10.1.4 Grammar: phonology, morphology, syntax

The inventory of classical Old English (i.e. Late West Saxon) surface phones, as usually reconstructed, is as follows. (see app. 3)

Unlike modern English, Old English is a language rich with morphological diversity and is spelled essentially as it is pronounced. It maintains several distinct cases: the nominative, accusative, genitive, dative and (vestigially) instrumental, remnants of which survive only in a few pronouns in modern English. [23]

The syntax word order of Old English is widely believed to be subject-verb-object (SVO) as in modern English and most Germanic languages (not including German and Dutch). The word order of Old English, however, was not overly important due to the aforementioned morphology of the language. So long as declension was correct, it didn't matter whether you said "My name is..." as "Mīn nama is..." or "Nama mīn is..." In relation to the rules of construction of questions …

Due to its similarity with Old Norse, it is believed that the word order of Old English changed when asking a question, from SVO to VSO; i.e. swapping the verb and the subject. For example: "You are..." becomes "Are you...?", "Þū bist..." becomes "Bist þū...?" [24]

10.1.5 Orthography

The runic alphabet used to write Old English before the introduction of the Latin alphabet. (see app.4)

Old English was at first written in runes (futhorc), but shifted to the Latin alphabet, with some additions, after the Anglo-Saxons' conversion to Christianity. The letter yogh, for example, was adopted from Irish; the letter eth was an alteration of Latin d, and the runic letters thorn and wynn are borrowings from futhorc. Also used was a symbol for the conjunction and, a character similar to the number seven (called a Tironian note), and a symbol for the relative pronoun þæt, a thorn with a crossbar through the ascender (''). Also used occasionally were macrons over vowels, abbreviations for following m’s or n’s. All of the sound descriptions below are given using IPA symbols.

Doubled consonants are geminated; the geminate fricatives ðð/þþ, ff and ss cannot be voiced. [25]

10.1.6 Comparison with other historical forms of English

Old English is often erroneously used to refer to any form of English other than Modern English. The term Old English does not refer to varieties of Early Modern English such as are found in Shakespeare or the King James Bible, nor does it refer to Middle English, the language of Chaucer and his contemporaries. The following timeline helps place the history of the English language in context. The dates used are approximate dates. It is inaccurate to state that everyone stopped speaking Old English in 1099, and woke up on New Year's Day of 1100 speaking Middle English. Language change is gradual, and cannot be as easily demarcated as are historical or political events. (see app. 5)

450–1100 Old English (Anglo-Saxon) – The language of Beowulf.

1100–1500 Middle English – The language of Chaucer.

1500–1650 Early Modern English (or Renaissance English) – The language of Shakespeare.

1650 – present Modern English (or Present-Day English) – The language as spoken today. [26]