Old English to Modern English

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Old English to Modern English. The Saxons, Angles, Jutes and Frisians arrived on our shores from the fifth century AD. They brought with them the basis of our culture and a language which we refer to as Old English. Over the next 1,500 years influences principally from the Scandinavian and French tongues took this to Middle English and eventually to Modern English. English is the most diverse language and this is not simply down to the number of words adopted from quite unrelated tongues, a remnant of colonial days. There is a reason why English, more than any other, needs a thesaurus - indeed most languages never bother publishing a thesaurus (Japanese is a notable exception). That English has been influenced by so many others has led to such a great number of alternative words. Learn how these came began, where they came from and, most interestingly, how they evolved, how the meanings changed and developed to become the language we know today. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

The letter A is for an used in such things as ‘an egg’ instead of ‘a’ when the following noun begins with a vowel. However, it actually began as ‘one’ hence ‘one egg’ and the use of ‘a’ actually the loss of the following ‘n’. Note it is difficult to say AN LEG, AN HORSE, AN BOTTLE) but Old English would have been pronounced as AYN LEG, AYN HORSE, AYN BOTTLE which is rather easier. The same thing is seen in anfeld which may have been used to mean ‘simple’ but actually comes from ‘one-fold’ as in ‘once’.

The letter C is for ceap meaning ‘market’ and which also gave geceapian ‘to buy’. Now today we look for things on the cheap at the market, where originally they would market things at the cheap. Note we say ‘on the cheap’ to mean ‘cheaply’ – on the cheap meaning ‘on the market’. And this is still seen in place names such as Chipping Norton, Chipping Sodbury and street names such as Cheap Street and Cheapside.

The Letter K is for nothing, no not a silent ‘k’ but a letter coming to modern English from the Scandinavian languages. Incidentally the silent ‘K’ is a modern idea – once we had k-nights, and k-nives, but nobody wore k-nickers as this was originally knickerbockers and even that word unknown before 1859. This was not what you were expecting when I mentioned knickerbockers – admit it.

The letter Q is French and did not appear in Old English. Oddly the word ‘queue’, albeit with a spelling of c-u-e, appeared in English before the Norman invasion. It was used to describe a ‘tail’ (and other long parts of the mammalian anatomy), and first used to refer to a line of people in 1837, some 350 years after the first queues were named as ‘lines of dancers’.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Salt Routes

A few will be aware I have been known to speak on various subjects over the years. Fundamentally these all revolve around my favourite subject of etymology. Have always enjoyed bringing this fascinating subject to others. It’s not for me to say whether the audiences have, although many have asked me to return.

Thought it might be worthwhile sharing a snippet or two from these etymological presentations, continuing with Salt Routes. As the original trade route, I look at why it existed and why these routes are still used today. While our distant ancestors were largely self-sufficient, for most one vital commodity meant having to trade. Bringing salt to the user produced a network of trails which can still be followed. Yet this is not just a travel history, salt has found its way into our culture, our language, our folklore and the talk brings all these factors to the fore. There is a PowerPoint presentation to accompany this talk if required.

Salt has long been the most valuable of necessary commodities – gold, saffron, diamonds might all be more valuable, but you can live without them, unlike salt – and retained its value until the spice trade brought other items to the table. Ironically, salt was knocked off the top by pepper.

Place names which reflect salt production include Hallein and Hallstat.

Words which have come to reflect a ‘salty’ origin include ‘soldier’ and ‘salary’; and we still speak of someone being ‘worth his salt’ or ‘sitting below the salt’.

If you think you know someone who would like to hear me speak on this subject, drop me a line.

Nonverbal Language

For writers nonverbal communication allows them to reveal a character’s thoughts and emotions without lengthy descriptions. Such also means drawing the reader into the story, top feel as the character does. But I wondered just where these originate. Are they learned or evolutionary?

Chemical communications may be associated with animals, but humans still pick up such olfactory messages. Scientists disagree as to the extent which humans can detect messages, and some maintain these abilities to detect pheromones fade and even vanish as an individual matures, which explains the high divorce rate.

Gestures may possibly predate verbal communication. Certainly apes do get a message across in this manner.

Universal expressions come next. The sort of things which communicate emotions such as anger, disgust, fear, happiness, surprise, and sadness – all of which are seemingly involuntary and thus suggesting these are evolutionary. Eyebrows are particularly helpful.

Facial expressions are possibly also evolutionary, but there is the idea that some of these – puzzlement, for example – are as much learned as involuntary.

There are also learned cues, the nod being the most obvious. I tried nodding for ‘no’ and shaking me head for ‘yes’ and found it more difficult than writing with my non-dominant hand. So isn’t it evolutionary? It can’t be – for while nodded affirmatives are well-nigh universal, there are several parts of the world where the reverse is the case. Bulgaria and Albania are two examples, while Greece and Turkey employs a quick backward jerk of the head to indicate ‘no’.

Body language – posture, stance, eye contact (or lack of it) – are all learned from out cultural and social experiences.

Vocalisations might seem to fit in the non-verbal group – but we all make sounds which convey a message, but are not words and are understood across verbal language barriers. “Ah”, “hmm”, “huh” for example.

And finally there are proxemics – which if you don’t know (and I didn’t) refers to how we have learned to communicate through the use of personal space. (Sociable and welcoming into that space; or the reverse like me.)

As a writer I have never considered I could communicate the miserable misanthrope through the use of body language in a passage. But the idea is intriguing and well worth investigating.

Proto-Indo European

In many of my posts on etymology I have spoken about Proto-Indo European, the language from the end of the last Ice Age which has given rise to almost all the tongues across Europe, the Middle East and the Indian sub-continent. I thought it about time I posted an image of the language family tree with Proto-Indo-European at the hub. I say an image, because having tried to explain it in writing several times, the visual image is undoubtedly much easier to understand. Actually a number of images, because the complexity requires a number of different angles on that tree.

That covers the spoken word, but it is worthwhile mentioning the written word, especially as Proto-Indo-European had no written form. The oldest written language, with the earliest known records, is generally considered to be Sumerian, a language spoken in Mesopotamia around 3500 BC. While Sumerian is no longer spoken, its written form is the earliest evidence of a language system in existence. Other contenders for the title of oldest language, including those still spoken today, include Egyptian and Tamil, which also have documented histories dating back thousands of years.

Homonyms, Etymologically Speaking: F

Many words have two meanings, sometimes more, which are often very different. Such words have identical spelling and pronunciation, they are known as homonyms. Here I continue an A to Z list of such words and look at how that word came to have two different meanings.

F is for file, and one my favourite words when it comes to its usage over the years. Likely our first thought turns to the tool used to smooth or abrade, this comes from the Proto-Germanic fihalo 'a cutting tool', and traceable to Proto-Indo-European peig 'to cut, mark by incision'. The second use, that heard so often in offices, refers to a place where documents are stored - even in the digital age the terminology has not changed - and has been derived from the first sense. How? Because the original filing systems were not drawers, but a length of wire produced by a cutting-like process. The papers would be suspended from the wire or file until required. We still remember those days because we never spoke of the document being in the drawer as being 'in file' but always 'on file'. This is why etymology and the development of language is fascinating.

Parts of Speech

As a schoolboy I struggled to remember the names of parts of speech and which was what and why. After I left school and when I started writing I found it a simple task. I recently discussed this with someone and, as I did so, began wondering if an etymologist's view would have helped. Let's see:

Verb, always said to be a 'doing word', came to English from France where the word verbe was used in the sense of 'word' and also 'word of God'. This is derived from the Proto-Indo-European were meaning 'to speak', which has also given us Avestan urvata 'command'; Sanskrit vrata 'command, vow'; Greek rhetor 'public speaker'; Hittite weriga 'call, summon'; Lithuanian vardas 'name'; and both the Gothic and English words for 'word'.

Noun is another from French, where nom has long meant 'name'. Interestingly, Old English name was used to mean 'name'. All can be traced back to Latin nomen and Proto-Indo-European no-men both meaning 'name'.

Adjective, as I recall it said to be the 'describing word', it also comes from French, where adjectif came from Latin adjectivum, the latter meaning 'added' - in this sense added to the noun. Note from around 1851 'adjective' was used as a euphemism for the mild oath 'bloody'.

Preposition is from the Latin praepositionem 'a putting before, a prefixing', and a fairly accurate description of how a preposition is used.

Conjunction is from French, where conjonction not only meant 'union, joining' but was also used in the sense of 'sexual intercourse', as was the Latin root of coniunctionem.

Pronoun has the same etymology as 'noun' but with the addition of the prefix 'pro' to mean 'in place of'.

Adverb also shares an etymology, this time with 'verb', with the prefix 'ad' meaning 'to'.

Uganda Place Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. As English place names share some links to other tongues it would be interesting to see if any of the elements contributing to our place names could be found elsewhere. Continuing an alphabetical tour of the world and a look at the largest Ugandan cities.

Kampala began as the name of a nearby hill. Originally it was known as kasozi impala or 'hill of the impala' but that description became shortened.

Entebbe comes from the Lugunda langaugae and means 'seat, chair'.

Kabale comes from the local Rujiga language and means 'small stone'.

Note the spellings of the places are English as the piece is written in English.

Do You Speak Reindeer?

It's that time of year when certain individuals get to don a certain suit of red. One of the delights of such is hearing what the little ones want for Christmas and having no idea what it is. Requests from more mature individuals have included a blonde of 18 and a Land Rover. Why she wanted an inexperienced driver for such a car when surely half the pleasure is in driving it, I have no idea.

As always I was stumped by one question. A young chap asking "What language does the reindeer speak?" I told him "reindeer" and moved the conversation quickly on. But it did get me thinking as to what animals are heard to sound like in other languages. A quick search failed to reveal anything about speaking reindeer, but I did find this fascinating list of dogs barking, ducks quacking and frogs croaking in other languages.

These alternative sounds can be found here'

Universal Languages Few Understand

Anyone who has read much of this blog will be aware my interest is in the development of words and languages. Whilst modern languages are most often named after the nation where they were originally spoken, there are those which have no national identity. I am thinking here of the artificial languages created in comparatively recent times, the most famous of which is Esperanto although there are a number of computer languages included. As these are such recent creations, I would hope the names would have been well thought out beforehand. At least the modern origins should mean there are no doubts as to the origins.

Esperanto was created in 1887 by Polish-born Lazarus Ludwig Zamenhof but not officially named until five years later. Oddly the name of the language comes from a term in Esperanto where Doktoro Esperanto means 'one who hopes'. This is the pen-name used by Zamenhof and on the title page.

Idiom Neutral was published in 1902 by the International Academy of the Universal Language, it is a revised form of Volapuk (see below), this considered imperfect. The reworking brought in many western terms and while technically a revision is in almost every aspect a new language - the name describes 'the neutral language'.

Interglossa was invented by biologist Lancelot Hogben in an attempt to provide a link between science terminology and etymology and the classical languages after having noticed the difficulty students had in learning scientific terms. This 'between languages' idea is also the origin of the name.

Interlingua is a computer language produced by the International Auxiliary Language Association, this founded by the American heiress Alice Vanderbilt Morris in the 1920s. As a name it speaks for itself.

Novial is derived from nov 'new' plus the initial letters IAL standing for International Auxiliary Language. It is designed to allow those who speak native languages to speak a single common tongue. With sources in Romance, Germanic, Occidental and Ido tongues, it first came to light in the late 1920s and virtually disappeared with the death of its inventor, Otto Jespersen, in 1943. However the internet has seen a minor revival of interest.

Occidental, later known as Interlingue, was another planned language to allow those of differing tongues to converse. Created by German Edgar de Wahl its name is taken from the French and Latin for 'western'.

Tutonish was created in 1901 by Elias Molee, with revisions in 1905 and 1915. It is the first Pan-Germanic language and intended as an Anglo-German unifying language and it is from the name virtually suggested itself. However it never really caught on, as evidenced by its reworking and also the various forms of its name, including Tutonish, Teutonish, Teutonik, Alteutonish, Altutonish, Altetonik, Nu Teutonish, Niu Teutonish, and Neuteutonish.

Volapuk was published in 1880, the work of German priest Johann Martin Schleyer. He claimed he had been told by God to create an international language, one he named to mean 'world speech'. Perhaps unkindly the word is used in other languages, Danish for example, to mean 'nonsense'.

Algol is not derived from the star in the constellation of Perseus, this from the Arabic al-ghul or 'the demon', but a contraction of 'algorithmic language'.

Basic is a computer language, an acronym standing for 'Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code'. It was invented by Hungarian-born US computer scientist John G. Kemeny in 1964.

Cobol is another computer language and acronym created in 1960 by the US Defense Department and describing 'Common Business-Oriented Language'.

Fortran is also a computer language, one dating from 1956 and an abbreviated form of 'formula translation'.

Modula is a programming language created by the Swiss Niklaus Wirth in the 1970s. It is derived from the Pascal (see below) language and named because it uses a module system unlike its predecessor.

Pascal is a computer language invented in 1971 and named for the 17th-century French scholar Blaise Pascal, who invented a calculating machine in 1642.

One thought - if the idea is to produce a single language spoken by us all (presumably as a second language), why are there so many?

Algerian Place Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. This time the African country of Algeria and some of its largest cities and towns which are listed in terms of population and begins with the biggest ....

Algiers reflects the French colonial days and comes from the French name of Alger and the Catalan Alger. In turn this comes from the Arabic name of al-Jaza'ir and translates as 'the islands'. Look at a map today and the islands will prove a mystery, yet until 1525 there were four very distinct islands which became a part of the mainland. Al Jaza'ir is an abbreviated form of the earlier name of Jaza'ir Bani Mazghana or 'the islands of the sons of Mazghana', a Berber people. Earlier this had been a Roman town known as Icosium which, as with just about every place name in the Roman Empire, was there version of the existing name, in this case the Phoenician trading post known as Ikosim. This Phoenician name is derived from a Greek legend, the place said to have been founded by twenty companions of Hercules with this being from the Greek word for 'twenty'.

Oran has a link to the capital city of Algiers in the Berber people and, at least in the example, their language. Here we find the Berber root hr meaning 'lion'. Around 3,000 years ago it is said there were lions to be seen around here. Legend has it the last two were killed on a nearby mountain which is now known as The Mountain of the Lions and large statues of these creatures stand outside the city's administrative centre.

Constantine was named in honour of the Roman emperor Constantine the Great, although originally the Romans had known the place as Cirta. To the Phoenicians this was Tzirta, but destroyed by the Romans at the beginning of the fourth century and rebuilt by them. The original name simply referred to this as a trading post.

Annaba has some of the earliest examples of advanced flake-tool techniques in the Middle Palaeolithic and has been occupied for at least 200,000 years. While we have no idea what the place was called for the vast majority of its existence - although it would be surprising to find anything other than the most simplistic names such as 'place' or 'home' - we do know it was settled by the Phoenicians around 1300 BC and later known as Hippo Regius by the Romans. Hippo is from the Punic ubon meaning 'harbour' with Regius 'of the king' referring to this being home to Numidian kings. The present name of Annaba is also from the origin ubon.

Blida is from bulaydah and ultimately from the Arabic word belda meaning 'city'.

Sidi Bel Abbes is named after Sidi bel Abbass a Muslim marabout who is buried here. A marabout being a religious leader and teacher.

Biskra was known to the Romas as Vescera although some records refer to this as Ad Piscinam a reference to the large pool of water heated by sulphurous springs to 45 degrees celsius and literally means 'at the waterworks'. It seems Vescera may have been a rather bad translation of the earlier native name. The modern name is Arabic and also refers to the hot waters, although the literal translation of 'boil' should be seen more as a reference to the bubbling of the hot waters.

Tebessa has seen its name change little over many centuries. The Romans, Arabs, French all simply using the existing name, albeit with a little corruption through pronunciation. This comes from the Greek name for the place which translated to 'one hundred gates'.

El Oued is known as 'the City of a Thousand Domes' and yet the name has a much simpler origin from the Arabic for 'river'. The city is built around an oasis, itself fed by an underground river which gave the place its name and helped the people grow their new home by growing dates and the quite rare production of bricks in the desert.

Tiaret is another name of Berber origin and, like Oran, has its origins in a big cat. However here the meaning is 'lioness', pointing to the Barbary lions once living in this region. Barbary lions, also refered to as the Atlas lion, is a species now considered extinct in the wild. The last recorded death by shooting being in 1942, although the species was certainly still in existence until at least the 1950s and some unconfirmed reports speak of sightings in the 1960s. It is thought to be extinct in captivity but, at least genetically, must survive in some form among the many animals bred in European zoos and a programme is looking at a selective breeding programme to eliminate the hybrid elements.

Note the spellings of the places are mostly English as the piece is written in English.

Zimbabwean City Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. It would seem logical to find any links with English place names to be fewer the further we get from the British Isles, yet this is not always the case.

Harare was, as any trivia buff will delight in telling you, known as Salisbury until 1982. This name came from the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, he being prime minister of Great Britain at the time. Harare took its name from the nearby village now known as Mbare and, with nearby Harare Kopje, taken from the Shona chief Neharawa whose name means 'he who does not sleep'.

Bulawayo was founded in the middle of the nineteenth century. The Ndebele king Lobengula, son of King Mzilikazi kaMatshobana who had brought his people here all the way from Zululand, naming the place KoBulawayo which means 'a place where he is killed'. This is thought to refer to a dispute between two factions of the Ndebele people, those who questioned Lobengula's right of succession fighting his supporters. Indeed at this time Bulawayo was referred to as KoBulawayo UmntwaneNkosi or 'the place where they are fightint or risin against the prince'.

Mutare is a long-established outpost on an ancient trade route - soapstone carvings and figurines have revealed much of its unwritten history. The modern city was founded as a fort in 1897 between the Tsambe and Mutare rivers. Clearly the place took the river name, itself dervied from utare meaning 'iron' or, more likely, 'gold' as the river runs through the Penhalonga Valley where gold was discovered.

Gweru was known as Gwelo until 1982, however neither were original name. Originally this was Kwelu, this the Kalanga word for 'pheasant' and the name given to their chieftain, but when the English arrived they corrupted the pronunciation to Gwelo and thereafter, the original name now largely forgotten, became pronounced as the modern version.

Kwekwe was known as Que Que until 1983 which is not named from the noise of frogs, as is often thought. The true meaning is even stranger, for this was originally isikwekwe and had the rather unusual meaning of 'scurvy', 'mange' or 'scab'.

Kadoma is a corruption of the earlier name of Gadooma, known as such from 1890 until 1982. Previously this was Katuma, named after the cattle enclosure associated with Chief Katuma.

Chinhoyi had been known as Sinoia during its days as a British colony. Both names are simply corrupted versions of the original Tjinoyi, the Lozwi chief who was the son of Lukuluba, himself the third son of Emperor Netjasike.

Norton is clearly of Old English origin and means 'the northern tun or farmstead'. However it came to Zimbabwe as a surname, the Norton family farming this area from the 1890s and who were murdered when nationalist guerrillas rose up against the Rhodesian government in the 1960s.

Marondera was known as Marandellas until 1982. This latter name was the original recording of the place name, in full known as Marandella's Kraal. Bringing this full circle the original place name was a corruption of the present name of Marondera, he the chieftain of the Barozwi people.

Note the spellings are mostly English as the piece is written in English.

Albania’s City Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. It would seem logical to find any links with English place names to be fewer the further we get from the British Isles, yet this is not always the case.

Tirana is often said to have been named by the Turkish general Barkinzade Suleyman Pasha, who founded the place around 1600 and naming it Tigran in honour of his home of Tehran. However there is enough evidence to show this was known as such some 1300 earlier and certainly the Emperor Justinian built a castle in the early 6th century named Tirkan. Thus it seems likely this city was named as ‘the village of Tirania’, this being the ancient name of Tuscany inhabited by the Etruscans. While the Etruscans gave their name to the Tyrrhenian Sea, this being the Greek version of their name, the names have never been explained.

Durres was once recorded as Dyrrhachion and this comes from the Greek and means something akin ‘bad shoreline’. Undoubtedly the rocky coastline around here would have made landing here extremely hazardous. Roman historians claimed this represented the hero Dyrrachius, yet if there is anyone to link with he will have been named from the place.

Vlore was first known as the Greek Aulon meaning ‘valley’, likely a Greek translation of the existing ancient name for the area. Later pronunciations, notably the Italian Valona, resulted in the modern form.

Elbasan shares an origin with the name of Albania, where the Indo-European alb has been seen as ‘place of eagles’ and has been influenced by the Turkish il-basan ‘the fortress’.

Fier is certainly not from the Italian fiera or ‘trade fair’ despite there being an important Venetian marketplace here in the 14th and 15th centuries. There is a record of this name well before the heyday of the market and comes from the Albanian word for ‘fern’.

Berat was earlier known as Beligrad, itself meaning ‘white city’ in the Slavic tongues and a reference to stone buildings.

Sarande has undergone several minor changes, these solely down to pronunciation differences as successive cultures came and went. This name came from the Greek for the Byzantine monastery of Agioi Saranada or ‘forth saints’. This refers to the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste, a group of Roman soldiers of the twelfth legion who were martyred on the orders of Licinius in 316.

Pogradec is another Albanian name of Slavic origin where po gradec literally means ‘under the city’. This not only defines the name of this place but also shows it was overlooked by the Illyrian settlement of Istarova located on the hill which still dominates the skyline.

Gjirokaster has often been recorded as being named after the legendary Princess Argjiro which, had she ever have existed, would be impossible as the name is known before her reputed lifetime in the 15th century. The true origin is Greek argyron kastron ‘the silver castle’.

Note the spellings are mostly English as the piece is written in English.

Afghanistan City Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. It would seem logical to find any links with English place names to be fewer the further we get from the British Isles, yet this is not always the case.

Kabul is by far the largest city of Afghanistan and indeed the only one with a population in excess of half a million. It stands on, and gets its name from, the River Kabul. While this name has never been defined with any certainty, suggestions it may be related to the Iranian for ‘storehouse’ can be dismissed as the river name is certainly the original. There are similar words from the same language which meaning either ‘red’ or ‘horse’, although just how these relate to the river name is a mystery.

Kendahar was founded in the third century BC as Alexandria Arachosia and named after its founder, Alexander the Great. It shares its name with Kandahar Province of which it is the capital,

Herat is derived from the Hari River, itself Old Iranian for ‘silken water’. This, as with so many rivers in this region, is described as shining or glistening, two adjectives which are invariably regarded as valuable and nothing can be more precious than a good and reliable water supply.

Mazar-i-Sharif has a name meaning ‘the noble shrine’. This refers to the city’s large sanctuary renowned for its resplendent blue tiling also known as the Blue Mosque or Shrine of Hazrat Ali. Some muslims believe it contains the tomb of Ali ibn Abi Talib, cousin and son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad.

Kunduz is derived from the Persian kuhan diz meaning ‘the ancient fortress’, although Turkic konak ‘residence, house’ is not beyond possibility.

Jalalabad, originally known as Adinapur, was renamed as recently as the end of the sixteenth century to honour Jalala, son of Pir Roshan who led the fighting against the Mughals.

Sheberghan is thought to have come from Shaporgan or ‘City of Shapor’. Two Sasanian kings named Shapur were associated with the general area but there is no evidence to link the two.

Lashkar Gah is from the Persian tongue and simply refers to the ‘army barracks’ created by the Saffarids in the ninth century and where soldiers were stationed on the route to the winter home of the Ghaznavid nobles.

Note the spellings of the places are generally English as the piece is written in English.

A Tree of Indo-European Languages

Over the last few weeks I have looked at the origins of the names of cities from many European countries. In doing this I wanted to examine the links between the various languages by comparing the elements which make up these names to English place names.

Last time I looked at Greek places which, for the most part, were derived from mythological figures. Conversely many of the other place names are derived from words which ultimately can be traced to more ancient tongues. Without a doubt the most commonly mentioned early language is Greek. In truth this is probably because more is known about this particular language than any other of comparable age.

I thought this might the ideal time to take a short break from looking at the place names and take a brief glimpse into the Indo-European group of languages and examine the family tree. The following image will show the development best of all. Note the timelines are approximate and only represent the first accepted appearance of a distinct tongue.

It is worthwhile highlighting the languages which have resulted in the majority of English place names. The Celtic languages first emerged and diversified around five thousand years ago, around the same time as the Germanic and Italic groups. The Celtic tongues have produced many of the topographical names, while the Germanic group contains Old English and Old Scandinavian, the two tongues which have contributed more to English place names than any other.

Le pub, El pub, Der pub, O pub, Bu pub, Il pub……

….. or simply Pub (the last is Polish) are all clear references to the English pub. Whilst thinking of how English pub names have a language all their own, it did occur to me there are a number of pub names in England which are not English. Undoubtedly the most common is the Fleur de Lys, most likely an heraldic reference to France and traced to at least the time of Edward III who did declare himself King of France – the name translating as ‘flower of the lily’. Yet there are others, more than I ever thought likely. The following are just a few examples.

Another comparatively common example is the German origin of Bierkeller, easily seen as meaning ‘beer cellar’ and probably not a true pub name in the traditional sense.

The same lack of tradition is probably true of the Bodega which is simply the Spanish for ‘tavern’.

Another Spanish name is the Posada, again it is probably stretching the point to see this as a traditional pub name as it simply means ‘lodging’.

De Hems is from Dutch but does not have any real meaning, other than it being taken from the surname of a former landlord.

Rai d’Or does qualify as a true foreign language pub name for this is the French for ‘ray of gold’.

Tir na nOg is an Irish name, one translating as ‘land of the young’.

Bibendum is from the Latin phrase Nunc est Bibendum meaning 'Now is the time to drink (also celebrate)'.

Having noted some of the unimaginative naming and renaming of pubs in recent years, perhaps the answer lies in using other languages as a source.

Accents and Dialects

An interesting question was put to me this week. The original reference was to the miners from Wales moving to the Midlands in order to find work in the coal fields of Staffordshire. As they would tend to congregate with others of their own culture, how many generations would it take for their Welsh accent to be replaced by the local Black Country tones?

Such is not really my area of expertise but I was reminded of two occasions when the voices did not match what was expected before the speakers opened their mouths. The first was at school when a couple of brothers joined our numbers having recently moved when the family needed to find work. Both brothers were of Indian parentage, each excellent scholars, and spoke with a very broad accent which made them difficult to understand – it was pure Glaswegian. The second instance came much later, when I visited an old friend and his family. They had moved to Leeds from Birmingham and while both parents were clearly Midlanders, their two sons sounded as if they had been raised by Amos Brearley from Emmerdale.

Another involved in the aforementioned conversation had had some experience of this. A young lady who had spent some time in Italy told how it was clearly our children who picked up the accents from their peers and not their parents.

This does show why successive generations speak virtually in a code and language all of their own. For example the baddie was obvious The Wizard of Oz when it was first seen on the big screen, but would today’s generation see the Wicked Witch of the West as the trendiest character in the story?

It did indicate how quickly accents and even use of words can change and shows how old written records, in my case particularly those of place names, can be influenced in the phonetic spelling by something which can never be a gradual change.