Germanic tribes in the British Isles. The Conquest of Britain by Germanic Tribes: The Origin of the English Language. Old English dialects and written records Which Germanic tribes settled in the British Isles
who were the ancient inhabitants of uk and got the best answer
Answer from Tolik Panarin [guru]
Britta.
Answer from knock Knock[guru]
cannibals
Answer from Victor Veselkov[guru]
Brita then Romans
Answer from Oleg Agarkov[guru]
Iberians, then Celts, then together with the Skelts, the Romans, then the Germans, the Britons, the Angles, then the French-Normans were added
Answer from Chelovek[guru]
By 5000 BC. e. Britain finally became an island inhabited by small tribes of hunters and fishermen.
Around 3000 BC e. the first wave of settlers arrived on the island, who grew grain, kept livestock and knew how to make pottery. Perhaps they came from the territory of Spain or even North Africa.
Followed by about 2400 BC. e. other people arrived who spoke Indo-European and knew how to make tools from bronze.
Around 700 BC e. Celts, who were tall, blue-eyed people with blond or red hair, began to arrive on the islands. Perhaps they migrated from central Europe or even from the south of Russia. The Celts knew how to work iron and make them more advanced weapons, which convinced the earlier inhabitants of the island to move westward to Wales, Scotland and Ireland. To cement their success, groups of Celts continued to move to the island in search of permanent residence for the next seven centuries.
Julius Caesar made an unofficial visit to the British Isles in 55 BC. BC, but the Romans captured Britain only a century later, in AD 43. e.
The Romans never took over Scotland, although they tried to do so for a good hundred years. They eventually built a wall along the northern border of the unconquered lands, which later defined the border between England and Scotland. The wall was named after the Emperor Hadrian, during whose reign it was erected.
With the collapse of the great Roman Empire came the end of Roman control over the British. In 409 the last Roman soldier left the island, leaving the "Romanized" Celts to be torn apart by the Scots, Irish and Saxons who periodically raid from Germany.
The wealth of Britain by the fifth century, accumulated over the years of peace and tranquility, haunted the hungry Germanic tribes. At first, they raided the island, and after 430 they returned to Germany less and less, gradually settling into British lands. Illiterate and warlike people were representatives of three Germanic tribes - Angles, Saxons and Jutes. The Angles captured the northern and eastern territories of modern England, the Saxons - the southern territories, and the Jutes - the lands around Kent. However, the Jutes soon completely merged with the Angles and Saxons and ceased to be a separate tribe.
The British Celts were very reluctant to concede lands to England, but under pressure from the better-armed Anglo-Saxons, they retreated into the mountains to the west, which the Saxons called "Wales" (land of outsiders). Some Celts went to Scotland, while others became slaves to the Saxons.
The Anglo-Saxons created several kingdoms, the names of some of which still remain in the names of counties and counties, for example, Essex, Sussex, Wessex. A hundred years later, the king of one of the kingdoms proclaimed himself the ruler of England. King Offa was wealthy and powerful enough to dig a huge moat along the entire length of the border with Wales. However, he did not control the lands of all England and with his death his rule came to an end.
As you know, the Teutons made their pirate raids on the coast of Britain even before the recall of the Romans in 410, but the situation escalated just after the departure of the Roman legions. The inhabitants of the British Isles began to fight with each other, were plundered by the Picts and Scots. Left without support, the British could not hold back attacks from literally all sides with their own forces for a long time. In the 5th century A.D. the growth of the number of Germanic tribes begins. Around the middle of the century, several West German tribes invade the territory of Britain and by the end of the century populate most of it.
According to the surviving chronicle of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the migration of Germanic tribes began in 449 AD. under the leadership of the two kings Hengist and Horsa, who were invited by the British king Vortigern as allies to help in the local war. In gratitude, they were given a number of privileges that put them above the local population. Attracted by easy prey, other Germanic tribes began to migrate to Britain in increasing numbers and from allies turned into invaders. According to the chronicle, the foreigners were "from the three strongest Germanic tribes: Angles, Saxons and Jutes."
The Jutes were the first to invade, settling in the southeast, Kent and the Isle of Wight. The second wave was mostly composed of Saxons, who were located west of the Jutes. With the last wave, they settled along the entire south bank and on both sides of the Thames. According to their locations, they were named South Saxons, West Saxons and East Saxons (also known as Central). They formed several kingdoms, the most powerful of which was Wessex (West Saxons).
The last to come to Britain were the Angles from the lower Elbe valley and southern Denmark. They settled north of the mouth of the Humber River and, annexing weak neighbors, founded several large kingdoms: East Anglia, Mercia and Northumbria. [Rastorgueva, 2003: 58]
The Celts resisted the invasion for a long time and stubbornly, but the Germans, having a numerical superiority, were victorious. The Celts were defeated, partially destroyed and driven back to the western and northwestern mountainous regions of the country: the Cornwall Peninsula, Wales and Cumberland.
Living conditions for the Celts turned out to be so difficult that some of them were forced to move from Britain to the Armorica Peninsula (in France), which has since been called Brittany.
The migration of Germanic tribes to the British Isles was a decisive event in linguistic history in English... Geographic separation, mixing and unification of people of different ethnic groups have become important factors in linguistic differentiation and the formation of languages. Separated from their sister Old Germanic languages, the closely related group of West Germanic dialects developed into a separate Germanic language, English. That is why the population of the British Isles by Germanic tribes can be considered the beginning of an independent history of the English language.
By the end of the 6th century, seven tribal kingdoms were formed on the territory occupied by the Germanic tribes. This period lasted for about 200 years and was called heptarchy, or seven-power.
In the north, between the mouth of the Humber River and the Firth of Forth, the kingdoms were formed - Deira (the territory of modern Yorkshire) and Bernizia (between the Tees River and Forth Bay). Later, these two states merged and formed one, known as Northumbria. In the central part of England, the state of Mercia was formed, which in the north was inhabited mainly by the Angles, and in the south by the Saxons. Over time, the population of this state mixes and forms a new ethnic group called the Mercians, and the dialect they spoke is called Mercian. South of the Thames, three Saxon states are formed: in the east - Essex, in the southeast of Kent - Sussex, west of Sussex - Wessex, which was destined to play an important role in the history of England. On the Kent Peninsula, the state of Kent was formed, inhabited by Utes. [Arakin, 2003: 29]
The period of existence of the seven-power is characterized by the decomposition of the tribal system and the transition to feudalism. During the period of resettlement, the Germanic tribes still retained a typical clan structure until the formation of the Anglo-Saxon states. But the growth of land ownership and the development of classes led to the disintegration of the tribal organization and the transition to a new structure of society. The previous division into tribes was replaced by division into territorial units, the inhabitants of which, although they were not somehow connected economically, nevertheless, considered themselves to be an integral part of a whole. From which we conclude that in the period from the 7th to the 10th century, a new community of people was formed, which can be called a nationality. A characteristic feature of the nationality is the absence of an internal single market, since the economy is still of a natural nature, and each region is weakly economically connected with any other. In the same period, the language of the English people was formed - English.
The relative authority between the kingdoms changed periodically. At different times, four kingdoms acquired seniority (superiority) in the country: Kent, Northumbria and Mercia - in the early Old English, preliterate period, and Wessex - the entire period of writing in the Old English period.
Kent's dominance in the south of the Humber River lasted until the early 7th century. In the VII - VIII centuries. there comes the temporary rise of Northumbria and the rule of Mercia, a large and prosperous kingdom in the wealthy Central Plains. Even during the reign of Mercia, Wessex gained control of Sussex and Kent and its influence continued to grow. The conquest of Mercia by Wessex at the beginning of the 9th century changed the position of these two states: Wessex took over the leadership and gained unrivaled leadership until the end of the Old English period (11th century). He had vast fertile lands in the Thames Valley. Control of London and the Lower Thames, as well as expanding contacts with Frankish empire contribute to the establishment of Wessex as a leading kingdom. In addition to the internal factors that contributed to the unification of England under the leadership of Wessex, a new, no less significant, appeared - the impact from the side of a common enemy. [Rastorgueva, 2003: 59]
The history of the English language began with the conquest of Britain by Germanic tribes in the 5th century AD. At that time, the British Isles were inhabited by the Celts, who once arrived in three stages from the European continent. Economically and socially, the Celts were a tribal society that consisted of tribes, clans and their leaders. The Celts were engaged in primitive agriculture. Initially, the territory of the British Isles was inhabited by the Celtic Gaelic tribes and the British. The Celtic languages used by the inhabitants were not Germanic, although they were Indo-European.
The official beginning of the conquest of Britain by the Germanic tribes is considered to be 449, when the Germanic tribes arrived on the islands under the leadership of the kings Hengst and Horst, although the Teutonic raids on the islands began long before that.
The Celts put up fierce resistance to the conquerors, and the Anglo-Saxons managed to consolidate their positions in England only by the end of the 6th century. By about AD 700, the Anglo-Saxons had conquered most of England (excluding Cornwall and the Northwest area) and much of southern Scotland, but they were unable to conquer Wales. The conquerors represented more than one Germanic tribe; Bada the Venerable noted in 730 that there were Angles, Saxons and Jutes among them.
Although the conquerors of Britain belonged to different Germanic tribes, they were closely related by language and culture and saw themselves as one people. Therefore, the word “Engle” (the Angles) began to be used in relation to all representatives of the Germanic tribes who settled in Britain, and the corresponding adjective “Enӡlisc” began to be used in relation to their language. Cut off from the continental German language, West Germanic dialects spoken by the conquerors of England gave rise to a new Germanic language - English.
Although the common origin of the dialects spoken by the Germanic conquerors, and their joint development in Britain led to their development into a single language, early in its development, English was represented by a number of disparate dialects, which were spoken in separate kingdoms. Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians - Germanic conquerors. They formed 7 Germanic principalities: Northumbria, Mercia - Angles; East Anglia; Essex, Wessex, Sussex - Saxons; Kent are jutes.
The Old English period was characterized by constant conflicts and wars for power. Different kings managed to periodically establish sovereignty over other kingdoms, but their power was temporary. In the 7th century, Northumbria was powerful, and it became the center of education. In the 8th century, Wessex gained the leading position, and it was the kings of Wessex who eventually united the country. At the end of the 9th century, King Alfred saved the south and west of England from the Scandinavians, and in the 10th century, Alfred's descendants conquered the north and south of England. The unification of England by the Wessex kings led to the recognition of the Wessex dialect as the literary standard of their era. The surviving Old English texts are written in four main dialects: Wessex, Kent, Mercian, and Northumbrian.
Each of these dialects is represented by a number of written records.
Northumbrian dialect(The Northumbrian dialect): runic inscriptions on a cross found near the village of Ruthwell and on a whalebone box, translations of the Gospel, the monk Kadmon's hymn and Beda's Death Song.
Mercian(The Mercian dialect): Psalter translations (9th century) and church hymns.
Wessex dialect (The West-Saxon dialect): "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle", works of King Alfred (849-900), original and translations from Latin, sermons of Abbot Elfric (10th century) and sermons of Wulfstan (early 11th century).
Kentish(The Kentish dialect): translations of psalms (50 to 70) and old charters.
Old English poetic monuments such as Beowulf, Genesis, Exodus, Judith, and the works of the monk Künevulf are difficult to attribute to one specific dialect, since along with the Wessex forms they also contain a number of English forms. Ilyish believes that these works were originally written in the English dialect, and later rewritten by Wessex scribes.
The predominance of written records in the Wessex dialect, both quantitatively and qualitatively, confirms the dominance of this dialect over all others, which allows us to consider it a conditionally literary language of its era.
The British ethnos has absorbed many features of the peoples who migrated from the European continent to the British Isles. However, scientists are still debating who is the main ancestor of the current inhabitants of the United Kingdom.
Settlement of the British Isles
For many years, a group of scientists led by Professor Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum of London has studied the settlement of the British Isles. Finally, the research results were released. Scientists have brought together archaeological data over the past centuries, thanks to which the chronology of the settlement of the islands has been built most completely.
According to the published data, people made at least 8 attempts to settle in the territory of what is now Great Britain, and only the last of them was successful. For the first time, man came to the islands about 700 thousand years ago, which is also confirmed by DNA analysis. However, after several hundred millennia, due to the cold snap, people left these places. It was not difficult to carry out the exodus, since the islands were connected to the continent at that time by a land isthmus, which sank under water about 6500 BC. e.
12 thousand years ago, the last conquest of Britain took place, after which people did not leave it. Subsequently, all new waves of continental migrants ended up in the British Isles, creating a motley picture of global migration. However, this picture is still not clear. “The pre-Celtic substrate remains to this day an elusive substance that no one has seen, but at the same time few would dispute its existence,” writes British scientist John Morris Jones.
From Celts to Normans
The Celts are perhaps the most ancient people whose influence can be seen in Britain today. Presumably fleeing from Roman rule, the Celts began to actively populate the British Isles from 500 to 100 BC. e. The Celts who migrated from the French province of Brittany, being skilled shipbuilders, most likely instilled in the islands the skills of sailing.
From the middle of the 1st century A.D. e. the systematic expansion of Britain by Rome began. However, mainly the southern, eastern and partly central regions of the island have undergone romanization. West and north, having put up fierce resistance, the Romans never submitted.
Nevertheless, Rome had a noticeable influence on the culture and organization of life in the British Isles. The historian Tacitus describes the Romanization process carried out by the Roman governor in Britain Agricola: “He privately and at the same time provided support from public funds, praising the diligent and decrying the baggy ones, persistently encouraged the British to build temples, forums and houses.”
Exactly at roman time cities first appeared in Britain. The colonists also introduced the islanders to Roman law and the art of war. However, in Roman politics there was more coercion than voluntary impulses.
In the 5th century, the Anglo-Saxon conquest of Britain began. Warlike tribes from the banks of the Elbe quickly conquered almost the entire territory of the present Kingdom. But along with the belligerence, the Anglo-Saxon peoples, who had adopted Christianity by that time, brought a new religion to the islands and laid the foundations of statehood.
However, the Norman conquest of the second half of the 11th century radically influenced the political and state structure of Britain. A strong royal power appeared in the country, the foundations of continental feudalism were transferred here, but most importantly, political orientations changed: from Scandinavia to central Europe.
Commonwealth of four peoples
The nations that make up the backbone of modern Britain - the British, Scots, Irish and Welsh - have evolved in the last millennium, largely facilitated by the historical division of the state into four provinces. The unification of the four distinctive ethnic groups into a single nation of the British was made possible for a number of reasons.
During the period of great geographical discoveries (XIV-XV centuries), the reliance on the national economy was a powerful uniting factor for the population of the British Isles. She largely helped to overcome the fragmentation of the state, which, for example, was in the lands of modern Germany.
Britain, in contrast to European countries, due to its geographic, economic and political isolation, found itself in a situation that contributed to the consolidation of society.
Religion and the associated formation of a universal English language for all British became an important factor for the unity of the inhabitants of the British Isles.
Another feature manifested itself during the period of British colonialism - this is the emphasized opposition of the population of the metropolis and the indigenous peoples: "We are - and they are."
Until the end of World War II, after which Britain as a colonial power ceased to exist, separatism in the Kingdom was not so pronounced. Everything changed when a stream of migrants poured into the British Isles from the former colonial possessions - Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, residents of the African continent and the Caribbean. It was at this time that the growth of national identity in the countries of the United Kingdom intensified. It culminated in September 2014, when an independence referendum was held for the first time in Scotland.
The trend towards national isolation is also confirmed by the latest opinion polls, in which only a third of the population of Foggy Albion called themselves British.
British genetic code
Recent genetic research may provide new insights into both British ancestry and the uniqueness of the Kingdom's four major nations. Biologists from London University College examined a segment of the Y-chromosome taken from ancient burials and concluded that more than 50% of the British genes contain chromosomes found in northern Germany and Denmark.
According to other genetic examinations, approximately 75% of the ancestors of modern Britons arrived on the islands more than 6 thousand years ago. Thus, according to Brian Sykes, a DNA genealogist from Oxford, in many respects, modern Celts of genealogy are associated not with the tribes of central Europe, but with more ancient settlers from the territory of Iberia who came to Britain at the beginning of the Neolithic.
Other data from genetic studies carried out in Foggy Albion literally shocked its inhabitants. The results show that the British, Welsh, Scots and Irish are largely identical in their genotype, which deals a serious blow to the pride of those who pride themselves on their national identity.
So the medical geneticist Stephen Oppenheimer puts forward a very bold hypothesis, considering that the common ancestors of the British arrived from Spain about 16 thousand years ago and initially spoke a language close to Basque. The genes of the later "occupiers" - the Celts, Vikings, Romans, Anglo-Saxons and Normans, according to the researcher, were adopted only to a small extent.
The results of Oppenheimer's research are as follows: the genotype of the Irish has only 12% uniqueness, the Welsh - 20%, and the Scots and British - 30%. The geneticist supports his theory with the works of the German archaeologist Heinrich Hoerke, who wrote that the Anglo-Saxon expansion added about 250 thousand people to the two million population of the British Isles, and the Norman conquest was even less - 10 thousand. So for all the difference in habits, customs and culture, the people of the United Kingdom have much more in common than meets the eye.
The British Isles were inhabited by humans long before the invasion of Germanic tribes into Britain in the 5th century AD. e. The first population of the British Isles was a non-Indo-European tribe of the Iberians, which in terms of material culture belongs to the Neolithic (Late Stone Age - about 3 millennium BC). The next settlers were the Celts - Indo-European tribes who settled in Britain in the 8-7th century. BC e.
The first to appear on the island of Britain were the Gaels, one of the many Celtic tribes that inhabited the vast expanses of central and western Europe. About 5 c. BC e. The island of Britain experienced another invasion of the Celtic tribes - the Britons, who stood above the Gaels in their culture. They pushed the Gaels back to the north and settled in the southern part of the island. In the 2nd century. BC e. on the island of Britain, the Celtic tribes of the Belgae appeared, which settled among the Britons.
The Celts had a tribal system, the basis of which was the clan, but the transition to royal power was already planned. With the spread of land ownership in Celtic society, there was a division into classes of landowners, free farmers and half-slaves.
By this time, the Celts were at a fairly high level of culture - they already knew how to cultivate the land with a hoe and a plow. The Celts built the first cities in Britain, which were essentially fenced-in villages. The Celts of this period did not have writing.
Celtic languages are divided into two main groups - Gallo-Breton and Gaelic. The Gaulish language was spoken by the population of Gaul - (the territory of modern France); British languages are subdivided into a) Breton (BretonorArmorican), which has survived to our time in Brittany (northern France); b) Cornish, now extinct - the language of the population of Cornwall, which was spoken until the end of the 18th century; c) Welsh (KymricorWelsh), which is spoken by the people of Wales. The Gaelic group includes a) the language of the Highlands (Scotch-Gaelicofthe Highlands), b) Irish (Erse) and c) the Manx language (theManxlanguage), which was spoken on the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea (died out in the 20th century).
Roman conquest. In the 1st century. BC Celtic Britain is invaded by the Roman legions. In 55, Julius Caesar, who by this time had conquered Gaul, undertook a campaign against the British Isles, landing in southern Britain. This first campaign was unsuccessful. The next - 54 BC. e. - Caesar landed a second time in Britain, defeated the Britons and reached the River Thames, but this time the Romans stayed in Britain only briefly. The lasting conquest of Britain began in AD 43. e. under the Emperor Claudius, under which the entire southern and central part of the island passed into the hands of the Romans.
The Romans colonized the country and created many military camps in it, from which later English cities developed. These are all those cities that contain in their name an element derived from the Latin castra "military camp, fortification": Lancaster, Manchester, Chester, Rochester, Leicester. Among the largest shopping centers were the cities of London (Londinium), York (Eburacum), Colchester (Camulodunum). The cities were inhabited by Roman legionaries and simple people of both Roman and Celtic origin. Urban population it was apparently largely romanized, mainly its apical layers. The Celtic nobility, along with the Roman patricians, also became the owner of large land holdings, gradually assimilated Roman customs and customs, losing their national features, which cannot be said about the rural population. History has not recorded any serious clashes between the local population and the Romans. The most serious known attempt at resistance by the Celts was the rebellion launched by Queen Boadicia in 60 AD. e., which was suppressed by the Romans.
In the 1980s, under Emperor Domitian, the Romans reached the rivers Glotta (now Clyde) and Bodotria (now the Fort). Thus, part of Scotland, including the areas of the modern cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow, was included in the territory under their control. Britain became a Roman province in this era. This colonization had a profound impact on Britain. Roman civilization - paved military roads (stratavia) and powerful walls (vallum> weall) of military camps - completely transformed the face of the country. To protect the borders of their possessions from the warlike northern neighbors, the Romans built defensive structures - the Hadrian or Roman, a rampart that stretched south of the highlands of Scotland, and at a distance of more than a hundred kilometers north of the Hadrian's rampart, Antony's rampart was built.
The Latin language supplanted the Celtic dialects in the cities and, probably, gained some distribution outside them. In any case, it was the language of government and the army, and thus, the language of communication for a very significant upper stratum of society. In the 4th century, with the introduction of Christianity in the Roman Empire, it also spread among the Britons. However, the Christian communities were apparently small.
The Romans ruled Britain for nearly four centuries, until the early 5th century. In 410, under the emperor Constantine, the Roman legions were withdrawn from Britain to protect Rome from the advancing Germans (this year Rome was taken by the Goths, led by King Alaric). In addition to the endless attacks of barbarian tribes, including the Teutons, the empire was also threatened by the emergence of independent kingdoms in the former Roman territories. Thus, the penetration of the Franks into Gaul finally cut off Britain from the Roman Empire.
After the departure of the Romans, the Britons were left to their own forces. The richest and most economically developed part of the island - the southeast - was devastated, many cities were destroyed. From the north, the Britons were threatened by the Pictish and cattle tribes, and the southern part was attacked by the Germanic tribes living on the continent.
It should be noted that since the Romans left Britain some time before the invasion of the West German tribes, there could be no direct contact between them in the territory of Britain. It follows that elements of Roman culture and language were taken over by the invaders from the Romanized Celts. However, it should not be forgotten that the Germanic tribes had already come into contact with the Romans and the Romanized population of the continental provinces before their invasion of Britain. They met the Romans in battles, ended up in Rome as prisoners of war and slaves, they were recruited into the Roman army, and finally they traded with the Romans or Romanized Celtic merchants. Thus, by means of different ways Germanic tribes got acquainted with the Roman civilization and the Latin language.
