English

英文词源

English

English: [OE] The people and language of England take their name from the Angles, a West Germanic people who settled in Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries AD. They came originally from the Angul district of Schleswig, an area of the Jutland peninsula to the south of modern Denmark. This had a shape vaguely reminiscent of a fishhook, and so its inhabitants used their word for ‘fishhook’ (a relative of modern English angler and angling) to name it.

From earliest times the adjective English seems to have been used for all the Germanic peoples who came to Britain, including the Saxons and Jutes, as well as the Angles (at the beginning of the 8th century Bede referred to them collectively as gens anglorum ‘race of Angles’). The earliest record of its use with reference to the English language is by Alfred the Great.
=> angler, angling

English (n.1)

"the people of England; the speech of England," noun use of Old English adjective Englisc (contrasted to Denisc, Frencisce, etc.), "of or pertaining to the Angles," from Engle (plural) "the Angles," the name of one of the Germanic groups that overran the island 5c., supposedly so-called because Angul, the land they inhabited on the Jutland coast, was shaped like a fish hook (see angle (n.)). Reinforced by Anglo-French engleis. Cognates: Dutch Engelsch, German Englisch, Danish Engelsk, French Anglais (Old French Engelsche), Spanish Inglés, Italian Inglese.

Englisc was used from earliest times without distinction for all the Germanic invaders -- Angles, Saxon, Jutes (Bede's gens Anglorum) -- and applied to their group of related languages by Alfred the Great. "The name English for the language is thus older than the name England for the country" [OED]. After 1066, of the native population of England (as distinguished from Normans and French occupiers), a distinction which lasted about a generation. But as late as Robert of Gloucester's "Chronicle" (c. 1300) it also was sometimes distinguished from "Saxon" ("Þe englisse in þe norþ half, þe saxons bi souþe").

"... when Scots & others are likely to be within earshot, Britain & British should be inserted as tokens, but no more, of what is really meant" [Fowler]

In pronunciation, "En-" has become "In-," perhaps through the frequency of -ing- words and the relative rarity of -e- before -ng- in the modern language, but the older spelling has remained. Meaning "English language or literature as a subject at school" is from 1889. Old English meaning the Anglo-Saxon language before the Conquest is attested from c. 1200 in an account of the native (as opposed to Latin) month names.

English (n.2)

"spin imparted to a ball" (as in billiards), 1860, from French anglé "angled" (see angle (n.)), which is similar to Anglais "English."

English (adj.)

Old English, "belonging to the English people;" late 13c., "belonging to England," from English (n.1). The adverb Englishly (mid-15c.) is rare.

english (v.)

"to translate into English," late 14c., from English (n.1) in the language sense. Related: Englished; englishing.