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It is the essence of any language that it changes over time to meet the needs of the people. English is a
language that has changed over time.
How has the English language changed over time? New words have been added to the language, and other
words have been dropped from spoken and written usage. The pronunciation of words in English has changed
drastically over the many centuries since it was first spoken and written. Spellings of words were haphazard
for many centuries. Letters have changed. Also, the meanings of some words have changed over time, so a
word may look the same in an old piece of literature but it meant something else back then.
The history of the English language is usually divided into three periods: Old English, Middle English, and
Modern English. The early English alphabet included several “runic” letters in addition to the Roman letters
we use now. Vowel sounds were drastically different than they are today. Therefore, if you were to try to
read aloud a poem such as Beowulf written about a thousand years ago in the Old English language, or a poem
such as Arthour and Merlin written over 500 years ago in the Middle English language, you would find it quite
difficult to say the strange letters and the oddly-spelled words. The words at the end of the lines would not
seem to rhyme as you read aloud because you would be pronouncing them in our Modern English rather than
pronouncing them the way they were pronounced in the past. You might recognize a word, but don’t assume
you understand what the author meant back then when he used that word.
(If you would like to hear Old English poetry read aloud, go to this website and click on one of the poem titles,
then click on a stanza of that poem on the audio page. If you would like to hear Middle English poetry read
aloud, go to this website and click on one of the Canterbury Tales excerpts listed, then click on the excerpt’s
title at the top of the audio page.)
There were no dictionaries in early English times. English authors spelled words however they felt like spelling
them. As English-speaking people traveled and traded around Europe in medieval times and studied scholarly
works in Latin, it became helpful to create hand-written bilingual lists, glossaries, and interlingual
dictionaries. This led to the first printed bilingual glossary in 1480, a French-English vocabulary compiled by
William Caxton for the use of travelers. Soon there were printed bilingual vocabularies for Latin-English, which
were used in English schools by students to study the classics.
As the Middle Ages ended and the Renaissance began, and the English had many colonies far away from
Britain, the educated English people were becoming upset by the variability in spelling in usage for English
words, and they wanted to encourage more people to be able to read, not just speak, English. They also
wanted the English language to be preserved so that it would not change so much over time in the future as it
had changed in the past. Five leading booksellers of London banded together to fund the writing of an English
dictionary by the poet and critic Samuel Johnson. Johnson and six helpers worked for ten years to compile a
printed dictionary of 43,500 English words. His two-volume Dictionary of the English Language was published
in London in 1755, and it became the standard dictionary for everyone to use.
The first American dictionary was compiled by a popular American teacher and lawyer, Noah Webster. An
American Dictionary of the English Language was published in 1828 after twenty years of his research work. It
contained about 70,000 words. The title of the dictionary indicates that Webster’s work on the dictionary
convinced him of the fundamental unity of the language in England and America, despite differences in
spellings and meanings for some words.
A modern unabridged dictionary of American English will list almost every word in the modern English
language, give every standard meaning for each word, and provide a lot of other information about each
word. There are about half a million word entries in a modern unabridged dictionary of the American English
language. It can take a decade of research, the work of hundreds of people, and millions of dollars invested to
produce one new unabridged dictionary edition. But you can buy a printed copy of this powerful language
tool at your local bookstore for a much more affordable price!
language that has changed over time.
How has the English language changed over time? New words have been added to the language, and other
words have been dropped from spoken and written usage. The pronunciation of words in English has changed
drastically over the many centuries since it was first spoken and written. Spellings of words were haphazard
for many centuries. Letters have changed. Also, the meanings of some words have changed over time, so a
word may look the same in an old piece of literature but it meant something else back then.
The history of the English language is usually divided into three periods: Old English, Middle English, and
Modern English. The early English alphabet included several “runic” letters in addition to the Roman letters
we use now. Vowel sounds were drastically different than they are today. Therefore, if you were to try to
read aloud a poem such as Beowulf written about a thousand years ago in the Old English language, or a poem
such as Arthour and Merlin written over 500 years ago in the Middle English language, you would find it quite
difficult to say the strange letters and the oddly-spelled words. The words at the end of the lines would not
seem to rhyme as you read aloud because you would be pronouncing them in our Modern English rather than
pronouncing them the way they were pronounced in the past. You might recognize a word, but don’t assume
you understand what the author meant back then when he used that word.
(If you would like to hear Old English poetry read aloud, go to this website and click on one of the poem titles,
then click on a stanza of that poem on the audio page. If you would like to hear Middle English poetry read
aloud, go to this website and click on one of the Canterbury Tales excerpts listed, then click on the excerpt’s
title at the top of the audio page.)
There were no dictionaries in early English times. English authors spelled words however they felt like spelling
them. As English-speaking people traveled and traded around Europe in medieval times and studied scholarly
works in Latin, it became helpful to create hand-written bilingual lists, glossaries, and interlingual
dictionaries. This led to the first printed bilingual glossary in 1480, a French-English vocabulary compiled by
William Caxton for the use of travelers. Soon there were printed bilingual vocabularies for Latin-English, which
were used in English schools by students to study the classics.
As the Middle Ages ended and the Renaissance began, and the English had many colonies far away from
Britain, the educated English people were becoming upset by the variability in spelling in usage for English
words, and they wanted to encourage more people to be able to read, not just speak, English. They also
wanted the English language to be preserved so that it would not change so much over time in the future as it
had changed in the past. Five leading booksellers of London banded together to fund the writing of an English
dictionary by the poet and critic Samuel Johnson. Johnson and six helpers worked for ten years to compile a
printed dictionary of 43,500 English words. His two-volume Dictionary of the English Language was published
in London in 1755, and it became the standard dictionary for everyone to use.
The first American dictionary was compiled by a popular American teacher and lawyer, Noah Webster. An
American Dictionary of the English Language was published in 1828 after twenty years of his research work. It
contained about 70,000 words. The title of the dictionary indicates that Webster’s work on the dictionary
convinced him of the fundamental unity of the language in England and America, despite differences in
spellings and meanings for some words.
A modern unabridged dictionary of American English will list almost every word in the modern English
language, give every standard meaning for each word, and provide a lot of other information about each
word. There are about half a million word entries in a modern unabridged dictionary of the American English
language. It can take a decade of research, the work of hundreds of people, and millions of dollars invested to
produce one new unabridged dictionary edition. But you can buy a printed copy of this powerful language
tool at your local bookstore for a much more affordable price!
Brief History of the English Dictionary
References
Read, Allen Walker. "Dictionaries" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.
McDavid, Raven I. "Webster, Noah" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.
"Dictionary of the English Language" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.
Read, Allen Walker. "Dictionaries" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.
McDavid, Raven I. "Webster, Noah" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.
"Dictionary of the English Language" Encyclopaedia Britannica. 15th ed. 1985.