1. There are many words in Modern English that look pretty the same as in Old English.

• Nouns: cynn 'kin', hand, god, man(n), word.

• Pronouns: hē, ic 'I', mē, self, wē.

• Verbs: beran 'bear', cuman 'come', dyde 'did', sittan 'sit', wæs 'was'.

• Adjectives: fæst 'fast', gōd 'good', hālig 'holy', rīce 'rich', wīd 'wide'.

• Adverbs: alle 'all', nū 'now', tō 'too', ðǣr 'there'.

• Prepositions: æfter 'after', for, in, on, under.

• Articles: ðæt 'that', ðis 'this'.

• Conjunctions: and, gif 'if'.

2. Read the Old English words and give their Modern English equivalents.

3. Compare two variants of Lord’s Prayer in Old Norse and Old English. Do they sound similar? Why?

4. Listen to a piece of Bede’s historia eccesiastica in Old English and try to define the main idea of the story given.

5. Read the paragraphs dedicated to OE language in the textbooks of

1. Iliyish B. The History of English language p. 48-140

2. Rastorguyeva T.A. The History of English Language p. 74-148

3. Arakin V. The History of English Language p. 36-109

and fill in the given chart

PECULIAR CHARACTERISTICS OF THE OE LANGUAGE

OE phonetics
vowels
consonants
stress
OE vocabulary
native OE words
Latin words
Viking words
OE grammar
inflections
nouns
demonstratives
adjectives
adverbs
pronouns
verbs
numerals

Norman conquest

Middle English
1066	1167	1215	1282	1286	1337	1381	1455

ACTIVATING THE STUDENTS’ BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE