so miȝt is might, ȝe is ye. The reasons for this are a story unto themselves.
But the most interesting change in this period isn’t a letter. Rather, it’s a pronoun. Notice the moment in the 1600 section where our blogger meets a farmer and says, “No, I thanke thee.” Then he adds, “I felt no ſhame at thouing ſuch a man as that.”
Thouing. To thou someone, or to use thou when talking to them, was, by the 1600s, a deliberate social statement. Thou was the old singular form of you; you was originally the plural. Over the centuries, you came to be used as a polite singular, much as French uses vous. Gradually, you took over entirely. By Shakespeare’s time (1564–1616), thou survived in two main contexts: intimacy (as in prayer) and insult. Our blogger is being a little rude here. He’s looking down on a man he considers beneath him, and his language gives him a way of making his feelings perfectly clear.
Over the wall (1000–1300)
Somewhere in this section — and if you’re like most readers, it happened around 1300 or 1200 — the language crossed a boundary. Up to this point, comprehension felt like it was dropping gradually, but now it’s fallen off a cliff. In one section, you could get by by squinting and guessing; in the next you were utterly lost. You have hit the wall.4
There are two reasons for this. The first is vocabulary. As you move backwards in time, the French and Latin loanwords that make up an enormous proportion of the Modern English vocabulary grow fewer and fewer. When you pass 1250, they drop off almost altogether. Where a modern writer would say he underwent torture, a 1200-era writer must say that he suffered pinunge instead.5
The farther back you go, the more the familiar Latinate layer of English is stripped away, revealing the Germanic core underneath: a language that looks to modern eyes more like German or Icelandic than anything we’d call English.
The second reason for the difficulty is grammar. Old English (450–1100) was an inflected language: it used endings on nouns, adjectives, and verbs to mark their grammatical roles in a sentence, much as Latin or modern German do. Alongside these endings came a greater freedom in word order, which makes sense given that the endings told you who was doing what to whom.
English lost most of these endings over the course of the period linguists call Middle English (1100–1450), and it tightened its word order as if to compensate. When you look at these final sections, if you can make out the words, you will see the effects of this freer word order. For example, in 1200 we read monige gode men he hæfð fordone ‘many good men he has destroyed’, where we’d expect a Modern English order more like and he has destroyed many good men.
To make matters worse, a few unfamiliar letters also appear: wynn (ƿ) is simply w, eth (ð) means the same as thorn (þ) — both represent th, and ash (æ) represents the vowel in cat and hat.6:
All of these factors combined likely made it difficult, if not impossible, to follow the plot. So let me tell you what happened. In the 1400 section, the blogger was seized. He was dragged before a creature they called the Master, and the Master was no man. He had the teeth and snout of a wolf, as well as a wolf’s long ears and great tail. His eyes glowed like burning coals. Wulfleet was once Wulfesfleot ‘the Bay of the Wolf.’
In the 1300 section, the Master condemned our hero to death. In the 1200 section, a woman appeared and killed his captor. The Master, however, fled into the darkness. In the 1100 section, the woman revealed her name: Ælfgifu ‘gift of the elves.’ She told the blogger — can we still call him that in 1100? — they would marry, and she shares the terrible truth about Wulfleet: no one leaves until the Master is dead.
In the 1000 section, they are married. She is, he writes, as bold as any man in battle, and yet fair of face. But they are not free. Together, through the dark streets of Wulfleet, they hunt the Master still.
The English in which I write this paragraph is not the English of fifty years ago, and it will not be the English of fifty years in the future.
Go back far enough, and English writing becomes unrecognisable. Go forward far enough and the same thing will happen, though none of us will be around to notice.
Our poor blogger didn’t notice either, even as he and his language travelled back in time through the centuries. He just kept writing even as he was carried off to somewhere he couldn’t come back from. Some say that, far away in Wulfleet, he’s writing still.
Simon Roper’s annual pronunciation videos were part of the inspiration for this piece. His most recent one is extraordinary. What Simon does for the spoken language, I’ve tried to do here for the written, albeit running in the opposite direction.
The authors and genres I am imitating in this passage are:
2000. The LiveJournal-era travel blog. Earnestness, overlong narration, audience awareness.
1900. M. R. James. Fussiness, litottes (not a little unsettled), reasonableness masking dread.
1800. Laurence Sterne (A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy, 1768), essayist William Hazlitt. Moralizing digressions, direct address to reader.
1700. Daniel Defoe (Robinson Crusoe, 1719). Plain style, sententious maxims, moral self-consciousness.
The authors and genres I am imitating in these passages are:
1600. Thomas Nashe (1567–1601), Thomas Coryat (1577–1617), Elizabethan pamphlets. Classical allusions, extravagant comparisons, narrator who can’t resist editorialising.
1500. William Caxton’s (1422–1491) prologues. Hedging, doublets, slightly awkward attempt to replicate Latinate syntax.
1400. Mandeville’s Travels (14th century). Repeated and clauses. The doublets are reminiscent of Romances.
In these passages I am imitating:
1300. Prose renderings of verse romances such as King Horn, Havelok the Dane. Formulaic doubleds, incremental repetition, similes.
1200. Laȝamon’s Brut. Alliterative doublets, repetition for emphasis.
1100. The Peterborough Chronicle. Plain, grim style. Fatalistic reporting of bad events.
1000. Homilies by Ælfric and Wulfstan. Inspired by the Old English homiletic tradition, and the prose saints’ lives.
This is the ancestor of the modern word pining ‘longing, yearning,’ as in pining for the fjords. Ironically, the word pinunge itself comes from is a very ancient Latin loanword: poena ‘punishment.’
Wynn was the original letter for the w sound in the English language. It was borrowed from the runic alphabet, before Norman scribes replaced it with a literal “double u, as in uuif ‘wife, i.e., woman,’ which you see in the 1200 passage, and gives the name to the modern letter w.
At the year 1000 I was reaching for the OE dictionary.
Great fun.
I was shocked to find that I often write in the language of 1900, even 1800.
No wonder people think I am nuts.
This was great. Like many others I got as far as 1300 and could understand some of what was going on in 1200 but missed some details.