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Why English is NOT a Romance Language
Posted by: Megan Onions, Sales Coordinator
Why English is NOT a Romance Language
England is surrounded by countries which speak Romance languages. France, Spain, Portugal, Italy all speak languages with roots deeply entrenched in the Latin of the days of the Roman occupation. Even the path of an entire network of Roman cobblestoned roads still runs across the entire country which was occupied by the Romans for four hundred years. So the question is: How come England was not influenced by Latin, but adopted a Germanic language instead? Especially considering that the Welsh still speak Brythonic and kept their native language despite continuous invasions from the North and the East!
The Roman Empire collapsed in Western Europe in the early 5th century. Bands of Germanic tribes crossed the frozen Rhine River in Gaul (France) took over the provinces of Rome and in their attempt to resist the invasion, left Britannia (which corresponds more or less to what is today England and Wales) with no defence. The Romano-Britons had to fend for themselves. Thus Britain was attacked by the Jutes, the Angles and the Saxons.
The Germanic invaders imposed their language – a Germanic dialect which later became known as Old English. The original inhabitants of England were pushed to the South west of the Island, to Wales, or migrated to the French province of Brittany. The Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms were later merged into one England. The English language was thus brought to the rest of the British Isles, namely, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.
Thus, because the foundation of the English language is not Latin, but comes from the Anglo-Frisian sub-group of the West Germanic branch of the Germanic family, and owing to the isolation of the British Isles, the language was allowed to develop freely.
See you next week for more updates on the History of English!
Discussion
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January 10, 2012
Hello. I would like to light one point that seems to lack in your analisis and might be the reason why some people seemed to find “surprising” that English is not a romance language.
It is the simple fact that English-speaking areas are not at all “surrounded” by romance-speaking ones as you said. Britain is part of Northern Europe and does just not belong to latin Europe (Romance speaking Europe), which consist in countries situated in south-western Europe. The extreme south of England might be situated a few miles of the extreme north of France, that should not make us forget that this is the exception more than the rule (especially since this part of France is only recently integrated in the Romance-speaking country of France, and has been culturally Flemish for centuries before beign “frenchified”). Most of France is quite far (at European scale) to the core of Britain – And I’m not even speaking of Italy or Spain. The same way works for Germany and Italy: the two countries are separated in their extremities by a few miles only; that doesn’t help that they are part of two different geographical areas of Europe – Separated by the Alps.
Looking at a map, Britain is situated far north in Europe, far from the mediterranean area (core of latin cultures). Lying at the latitudes of northern Germany, Denmark and southern Sweden… Its closest neighbours, on the other side of the north sea are far to be Romance-speaking, but show instead cultures very similar to the English one: Flanders, Netherlands, Northern Germany, Denmark and Norway. Britain is not “out of context” in the part of Europe in which it belongs geographically and culturally. English culture is, and has always been, a north sea culture, as well as Dutch, Norse or North German cultures.
The far Northern localisation of Britain explain in itself why it has not been heavily settled by Roman culture. Too Far from the “heart” of the Emplire, separated by the sea on its island is enough for the Roman culture did not took roots in this part of Europe.
There are actually other Germanic-speaking areas that were once part of the Roman empire, but, for the same reason of being too far in the limits of the empire to have been able to become culturally Romance: Western Germany, Southern Netherlands, Autria, etc… England is not an exception.
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About the Author
Megan has studied French and German since she was 11 years old and graduated with a First Class Honours degree in Translation in 2011. After school exchanges and two stints as an au pair in Austria, Megan turned her attention to translation, completing several internships with translation companies, doing volunteer translations for a not-for-profit organisation in the healthcare sector and working as a freelance translator during her final year. During her undergraduate studies, Megan carried out a 5-month internship as a translator at the Headquarters of Volkswagen AG in Germany and completed a semester of study at Geneva’s prestigious Ecole de traduction et d’interprétation (ETI), gaining First Class marks. She hopes to continue this success as she completes a Master’s degree in Translation alongside her position at Veritas.