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Old English Period

The earliest Old English records date back from about the year 650. most surviving Old English manuscripts , however, are from the tenth and eleven centuries, including the single surviving manuscript of the epic poem Beowulf.

The English of these times is much different from that of today. The extract below is taken from records of English written documents of old times. The first lines of the Lord’s Prayer as written in the southwest of England about the year 1000 says: Faeder ure, thu the eart on heofenum, si thin nama gehalgod…

Middle English Period

Chaucer wrote during the Middle English period and died in the year 1400, the English is much more easily recognizable as the language we speak today. See below the famous opening couplet of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales:

What that Aprille with his shoures sote,

The droghte of Marche hath perced to the rote.

Shakespeare, like Chaucer, wrote in the London dialect of English, so did other writers of his time. It is important to realize that more current editions of Shakespeare do not keep the original spellings. Here is a famous line from Hamlet as found in an edition printed in 1604 (the second Quarto edition: O that this too too sallied flesh would melt…)

Ex.12. Express your point of view on the following statement. Give reasons for your answer.

“Language is the road map of a culture. It tells you where its people come from and where they are going.” (Rita Mae Brown)

Section III

Pre-reading exercises:

Ex.1. Translate and transcribe the following words:

Equal, foreign, success, tongue, technical, scientific, glamour, audience

Ex.2. Practice the pronunciation of the following words.

[o]	[o:]	[ʌ]	[ә:]	[i:]		[iә]
belong	abroad	nothing	word	people		appear
almost	author	touched	world	speaker		hear
origin	talking	other	learn	deal		nearly
borrow	brought	some	third	least
colony	store	among	first	sea
	‘broadcasting	mother	church	tea
	‘audience	tongue		ex’ceed
		become		between
		company		medium
		us
		studying
		con’duct
		country

Ex.3. Read the following word combinations. Mind linking “r” at the juncture.

The answer is, there is, we are all interested, appear and die, are in English, the air and sea

Ex.4. Read and translate the text.