It’s difficult to imagine that English very almost disappeared in favour of the Old Norse language of the Vikings! In the 8th and 9th centuries, they took over the Saxon kingdoms, with the exception of Wessex. In fact, it only took a few battles for them to completely eliminate the Anglo-Saxons. The “Danish” settled down in the east of England and created a kingdom, the Danelaw (Danalagu: a region where Danish law is enforced), which included all of the territory situated to the north of Watling Street, an ancient trackway which went from London to Chester. Following this, English remained a language of minor importance until the 17th century and several “specialists” even took the risk to predict its early death…and we all know the rest of the story!
These few words which come from Old Norse will remind us of the cold sweats of a language which has today become global and indispensable:
call (< ceallian), fellow (< feolaga: “partner”, “companion”), husband (< hūsbonda: “master of the house”), law (< lagu: “ to pose”, “to establish”), wrong (< wrangr)
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