When the Normans came, they brought French. They enslaved the old German speakers of Britain, and the language of the people who bathed more often was, for centuries to come, Romance.
The overarching story is good but to respectfully nitpick, in terms of linguistics, Germanic and German don't mean the same thing. At least, only a little more than Java and JavaScript do.
The English were not speaking German prior to 1066 but Old English or Anglo Saxon, a mish-mash of ancient Britannic languages, Latin, Old Norse, and some West Germanic languages.
Also, it wasn't "French" that was brought over to England. At least, not in any codified, official sense of the term that we now accept. The Duchy of Normandy was still separate from the Kingdom of France (although Norman was one of the oïl languages) until the 13th century and Norman, as a language, had more Norse influence than other oïl languages due to prior invasions.
As a Scandinavian I noticed this, and it is what's keeping me from upvoting this article. Simplification is good, simplification that borders on misinformation is not so good.
You're right. I actually said "German" because the word is simpler and it makes for a more sonorous title. But I've also met super-important linguists who in conversation call old Englishes "German" and the Norman language "French".
I've definitely heard of the language of the Normans referred to as French or Norman French, but I have yet to come across anyone calling Anglo-Saxon German.
Cool. I hadn't noticed that but I can imagine it happening for simplicity's sake, especially among people who "know"!
BTW, I definitely wasn't trying to imply you didn't understand the background since you seemed to know what you were talking about but it bristles me to think other people with no linguistic background could be reading "German" and thinking.. ooh, German! Maybe that's just the personality disorder talking though ;-)
Of course languages get influenced from its neigbours. But twisting it into "a mish-mash of ... [a lot of important stuff] and some West Germanic languages" is exactly what proves the point of the story: Languages are tied to races and depending on point of view, are viewed as inferior.
In Europe it has always been problematic for linguists to prove to their own society that their language is a descendant of the arch-enemy's language (therefor "inferior").
E.G. the country of Luxembourg has been pushing legislature within the EU to recognize Luxembourgish as an official language, while linguists consider it part of a greater German dialect family. This illustrates the political implications, that arise out of "esteeming" languages. Luxembourg on the one hand tries to secure it's heritage. On the other Hand: Making it an official language may give a Luxembuorgish "Führer" of a horrible future leverage to claim those lands in Germany where this dialect is spoken too (or even the greater dialect family).
The Netherlands did exactly that after WWII, claiming chunks of northern Germany on behalf of linguistic similarities of the spoken dialect there (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_annexation_of_German_terr...). And speaking of a "Führer" one could understand why it was controversial in the Netherlands to tie the Dutch language to the German language, while "Dutch" stands for what the English heard how the Dutch called themselves: "Deutsch", German.
Also "Old Norse" was a Germanic language too. Northern Germanic: North, Norse, Norsemen, Normans. The English also never spoke German, but they speak a Germanic language. And this is what the Germans do too. Why linguists under imaginable pressure in the past still call it 'Germanic', I don't know but I rather just go with it. And attaching feelings to stuff like that again proves the point of the story.
"Also, it wasn't "French" that was brought over to England." As English is a Germanic language, the similarities do not apply to e.g. the english clause syntax. But for a non-English-native-speaker the impact of french words in English vocabulary is overwhelming as is the way English words are written "frenchy". Just consider this HTML-Tag and attributes <titLE ... vertical-al IGN: middLE; Since in Germany we're taught British English in schools, the CSS-Attribute "colOUR" drove me nuts.
French was the lingua-franca (well, where does this term derive from?) in all of western europe, since it was the modern Latin, the language of rulers, intellectuals and clerics. It does not mean, that those who spoke it in Germany, England or Russia were of french descent. But speaking anything else was indeed seen as being inferior. As it is seen inferior in non-English speaking countries nowadays, if you don't use English words in specialized industries.
The eliteness of french is the root of the conflict that keeps Belgium from forming a government for 4 years now (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flemish_movement#History), as Flemish was seen inferior back in the days.
It's what made Martin Luther successful with reaching the masses, since he un-elited Christianity by making the bible available in German for the first time ever.
It's what made Pushkin THE national poet, since he un-elited literature by writing in Russian for the first time, instead of french. The russian rulers didn't even understood the people they ruled upon!
I wonder if Hitler knew, that the first German words ever written down in his thousand-year old Reich, were written in Hebrew letters, since Yiddish is Germanic and Jews (as anyone not-speaking elitish) were inferior people, but yet capable of writing.
ACtually, lingua franca was NOT French. Also known as _sabir_, it was a pidgin language used by the sailors in the Mediterranean (it went extinct in the XIX century). It was a mix of various romance languages and Arabic and Turkish. At first the main romance language mixed was French, then the influence of Spanish and Italian become more notable. The name was coined by the Turks (for whom people speaking romance languages must have looked similar enough to call them all "Franks").
I agree. What acutally the lingua franca was, changes from time-period to time-period and location. And you're right, what the part "franca" in lingua franca refers to is the Franks, but so does french ;-)
I don't mean that at all times and at any place people spoke French to foreigners. It has been Latin before French, it is English ever since. And the term lingua franca just happened to come into existence while french/frankish was the no 1 language or the "Franks" the no 1 nation in western europe.
Sabir was a pidgin language, but calling it the lingua franca would not satisfy me. Since surely no one sailing from helsinki to stockholm back then, spoke even a dime turkish. Lingua Franca, at least for me, refers to what original language non-native speakers are driven to to speak in. Thus creating pidgin languages.
E.G.: Back then Danes or Swedes did have no intention to use arabic even when meeting an arab trader in some port, since it was easier to try it with some frenche verbes.
The overarching story is good but to respectfully nitpick, in terms of linguistics, Germanic and German don't mean the same thing. At least, only a little more than Java and JavaScript do.
The English were not speaking German prior to 1066 but Old English or Anglo Saxon, a mish-mash of ancient Britannic languages, Latin, Old Norse, and some West Germanic languages.
Also, it wasn't "French" that was brought over to England. At least, not in any codified, official sense of the term that we now accept. The Duchy of Normandy was still separate from the Kingdom of France (although Norman was one of the oïl languages) until the 13th century and Norman, as a language, had more Norse influence than other oïl languages due to prior invasions.