Book contents
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Maps
- Contributors to Volume I
- General Preface
- Abbreviations
- General Editor’s Introduction
- Introduction to Volume I
- Part I The Context of English
- Part II Contact and External Influences
- 6 Early Contact with Celtic
- 7 Latin in the Early History of English
- 8 Scandinavian Influence
- 9 Anglo-Norman, Its Dictionary and the Study of English Vocabulary
- 10 Code-Switching and Language Mixing
- 11 Early Standardisation
- 12 Neoclassical Borrowings: ‘Hard Words’ in English
- 13 Typological Reorientation in the History of English
- Part III The Long View by Levels and Areas
- Appendix: Recommended Reading
- Index
- References
8 - Scandinavian Influence
from Part II - Contact and External Influences
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 October 2025
Book contents
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- The New Cambridge History of the English Language
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Maps
- Contributors to Volume I
- General Preface
- Abbreviations
- General Editor’s Introduction
- Introduction to Volume I
- Part I The Context of English
- Part II Contact and External Influences
- 6 Early Contact with Celtic
- 7 Latin in the Early History of English
- 8 Scandinavian Influence
- 9 Anglo-Norman, Its Dictionary and the Study of English Vocabulary
- 10 Code-Switching and Language Mixing
- 11 Early Standardisation
- 12 Neoclassical Borrowings: ‘Hard Words’ in English
- 13 Typological Reorientation in the History of English
- Part III The Long View by Levels and Areas
- Appendix: Recommended Reading
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter introduces and explores the complex evidence for the Scandinavian influence on English. This influence resulted from the period of intense contact following the settlement of speakers of the early Scandinavian languages (Old Norse) in Viking age Britain, and its effects were extensive and profound, most measurably upon the lexicon. We begin by addressing the considerable difficulty of identifying Scandinavian input at the etymological level. We then highlight the wide range of English sources, medieval and modern, which need to be examined in order to find and analyse lexical material influenced by Norse. We assess the evidence provided by some of these sources for how Norse-derived words were integrated into early English vocabulary, paying attention to dialect distribution and to the semantic and stylistic relationships that these terms established with other members of their semantic fields.
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- The New Cambridge History of the English LanguageContext, Contact and Development, pp. 219 - 246Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
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