TIMELINE OF ENGLISH LITERATURE - Old English Literature (upto 1300)
History of Old English Literature Birth of English: Stage 1. Tribal Germanic peoples from northwest Germany ( Saxons and Angles ) and Jutland (Jutes) invaded Eastern England around the fifth century AD and the language spoken by them became the origin of English. Stage 2. Their Old English or Anglo - Saxon language survived and evolved until the Normans conquered the island in 1066. The Norman conquest of England in 1066 greatly influenced the evolution of the language. For about 300 years after this, the Normans used Anglo-Norman , which was close to Old French , as the language of the court, law and administration. Stage 3. By the latter part of the fourteenth century, English had replaced French as the language of law and government. However, there remained considerable Anglo-Norman borrowings integrated into the language.