99-687: The word Finn ( pl. Finns ) usually refers to Finnish people , a Finnic ethnic group. Finn or Finns may also refer to: Finnish people No official statistics are kept on ethnicity. However, statistics of the Finnish population according to first language and citizenship are documented and available. Finnish born population resident in Sweden. This figure likely includes all Finnish-born (regardless of ethnic background) and as such might be misleading. Finns or Finnish people ( Finnish : suomalaiset , IPA: [ˈsuo̯mɑlɑi̯set] ) are
198-629: A Baltic Finnic ethnic group native to Finland . Finns are traditionally divided into smaller regional groups that span several countries adjacent to Finland, both those who are native to these countries as well as those who have resettled. Some of these may be classified as separate ethnic groups, rather than subgroups of Finns. These include the Kvens and Forest Finns in Norway , the Tornedalians in Sweden , and
297-613: A definite article ("the"), a demonstrative adjective ("that"), and demonstrative pronoun . Other demonstratives are þēs ("this"), and ġeon ("that over there"). These words inflect for case, gender, and number. Adjectives have both strong and weak sets of endings, weak ones being used when a definite or possessive determiner is also present. Verbs conjugate for three persons : first, second, and third; two numbers: singular, plural; two tenses : present, and past; three moods : indicative , subjunctive , and imperative ; and are strong (exhibiting ablaut) or weak (exhibiting
396-681: A version of the Latin alphabet . Englisċ , from which the word English is derived, means 'pertaining to the Angles '. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes who settled in many parts of Britain in the 5th century. By the 9th century, all speakers of Old English, including those who claimed Saxon or Jutish ancestry, could be referred to as Englisċ . This name probably either derives from Proto-Germanic *anguz , which referred to narrowness, constriction or anxiety, perhaps referring to shallow waters near
495-398: A back vowel ( /ɑ/ , /o/ , /u/ ) at the time of palatalization, as illustrated by the contrast between fisċ /fiʃ/ ('fish') and its plural fiscas /ˈfis.kɑs/ . But due to changes over time, a knowledge of the history of the word in question is needed to predict the pronunciation with certainty (for details, see palatalization ). In word-final position, the pronunciation of sċ
594-406: A dental suffix). Verbs have two infinitive forms: bare and bound; and two participles : present and past. The subjunctive has past and present forms. Finite verbs agree with subjects in person and number. The future tense , passive voice , and other aspects are formed with compounds. Adpositions are mostly before but are often after their object. If the object of an adposition is marked in
693-564: A fellow Balto-Finnic group. Finns and Karelians form a cluster with another Balto-Finnic people, the Veps . They show relative affinity to Northern Russians as well, who are known to be at least partially descended from Finno-Ugric-speakers who inhabited Northwestern Russia before the Slavs. When not compared to these groups, Finns have been found to cluster apart from their neighboring populations, forming outlier clusters. They are shifted away from
792-587: A fine-scale analysis contain more precise clusters that are consistent with traditional dialect areas. When looking at the fixation index (F ST ) values, the distance within Finns from different parts of the same country is exceptional in Europe. The distance between Western and Eastern Finns is higher than the distance between many European groups from different countries, such as the British people and Northern Germans. This
891-517: A following ⟨m⟩ or ⟨n⟩ . Modern editions of Old English manuscripts generally introduce some additional conventions. The modern forms of Latin letters are used, including ⟨g⟩ instead of insular G , ⟨s⟩ instead of insular S and long S , and others which may differ considerably from the insular script, notably ⟨e⟩ , ⟨f⟩ and ⟨r⟩ . Macrons are used to indicate long vowels, where usually no distinction
990-467: A friction that led to the erosion of the complicated inflectional word endings. Simeon Potter notes: No less far-reaching was the influence of Scandinavian upon the inflexional endings of English in hastening that wearing away and leveling of grammatical forms which gradually spread from north to south. It was, after all, a salutary influence. The gain was greater than the loss. There was a gain in directness, in clarity, and in strength. The strength of
1089-695: A higher frequency of the Y-haplogroup N1c (71.6%). While N1c is the most common haplogroup in Western Finland as well (53.8%), the haplogroup I1a is found more often there (30.9%) than it is in Eastern and Northern Finland (19%). This suggests that there is an additional Western component in the Western Finnish gene pool. Despite the differences, the IBS analysis points out that Western and Eastern Finns share overall
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#17328484403081188-406: A large number of words (about one-third) without a known etymology, hinting at the existence of a disappeared Paleo-European language ; these include toponyms such as niemi , 'peninsula'. Because the Finnish language itself reached a written form only in the 16th century, little primary data remains of early Finnish life. For example, the origins of such cultural icons as the sauna , and
1287-479: A largely similar genetic foundation. In the 19th century, the Finnish researcher Matthias Castrén prevailed with the theory that "the original home of Finns" was in west-central Siberia . Until the 1970s, most linguists believed that Finns arrived in Finland as late as the first century AD. However, accumulating archaeological data suggests that the area of contemporary Finland had been inhabited continuously since
1386-506: A low frequency, but seems to be found in significantly higher levels among Finns, Estonians and the Sami people . The older population of European hunter-gatherers that lived across large parts of Europe before the early farmers appeared are outside the genetic variation of modern populations, but most similar to Finns. With regard to the Y-chromosome, the most common haplogroups of the Finns
1485-684: A minor employer (see Economy of Finland ). Christianity spread to Finland from the Medieval times onward and original native traditions of Finnish paganism have become extinct. Finnish paganism combined various layers of Finnic, Norse, Germanic and Baltic paganism. Finnic Jumala was some sort of sky-god and is shared with Estonia. Belief of a thunder-god, Ukko or Perkele , may have Baltic origins. Elements had their own protectors, such as Ahti for waterways and Tapio for forests. Local animistic deities, haltija , which resemble Scandinavian tomte , were also given offerings to, and bear worship
1584-442: A more toponymical approach. Yet another theory postulates that the words Finn and Kven are cognates . The Icelandic Eddas and Norse sagas (11th to 14th centuries), some of the oldest written sources probably originating from the closest proximity, use words like finnr and Finnas inconsistently. However, most of the time they seem to mean northern dwellers with a mobile life style. Current linguistic research supports
1683-504: A northern part of Europe, but the real meaning of these terms is debatable. It has been suggested that this non- Uralic ethnonym is of Germanic language origin and related to such words as Old High German : finthan , lit. 'find, notice'; Old English : fanthian , lit. 'check, try'; and fendo ( Middle High German : vende ) ' pedestrian, wanderer ' . Another etymological interpretation associates this ethnonym with fen in
1782-520: A period of 700 years, from the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain in the 5th century to the late 11th century, some time after the Norman invasion . While indicating that the establishment of dates is an arbitrary process, Albert Baugh dates Old English from 450 to 1150, a period of full inflections, a synthetic language . Perhaps around 85% of Old English words are no longer in use, but those that survived are
1881-468: A way that distinguished it from its neighbors. Finnish material culture became independent of the wider Baltic Finnic culture in the 6th and 7th centuries, and by the turn of the 8th century the culture of metal objects that had prevailed in Finland had developed in its own way. The same era can be considered to be broadly the date of the birth of the independent Finnish language, although its prehistory, like other Baltic Finnic languages, extends far into
1980-506: Is N1c , as it is carried by 58–64 percent of Finnish men. N1c, which is found mainly in a few countries in Europe (Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Russia), is a subgroup of the haplogroup N distributed across northern Eurasia and suggested to have entered Europe from Siberia. The haplogroup N is typical for Uralic-speaking peoples. Other Y-DNA haplogroups among Finns include I1a (25 %), R1a (4.3 %), and R1b (3.5 %). Finns are genetically closest to Karelians ,
2079-569: Is a matter of debate how best to designate the Finnish-speakers of Sweden, all of whom have migrated to Sweden from Finland. Terms used include Sweden Finns and Finnish Swedes , with a distinction almost always made between more recent Finnish immigrants, most of whom have arrived after World War II , and Tornedalians , who have lived along what is now the Swedish-Finnish border since the 15th century. The term "Finn" occasionally also has
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#17328484403082178-417: Is also Meänkieli , a language developed in partial isolation from standard Finnish, spoken by three minorities, Tornedalians, Kvens and Lantalaiset , in the border area of northern Sweden. The Finnish language as well as Meänkieli are recognized as official minority languages in Sweden . The use of mitochondrial "mtDNA" (female lineage) and Y-chromosomal "Y-DNA" (male lineage) DNA-markers in tracing back
2277-513: Is also noticeable in the distances of Finns from other Europeans, as the isolation is even more profound in Eastern Finns than in Western Finns. The division is related to the later settlement of Eastern Finland by a small number of Finns, who then experienced separate founder and bottleneck effects and genetic drift. Eastern Finns also have a higher portion of autosomal Siberian admixture and
2376-548: Is also sparse early Northumbrian evidence of a sixth case: the locative . The evidence comes from Northumbrian Runic texts (e.g., ᚩᚾ ᚱᚩᛞᛁ on rodi "on the Cross"). Adjectives agree with nouns in case, gender, and number, and can be either strong or weak. Pronouns and sometimes participles agree in case, gender, and number. First-person and second- person personal pronouns occasionally distinguish dual-number forms. The definite article sē and its inflections serve as
2475-422: Is as follows. The sounds enclosed in parentheses in the chart above are not considered to be phonemes : The above system is largely similar to that of Modern English , except that [ç, x, ɣ, l̥, n̥, r̥] (and [ʍ] for most speakers ) have generally been lost, while the voiced affricate and fricatives (now also including /ʒ/ ) have become independent phonemes, as has /ŋ/ . The open back rounded vowel [ɒ]
2574-606: Is evidenced by the continued variation between their successors in Middle and Modern English. In fact, what would become the standard forms of Middle English and of Modern English are descended from Mercian rather than West Saxon, while Scots developed from the Northumbrian dialect. It was once claimed that, owing to its position at the heart of the Kingdom of Wessex, the relics of Anglo-Saxon accent, idiom and vocabulary were best preserved in
2673-646: Is followed by Middle English (1150 to 1500), Early Modern English (1500 to 1650) and finally Modern English (after 1650), and in Scotland Early Scots (before 1450), Middle Scots ( c. 1450 to 1700) and Modern Scots (after 1700). Just as Modern English is not monolithic, Old English varied according to place. Despite the diversity of language of the Germanic-speaking migrants who established Old English in England and southeastern Scotland, it
2772-693: Is how the Celtic , Germanic , Slavic , and Baltic languages were formed. The linguistic ancestors of modern Finns did not switch their language due to their isolated location. The main supporters of Wiik's theory are Professor Ago Künnap of the University of Tartu , Professor Kyösti Julku of the University of Oulu and Associate Professor Angela Marcantonio of the University of Rome . Wiik has not presented his theories in peer-reviewed scientific publications. Many scholars in Finno-Ugrian studies have strongly criticized
2871-460: Is not known how, why, and when this occurred. Petri Kallio had suggested that the name Suomi may bear even earlier Indo-European echoes with the original meaning of either "land" or "human", but he has since disproved his hypothesis. The first known mention of Finns is in the Old English poem Widsith which was compiled in the 10th century, though its contents are believed to be older. Among
2970-852: Is possible to reconstruct proto-Old English as a fairly unitary language. For the most part, the differences between the attested regional dialects of Old English developed within England and southeastern Scotland, rather than on the Mainland of Europe. Although from the tenth century Old English writing from all regions tended to conform to a written standard based on Late West Saxon, in speech Old English continued to exhibit much local and regional variation, which remained in Middle English and to some extent Modern English dialects . The four main dialectal forms of Old English were Mercian , Northumbrian , Kentish , and West Saxon . Mercian and Northumbrian are together referred to as Anglian . In terms of geography
3069-434: Is replaced by ⟨þ⟩ ). In contrast with Modern English orthography , Old English spelling was reasonably regular , with a mostly predictable correspondence between letters and phonemes . There were not usually any silent letters —in the word cniht , for example, both the ⟨c⟩ and ⟨h⟩ were pronounced ( /knixt ~ kniçt/ ) unlike the ⟨k⟩ and ⟨gh⟩ in
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3168-413: Is very different from Modern English and Modern Scots, and largely incomprehensible for Modern English or Modern Scots speakers without study. Within Old English grammar nouns, adjectives, pronouns and verbs have many inflectional endings and forms, and word order is much freer. The oldest Old English inscriptions were written using a runic system , but from about the 8th century this was replaced by
3267-488: The heimos have been constructed according to dialect during the rise of nationalism in the 19th century. The historical provinces of Finland can be seen to approximate some of these divisions. The regions of Finland , another remnant of a past governing system, can be seen to reflect a further manifestation of a local identity. Journalist Ilkka Malmberg [ fi ] toured Finland in 1984 and looked into people's traditional and contemporary understanding of
3366-402: The heimos , listing them as follows: Tavastians ( hämäläiset ), Ostrobothnians ( pohjalaiset ), Lapland Finns ( lappilaiset ), Finns proper ( varsinaissuomalaiset ), Savonians ( savolaiset ), Kainuu Finns ( kainuulaiset ), and Finnish Karelians ( karjalaiset ). Today the importance of the tribal ( heimo ) identity generally depends on the region. It is strongest among
3465-517: The Angles , Saxons and Jutes . As the Germanic settlers became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain : Common Brittonic , a Celtic language ; and Latin , brought to Britain by the Roman conquest . Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms : Kentish , Mercian , Northumbrian , and West Saxon . It was West Saxon that formed
3564-508: The Ice age ended. They populated central and northern Europe, while Basque speakers populated western Europe. As agriculture spread from the southeast into Europe, the Indo-European languages spread among the hunter-gatherers. In this process, both the hunter-gatherers speaking Finno-Ugric and those speaking Basque learned how to cultivate land and became Indo-Europeanized. According to Wiik, this
3663-878: The Ingrian Finns in Russia. Finnish , the language spoken by Finns, is closely related to other Balto-Finnic languages , e.g. Estonian and Karelian . The Finnic languages are a subgroup of the larger Uralic family of languages , which also includes Hungarian . These languages are markedly different from most other languages spoken in Europe, which belong to the Indo-European family of languages . Native Finns can also be divided according to dialect into subgroups sometimes called heimo ( lit. ' tribe ' ), although such divisions have become less important due to internal migration. Today, there are approximately 6–7 million ethnic Finns and their descendants worldwide, with
3762-628: The Latin alphabet was introduced and adapted for the writing of Old English , replacing the earlier runic system. Nonetheless, the largest transfer of Latin-based (mainly Old French ) words into English occurred after the Norman Conquest of 1066, and thus in the Middle English rather than the Old English period. Another source of loanwords was Old Norse , which came into contact with Old English via
3861-513: The Uralic languages were first spoken in the area of contemporary Finland is debated. It is thought that Proto-Finnic (the proto-language of the Finnic languages ) was not spoken in modern Finland, because the maximum divergence of the daughter languages occurs in modern-day Estonia. Therefore, Finnish was already a separate language when arriving in Finland. Furthermore, the traditional Finnish lexicon has
3960-644: The Volga , Oka , and Kama rivers in what is now Russia. The genetic basis of future Finns also emerged in this area. There have been at least two noticeable waves of migration to the west by the ancestors of Finns. They began to move upstream of the Dnieper and from there to the upper reaches of the Daugava , from where they eventually moved along the river towards the Baltic Sea in 1250–1000 BC. The second wave of migration brought
4059-597: The dialect of Somerset . For details of the sound differences between the dialects, see Phonological history of Old English § Dialects . The language of the Anglo-Saxon settlers appears not to have been significantly affected by the native British Celtic languages which it largely displaced . The number of Celtic loanwords introduced into the language is very small, although dialect and toponymic terms are more often retained in western language contact zones (Cumbria, Devon, Welsh Marches and Borders and so on) than in
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4158-688: The kantele (an instrument of the zither family) have remained rather obscure. Agriculture supplemented by fishing and hunting has been the traditional livelihood among Finns. Slash-and-burn agriculture was practiced in the forest-covered east by Eastern Finns up to the 19th century. Agriculture, along with the language, distinguishes Finns from the Sámi , who retained the hunter-gatherer lifestyle longer and moved to coastal fishing and reindeer herding . Following industrialization and modernization of Finland, most Finns were urbanized and employed in modern service and manufacturing occupations, with agriculture becoming
4257-594: The kingdom of Northumbria . Other parts of the island continued to use Celtic languages ( Gaelic – and perhaps some Pictish – in most of Scotland, Medieval Cornish all over Cornwall and in adjacent parts of Devon , Cumbric perhaps to the 12th century in parts of Cumbria , and Welsh in Wales and possibly also on the English side of the Anglo-Welsh border ); except in the areas of Scandinavian settlements, where Old Norse
4356-713: The 18th century. When Finland became independent, it was overwhelmingly Lutheran Protestant . A small number of Eastern Orthodox Finns were also included, thus the Finnish government recognized both religions as "national religions". In 2017 70.9% of the population of Finland belonged to the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland , 1.1% to the Finnish Orthodox Church , 1.6% to other religious groups and 26.3% had no religious affiliation . Whereas, in Russian Ingria, there were both Lutheran and Orthodox Finns;
4455-422: The 8th century, the runic system came to be supplanted by a (minuscule) half-uncial script of the Latin alphabet introduced by Irish Christian missionaries. This was replaced by Insular script , a cursive and pointed version of the half-uncial script. This was used until the end of the 12th century when continental Carolingian minuscule (also known as Caroline ) replaced the insular. The Latin alphabet of
4554-406: The English language; some of them, such as Pope Gregory I 's treatise Pastoral Care , appear to have been translated by Alfred himself. In Old English, typical of the development of literature, poetry arose before prose, but Alfred chiefly inspired the growth of prose. A later literary standard, dating from the late 10th century, arose under the influence of Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester , and
4653-910: The Finns and the Sami. While their genome is still mostly European, they also have some additional East Eurasian ancestry (varies from 5 up to 10 –13 % in Finns). This component is most likely Siberian -related, best represented by the north Siberian Nganasans . The specific Siberian-like ancestry is suggested to have arrived in Northern Europe during the early Iron Age , linked to the arrival of Uralic languages . Finns have high steppe or Corded Ware culture -like admixture, and they have less farmer-related and more hunter-gatherer-related admixture than Scandinavians and West and Central Europeans. Finns share more identity-by-descent (IBD) segments with several other Uralic-speaking peoples, including groups like Estonians,
4752-448: The Finns, are also closer to Finns than most European populations. Finns being an outlier population has to do with their gene pool having reduced diversity and differences in admixture, including Asian influence, compared to most Europeans. In general, Europeans can be modelled to have three ancestral components (hunter-gatherer, farmer and steppe), but this model does not work as such for some northeastern European populations, like
4851-598: The Great . From that time on, the West Saxon dialect (then in the form now known as Early West Saxon) became standardised as the language of government, and as the basis for the many works of literature and religious materials produced or translated from Latin in that period. The later literary standard known as Late West Saxon (see History , above), although centred in the same region of the country, appears not to have been directly descended from Alfred's Early West Saxon. For example,
4950-606: The Karelians, Savonians and South Ostrobothnians. The Sweden Finns are either native to Sweden or have emigrated from Finland to Sweden. An estimated 450,000 first- or second-generation immigrants from Finland live in Sweden, of which approximately half speak Finnish . The majority moved from Finland to Sweden following the Second World War, contributing and taking advantage of the rapidly expanding Swedish economy . This emigration peaked in 1970 and has been declining since. There
5049-410: The Northumbrian dialect retained /i(ː)o̯/ , which had merged with /e(ː)o̯/ in West Saxon. For more on dialectal differences, see Phonological history of Old English (dialects) . Some of the principal sound changes occurring in the pre-history and history of Old English were the following: For more details of these processes, see the main article, linked above. For sound changes before and after
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#17328484403085148-857: The Northumbrian region lay north of the Humber River; the Mercian lay north of the Thames and south of the Humber River; West Saxon lay south and southwest of the Thames; and the smallest, Kentish region lay southeast of the Thames, a small corner of England. The Kentish region, settled by the Jutes from Jutland, has the scantest literary remains. The term West Saxon actually is represented by two different dialects: Early West Saxon and Late West Saxon. Hogg has suggested that these two dialects would be more appropriately named Alfredian Saxon and Æthelwoldian Saxon, respectively, so that
5247-462: The Old English period is also often attributed to Norse influence. The influence of Old Norse certainly helped move English from a synthetic language along the continuum to a more analytic word order , and Old Norse most likely made a greater impact on the English language than any other language. The eagerness of Vikings in the Danelaw to communicate with their Anglo-Saxon neighbours produced
5346-478: The Old English period, see Phonological history of English . Nouns decline for five cases : nominative , accusative , genitive , dative , instrumental ; three genders : masculine, feminine, neuter; and two numbers : singular, and plural; and are strong or weak. The instrumental is vestigial and only used with the masculine and neuter singular and often replaced by the dative . Only pronouns and strong adjectives retain separate instrumental forms. There
5445-491: The Sami and the geographically distant Komis and Nganasans, than with their Indo-European-speaking neighbours. This is consistent with the idea that the Uralic peoples share common roots to some degree. Finnish genes being often described as homogeneous does not mean that there is no regional variation within Finns. Finns can be roughly divided into Western and Eastern (or Southwestern and Northeastern) Finnish sub-clusters, which in
5544-515: The Scandinavian rulers and settlers in the Danelaw from the late 9th century, and during the rule of Cnut and other Danish kings in the early 11th century. Many place names in eastern and northern England are of Scandinavian origin. Norse borrowings are relatively rare in Old English literature, being mostly terms relating to government and administration. The literary standard, however,
5643-602: The Viking influence on Old English appears from the fact that the indispensable elements of the language – pronouns , modals , comparatives , pronominal adverbs (like hence and together ), conjunctions and prepositions – show the most marked Danish influence; the best evidence of Scandinavian influence appears in the extensive word borrowings because, as Jespersen indicates, no texts exist in either Scandinavia or Northern England from this time to give certain evidence of an influence on syntax. The effect of Old Norse on Old English
5742-501: The basic elements of Modern English vocabulary. Old English is a West Germanic language , and developed out of Ingvaeonic (also known as North Sea Germanic) dialects from the 5th century. It came to be spoken over most of the territory of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which became the Kingdom of England . This included most of present-day England, as well as part of what is now southeastern Scotland , which for several centuries belonged to
5841-570: The basis for the literary standard of the later Old English period, although the dominant forms of Middle and Modern English would develop mainly from Mercian, and Scots from Northumbrian. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule and settlement beginning in the 9th century. Old English is one of the West Germanic languages , and its closest relatives are Old Frisian and Old Saxon . Like other old Germanic languages, it
5940-552: The beginnings of the compound tenses of Modern English . Old English verbs include strong verbs , which form the past tense by altering the root vowel, and weak verbs , which use a suffix such as -de . As in Modern English, and peculiar to the Germanic languages, the verbs formed two great classes: weak (regular), and strong (irregular). Like today, Old English had fewer strong verbs, and many of these have over time decayed into weak forms. Then, as now, dental suffixes indicated
6039-488: The borrowing of individual Latin words based on which patterns of sound change they have undergone. Some Latin words had already been borrowed into the Germanic languages before the ancestral Angles and Saxons left continental Europe for Britain. More entered the language when the Anglo-Saxons were converted to Christianity and Latin-speaking priests became influential. It was also through Irish Christian missionaries that
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#17328484403086138-548: The cline that most Europeans belong to towards geographically distant Uralic-speakers like the Udmurts and Mari (while remaining genetically distant from them as well). Their distance from Western Europeans is about the same as their distance from Komis . The Balto-Finnic Estonians are among the genetically closest populations of Finns, but they are less isolated from the European cluster than Finns. Swedes , while being distinct from
6237-499: The cluster ending in the palatal affricate is sometimes written ⟨nċġ⟩ (or ⟨nġċ⟩ ) by modern editors. Between vowels in the middle of a word, the pronunciation can be either a palatalized geminate /ʃː/ , as in fisċere /ˈfiʃ.ʃe.re/ ('fisherman') and wȳsċan , /ˈwyːʃ.ʃɑn 'to wish'), or an unpalatalized consonant sequence /sk/ , as in āscian /ˈɑːs.ki.ɑn/ ('to ask'). The pronunciation /sk/ occurs when ⟨sc⟩ had been followed by
6336-457: The coast, or else it may derive from a related word *angô which could refer to curve or hook shapes including fishing hooks. Concerning the second option, it has been hypothesised that the Angles acquired their name either because they lived on a curved promontory of land shaped like a fishhook , or else because they were fishermen (anglers). Old English was not static, and its usage covered
6435-421: The dative case, an adposition may conceivably be located anywhere in the sentence. Remnants of the Old English case system in Modern English are in the forms of a few pronouns (such as I/me/mine , she/her , who/whom/whose ) and in the possessive ending -'s , which derives from the masculine and neuter genitive ending -es . The modern English plural ending -(e)s derives from the Old English -as , but
6534-694: The debate has calmed, each side retaining their positions. Genotype analyses across the greater European genetic landscape have provided some credibility to the theory of the Last Glacial Maximum refugia . But this does not in any way corroborate or prove that these 'refugia' spoke Uralic/Finnic, as it belies wholly independent variables that are not necessarily coeval (i.e. language spreads and genetic expansions can occur independently, at different times and in different directions). Old English language Old English ( Englisċ or Ænglisc , pronounced [ˈeŋɡliʃ] ), or Anglo-Saxon ,
6633-431: The east. However, various suggestions have been made concerning possible influence that Celtic may have had on developments in English syntax in the post–Old English period, such as the regular progressive construction and analytic word order , as well as the eventual development of the periphrastic auxiliary verb do . These ideas have generally not received widespread support from linguists, particularly as many of
6732-427: The end of the ice age , contrary to the earlier idea that the area had experienced long uninhabited intervals. The hunter-gatherer Sámi were pushed into the more remote northern regions. A hugely controversial theory is so-called refugia . This was proposed in the 1990s by Kalevi Wiik , a professor emeritus of phonetics at the University of Turku . According to this theory, Finno-Ugric speakers spread north as
6831-512: The first written sources possibly designating western Finland as the land of Finns are also two rune stones . One of these is in Söderby, Sweden, with the inscription finlont ( U 582 ), and the other is in Gotland , a Swedish island in the Baltic Sea , with the inscription finlandi ( G 319 M ) dating from the 11th century. As other Western Uralic and Baltic Finnic peoples, Finns originated between
6930-639: The former diphthong /iy/ tended to become monophthongised to /i/ in EWS, but to /y/ in LWS. Due to the centralisation of power and the destruction wrought by Viking invasions, there is relatively little written record of the non-West Saxon dialects after Alfred's unification. Some Mercian texts continued to be written, however, and the influence of Mercian is apparent in some of the translations produced under Alfred's programme, many of which were produced by Mercian scholars. Other dialects certainly continued to be spoken, as
7029-481: The former were identified as Ingrian Finns while the latter were considered Izhorians or Karelians . Finns are traditionally assumed to originate from two different populations speaking different dialects of Proto-Finnic ( kantasuomi ). Thus, a division into Western Finnish and Eastern Finnish is made. Further, there are subgroups, traditionally called heimo , according to dialects and local culture. Although ostensibly based on late Iron Age settlement patterns,
7128-526: The futhorc. A few letter pairs were used as digraphs , representing a single sound. Also used was the Tironian note ⟨⁊⟩ (a character similar to the digit 7) for the conjunction and . A common scribal abbreviation was a thorn with a stroke ⟨ꝥ⟩ , which was used for the pronoun þæt ( that ). Macrons over vowels were originally used not to mark long vowels (as in modern editions), but to indicate stress, or as abbreviations for
7227-562: The history of human populations has been gaining ground in ethnographic studies of Finnish people (e.g. the National Geographic Genographic Project and the Suomi DNA-projekti.) The most common maternal haplogroup among Finns is H , as 41.5% of Finnish women belong to it. One in four carry the haplogroup U5 . It is estimated to be the oldest major mtDNA haplogroup in Europe and is found in the whole of Europe at
7326-466: The hypothesis of an etymological link between the Finnish and the Sami languages and other modern Uralic languages . It also supports the hypothesis of a common etymological origin of the toponyms Sápmi ( Northern Sami for 'Lapland') and Suomi ( Finnish for 'Finland') and the Finnish and Sami names for the Finnish and Sami languages ( suomi and saame ). Current research has disproved older hypotheses about connections with
7425-590: The inscriptions on the Franks Casket ) date to the early 8th century. The Old English Latin alphabet was introduced around the 8th century. With the unification of several of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (outside the Danelaw ) by Alfred the Great in the later 9th century, the language of government and literature became standardised around the West Saxon dialect (Early West Saxon). Alfred advocated education in English alongside Latin, and had many works translated into
7524-478: The language of the upper classes. This is regarded as marking the end of the Old English era, since during the subsequent period the English language was heavily influenced by Anglo-Norman, developing into what is now known as Middle English in England and Early Scots in Scotland. Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or Ingvaeonic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as
7623-449: The latter applied only to "strong" masculine nouns in the nominative and accusative cases; different plural endings were used in other instances. Old English nouns had grammatical gender , while modern English has only natural gender. Pronoun usage could reflect either natural or grammatical gender when those conflicted, as in the case of ƿīf , a neuter noun referring to a female person. In Old English's verbal compound constructions are
7722-520: The main group of ancestors of Finns from the Baltic Sea to the southwest coast of Finland in the 8th century BC. During the 80–100 generations of the migration, Finnish language changed its form, although it retained its Finno-Ugric roots. Material culture also changed during the transition, although the Baltic Finnic culture that formed on the shores of the Baltic Sea constantly retained its roots in
7821-544: The majority of them living in their native Finland and the surrounding countries, namely Sweden , Russia and Norway. An overseas Finnish diaspora has long been established in the countries of the Americas and Oceania, with the population of primarily immigrant background, namely Australia , Canada , New Zealand , Brazil, and the United States . The Finnish term for Finns is suomalaiset ( sing. suomalainen ). It
7920-462: The meaning "a member of a people speaking Finnish or a Finnic language". Historical references to Northern Europe are scarce, and the names given to its peoples and geographic regions are obscure; therefore, the etymologies of the names are questionable. Such names as Fenni , Phinnoi , Finnum , and Skrithfinni / Scridefinnum appear in a few written texts starting from about two millennia ago in association with peoples located in
8019-451: The modern knight ( /naɪt/ ). The following table lists the Old English letters and digraphs together with the phonemes they represent, using the same notation as in the Phonology section above. After /n/ , /j/ was realized as [dʒ] and /ɣ/ was realized as [ɡ] . The spellings ⟨ncg⟩ , ⟨ngc⟩ and even ⟨ncgg⟩ were occasionally used instead of
8118-496: The naive reader would not assume that they are chronologically related. Each of these four dialects was associated with an independent kingdom on the islands. Of these, Northumbria south of the Tyne , and most of Mercia , were overrun by the Vikings during the 9th century. The portion of Mercia that was successfully defended, and all of Kent , were then integrated into Wessex under Alfred
8217-408: The names Häme (Finnish for ' Tavastia ') and Proto-Baltic *žeme / Slavic землꙗ (zemlja) meaning ' land ' . This research also supports the earlier hypothesis that the designation Suomi started out as the designation for Southwest Finland ( Finland Proper , Varsinais-Suomi ) and later for their language and later for the whole area of modern Finland. But it
8316-512: The past tense of the weak verbs, as in work and worked . Old English syntax is similar to that of modern English . Some differences are consequences of the greater level of nominal and verbal inflection, allowing freer word order . Old English was first written in runes , using the futhorc —a rune set derived from the Germanic 24-character elder futhark , extended by five more runes used to represent Anglo-Saxon vowel sounds and sometimes by several more additional characters. From around
8415-478: The past. Just as uncertain are the possible mediators and the timelines for the development of the Uralic majority language of the Finns. On the basis of comparative linguistics, it has been suggested that the separation of the Finnic and the Sami languages took place during the 2nd millennium BC, and that the Proto-Uralic roots of the entire language group date from about the 6th to the 8th millennium BC. When
8514-409: The theorized Brittonicisms do not become widespread until the late Middle English and Early Modern English periods, in addition to the fact that similar forms exist in other modern Germanic languages. Old English contained a certain number of loanwords from Latin , which was the scholarly and diplomatic lingua franca of Western Europe. It is sometimes possible to give approximate dates for
8613-450: The theory. Professor Raimo Anttila, Petri Kallio and brothers Ante and Aslak Aikio have rejected Wiik's theory with strong words, hinting strongly to pseudoscience , and even alt-right political biases among Wiik's supporters. Moreover, some dismissed the entire idea of refugia, due to the existence even today of arctic and subarctic peoples. The most heated debate took place in the Finnish journal Kaltio during autumn 2002. Since then,
8712-564: The time still lacked the letters ⟨j⟩ and ⟨w⟩ , and there was no ⟨v⟩ as distinct from ⟨u⟩ ; moreover native Old English spellings did not use ⟨k⟩ , ⟨q⟩ or ⟨z⟩ . The remaining 20 Latin letters were supplemented by four more: ⟨ æ ⟩ ( æsc , modern ash ) and ⟨ð⟩ ( ðæt , now called eth or edh), which were modified Latin letters, and thorn ⟨þ⟩ and wynn ⟨ƿ⟩ , which are borrowings from
8811-404: The usual ⟨ng⟩ . The addition of ⟨c⟩ to ⟨g⟩ in spellings such as ⟨cynincg⟩ and ⟨cyningc⟩ for ⟨cyning⟩ may have been a means of showing that the word was pronounced with a stop rather than a fricative; spellings with just ⟨nc⟩ such as ⟨cyninc⟩ are also found. To disambiguate,
8910-423: The word was so nearly the same in the two languages that only the endings would put obstacles in the way of mutual understanding. In the mixed population which existed in the Danelaw, these endings must have led to much confusion, tending gradually to become obscured and finally lost. This blending of peoples and languages resulted in "simplifying English grammar". The inventory of Early West Saxon surface phones
9009-500: Was also known. Finnish neopaganism , or suomenusko , attempts to revive these traditions. Christianity was introduced to Finns from both the west and the east. Swedish kings conquered western parts of Finland in the late 13th century, imposing Roman Catholicism . Reformation in Sweden had the important effect that bishop Mikael Agricola , a student of Martin Luther 's, introduced written Finnish, and literacy became common during
9108-443: Was an allophone of short /ɑ/ which occurred in stressed syllables before nasal consonants (/m/ and /n/). It was variously spelled either ⟨a⟩ or ⟨o⟩. The Anglian dialects also had the mid front rounded vowel /ø(ː)/ , spelled ⟨œ⟩, which had emerged from i-umlaut of /o(ː)/ . In West Saxon and Kentish, it had already merged with /e(ː)/ before the first written prose. Other dialects had different systems of diphthongs. For example,
9207-439: Was based on the West Saxon dialect , away from the main area of Scandinavian influence; the impact of Norse may have been greater in the eastern and northern dialects. Certainly in Middle English texts, which are more often based on eastern dialects, a strong Norse influence becomes apparent. Modern English contains many, often everyday, words that were borrowed from Old Norse, and the grammatical simplification that occurred after
9306-481: Was either /ʃ/ or possibly /ʃː/ when the preceding vowel was short. Doubled consonants are geminated ; the geminate fricatives ⟨ff⟩ , ⟨ss⟩ and ⟨ðð⟩ / ⟨þþ⟩ / ⟨ðþ⟩ / ⟨þð⟩ are always voiceless [ff] , [ss] , [θθ] . The corpus of Old English literature is small but still significant, with some 400 surviving manuscripts. The pagan and Christian streams mingle in Old English, one of
9405-603: Was followed by such writers as the prolific Ælfric of Eynsham ("the Grammarian"). This form of the language is known as the " Winchester standard", or more commonly as Late West Saxon. It is considered to represent the "classical" form of Old English. It retained its position of prestige until the time of the Norman Conquest, after which English ceased for a time to be of importance as a literary language. The history of Old English can be subdivided into: The Old English period
9504-562: Was made between long and short vowels in the originals. (In some older editions an acute accent mark was used for consistency with Old Norse conventions.) Additionally, modern editions often distinguish between velar and palatal ⟨c⟩ and ⟨g⟩ by placing dots above the palatals: ⟨ċ⟩ , ⟨ġ⟩ . The letter wynn ⟨ƿ⟩ is usually replaced with ⟨w⟩ , but ⟨æ⟩ , ⟨ð⟩ and ⟨þ⟩ are normally retained (except when ⟨ð⟩
9603-411: Was spoken and Danish law applied. Old English literacy developed after Christianisation in the late 7th century. The oldest surviving work of Old English literature is Cædmon's Hymn , which was composed between 658 and 680 but not written down until the early 8th century. There is a limited corpus of runic inscriptions from the 5th to 7th centuries, but the oldest coherent runic texts (notably
9702-425: Was substantive, pervasive, and of a democratic character. Old Norse and Old English resembled each other closely like cousins, and with some words in common, speakers roughly understood each other; in time the inflections melted away and the analytic pattern emerged. It is most important to recognize that in many words the English and Scandinavian language differed chiefly in their inflectional elements. The body of
9801-546: Was the earliest recorded form of the English language , spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages . It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th century, and the first Old English literary works date from the mid-7th century. After the Norman Conquest of 1066, English was replaced for several centuries by Anglo-Norman (a type of French ) as
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