Historical changes in the sphere of the English vocabulary: borrowings from the Latin Language.

Latin words entered the English language at different stages of OE history.

These may be classified into two layers: (1) the oldest layer words taken over either directly from the Romans before the Anglo- Saxons settled in Britain, or from the Celtic inhabitants of Britain, (2) the second layer: words concerning religion and the church, taken over after the introduction of Christianity, which began in 597; these words belong to the 7th century.

First Layer

Here belong, on the one hand, names of objects of material culture, and on the other, names of products which the Anglo-Saxons bought from Roman merchants. The first group is represented by the words: street ‘street’, from Latin strata (via) ‘paved road’; weall ‘wall’ from Latin vallum; cycene ‘kitchen’ from Latin coquina-, myln ‘mill’ from Latin molinum; pipor ‘pepper’ from Latin piper; win 4vine’ from Latin vinum. The Latin substantive castra ‘camp’ made part of a number of names of cities, which were camps in the Roman epoch: Chester, Manchester, Winchester, Worcester, Leicester; Latin colonia has been preserved in the place names Lincoln, Colchester-, Latin portus ‘port’ in Portsmouth, Bridport, Latin strata in Stratford'; Latin fossa ‘moat’ in Fossway, Fosbroke.

Second Layer

The second layer consists of words which directly or indirectly belong to the sphere of religion and church. When Christianity was introduced in England, the Latin language came to be used as language of the church. At this time a certain number of Latin words were taken over into English: biscop ‘bishop’ from Latin episcopus, Greek episkopos-, cleric church man’ from Latin clericus, Greek klerikos-, apostol ‘apostle’ from Latin apostolus, Greek aposto- los; deofol ‘devil’ from Latin diabolus, Greek diabolos-, msesse ‘mass’ from Latin missa, munuc ‘monk’ from Latin monachus, Greek mo- nachos-, magister ‘teacher’ from Latin magister; scrifan ‘prescribe’ from Latin scribere. Some Latin loan-words yielded derivatives: biscophad ‘bishopric’, biscepun5 ‘becoming a bishop’, scrift ‘shrift’.

Under Latin influence some native English words acquired new meanings: thus, the substantive eastron, which originally denoted a heathen spring holiday, acquired the meaning ‘Easter’. Some new terms were created on the pattern of Latin words, e.g. 5ddspell ‘gospel’ (literally ‘good news’), prenes ‘Trinity’.

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