More than 200 years passed in the dark between the beginning of the linguistic invasion of Britain by English and our first records of its form. Records of the fifth and early sixth centuries would certainly produce some surprises in detail for philologists (as no doubt would those of Welsh for a like period); yet the evidence seems to me clear that already in the days of Hengest and Horsa, at the moment of its first entry, English was in the 'middle' stage.

On the other hand, British forms of language had entered Britain in an archaic state; indeed, if we place their first arrival some centuries before the beginning of our era, in a mode far more archaic than that of the earliest Latin. The whole of its transformation, therefore, from a language of very ancient mode, an elaborately inflected and recognizable dialect of western Indo-European, to a middle and a modern speech has gone on in this island. It has, and had long ago, become, as it were, acclimatized to and naturalized in Britain; so that it belonged to the land in a way with which English could not compete, and «till belongs to it with a seniority which we cannot overtake. In that sense we may call it an 'old' tongue: old in this island. It had become already virtually 'indigenous' when English first came to disturb its possession.

Changes in a language arc largely conditioned by its own patterns of sound and function. Even after loosening or loss of former contacts, it may continue to change according to trends already in evidence before migration. So 'Celts' in their new situations in Britain, no doubt, continued for some time to change their language along the same lines as their kinsmen on the Continent. But separation from them, even if not complete, would tend to halt some changes already initiated, and to hasten others; while the adoption of Celtic by aliens might set up new and unprecedented movements. Celtic dialects in this island, as compared with their nearest kin overseas, would slowly become British and peculiar. How far and in what ways that was true in the days of the coming of the English we can only guess, in the absence of records from this side and of connected texts of known meaning in any Celtic dialect of the Continent. The pre-Roman languages of Gaul have for all practical purposes disastrously perished. We may, however, compare the Welsh treatment of the numerous Latin words that it adopted with the Gallo-Roman treatment of the same words on their way to French. Or the Gallo-Roman and French treatment of Celtic words and names may be compared with their treatment in Britain. Such comparisons certainly indicate that British was divergent and in some respects conservative.

The Latin reflected by the Welsh loan-words is one that remains far closer to classical Latin than to the spoken Latin of the Continent, especially that of Gaul. For example: in the preservation of с and g as stops before all vowels; of v (u̮) as distinct from medial b (ƀ); or of quantitative distinctions in vowels, so that Latin ă, ĭ are in Welsh treated quite differently from ā, ē. [10] This conservatism of the Latin clement may of course be, at least in part, due to the fact that we are looking at words that were early removed from a Latin context to a British, so that certain features later altered in spoken Latin were fossilized in the British dialects of the West. Since the spoken Latin of southern Britain perished and did not have time to develop into a Romance language, we do not know how it would have continued to develop. The probability is, however, that it would have been very different from that of Gaul.

In a similar way the early English loan-words from French preserve, for instance in ch and ge (as in change), consonantal values of Old French since altered in France. Spoken French also eventually died out in England, and we do not know how it would have developed down to the present day, if it had survived as an independent dialect; though the probability is that it would have shown many of the features revealed in the English loan-words.

In the treatment of Celtic material there was, in any case, wide divergence between Gaul and Britain. For example the Gallo-Roman Rotomagus, on its way to Rouen, is represented in late Old English as Rothem; but in Old Welsh it would have been written *Rotmag, and later *Rodva, *Rhodfa.

English was well set in its own, and in many respects (from a general Germanic point of view) divergent, directions of change at the time of its arrival, and it has changed greatly since. Yet in some points it has remained conservative. It has preserved, for instance, the Germanic consonants þ (now written th) and w. No other Germanic dialect preserves them both, and þ is in fact otherwise preserved only in Icelandic. It may at least be noted that Welsh also makes abundant use of these two sounds. [11] It is a natural question to ask: how did these two languages, the long-settled British and the new-come English, affect one another, if at all; and what at any rate were their relations?

It is necessary to distinguish, as far as that is possible, between languages as such and their speakers. Languages are not hostile one to another. They are, in the contrast of any pair, only similar or dissimilar, alien or akin. In this, actual historical relationship may be and commonly is involved. But it is not inevitably so. Latin and British appear to have been similar to one another, in their phonetic and morphological structure, to a degree unusual between languages sufficiently far separated in history to belong to two different branches of western Indo-European language. Yet Goidelic Celtic must have seemed at least as alien to the British as the language of the Romans.

English and British were far sundered in history and in structure, if less so in the department of phonetics than in morphology. Borrowing words between the two would have presented in many cases small difficulty; but learning the other speech as a language would mean adventuring into an alien country with few familiar paths. As it still does. [12]

Between the speakers of British and English there was naturally hostility (especially on the British side); and when men are hostile the language of their enemies may share their hatred, On the defending side, to the hatred of cruel invaders and robbers was added, no doubt, contempt for barbarians from beyond the pale of Rome, and detestation of heathens unbaptized. The Saxons were a scourge of God, devils allowed to torment the Britons for their sins. Sentiments hardly less hostile were felt by the later baptized English for the heathen Danes. The invective of Wulfstan of York against the new scourge is much like that of Gildas against the Saxons: naturally, since Wulfstan had read Gildas and cites him.

But such sentiments, especially those expressed by preachers primarily concerned with the correction of their own flock, do not govern all the actions of men in such situations. Invasion has as first objectives wealth and land; and those who are successful leaders in such enterprises are eager rather for territory and subjects than for the propagation of their native tongue, whether they are called Julius or Hengest or William. On the other side leaders will seek to hold what they can, and will treat with the invaders for their own advantage. So it was in the days of the Roman invasions; and small mercy did the Romans show to those who called themselves their friends.

Of course in the first turmoils the defenders will not try to learn the language of the barbarian invaders, and if, as the story goes in the case of the English-speaking adventurers, these are in part revolted mercenaries, there will be no need. Neither do successful land-grabbers in the first flush of loot and slaughter bother much about 'the lingo of the natives'. But that situation will not last long. There will come a pause, or pauses – in the history of the spread of English there were many – in which the leaders will look ahead from their small conquests to lands still beyond their grasp, and sideways to their rivals. They will need information; in rare cases they may even display intelligent curiosity. [13] Even as Gildas accuses the surviving British princes of warring with one another rather than with the enemy, so the kings of small English realms at once began to do the same. In such circumstances sentiments of language against language, Roman against barbarian, or Christendom against heathendom will not outweigh the need for communication.