Middle English
The Mid-English era was between the years c. 1100 – c.1500. At this point of the history, the English language was about to be influence by many other languages causing it to become a more sophisticated language and easier to the ear to comprehend, also some historical events which also influence in the English language.
The event that would start the change from Old English to Middle English was the Norman Conquest. According to Luke Mastin (2011) in his website (thehistoryofenlgish.com) he states the following, “The event that began the transition from Old English to Middle English was the Norman Conquest of 1066, when William the Conqueror invaded the island of Britain from his home base in northern France and settled in his new acquisition along with his nobles and court.” Once the Normans took over, Anglo- Norman English took over as a royalty language and the English language became a peasantry lower class language. By the same time the French language started to influence the English language, making the Normans learn words with the following suffixes: “-age”, “-ance/-ence”, “ant/ -ent”, “-ment”, “-ity” and “-tion. The language also acquire prefixes, such as: “con-“, “de-“, “ex-“, “trans-“ and others.
The next event that influence the English language was back in year 1215. According to an article written by Claire Breay and Julian Harrison (2014) they mention that the Magna Carta is the most famous document in the world and its purpose was that for the first time the principle that everybody was subject to the law, even the king. The importance of this event is that the English had constitutional law and this system lead to a new foundation of English Parliament.
The hundred year war is probably one event in the history of the English language that could have affected it in a mayor way. This war lasted for about 117 years and the conflict began back in 1066 in the battle of Hastings, when King Edward refuse to pay homage to Philip IV. The importance the hundred year war has is that the battles fought by the English army against the French were plenty, but sadly the French won the war and castaway the English. If the English would have won this war the language would have taken all over Europe and be completely different.
