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Middle English
Sign in to saveAlso known as Middle English (1100–1500), ME, enm
stage of the English language from about the 12th through 15th centuries
Middle English is the form of English spoken and written between roughly the 1200s and 1500s, falling between Old English and the Modern English we use today. It matters because it represents a crucial transitional period in how the English language developed, shaped by the Norman Conquest and other historical changes that transformed English vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation.
AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- chronolect
- Subclass of
- English language
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Followed by
- Early Modern English
- Image
- Geoffrey Chaucer, Tale of Melibee, Ellesmere Chaucer, mssEL 26 C 9, folio 153v.jpg
Show 14 more facts
- writing system
- Latin script
- number of speakers, writers, or signers
- 0
- topic's main category
- Category:Middle English
- linguistic typology
- fusional language
- replaces
- Old English
- replaced by
- Modern English
- native label
- Middle English
- described by source
- The Nuttall Encyclopædia
- Wikimedia language code
- enm
- Wikimedia Incubator URL
- incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/enm
- P10369
- Q364
- P13311
- May
- Commons category
- Middle English
Sources (7)
via Wikidata · CC0
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Encyclopedic overview
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is the forms of the English language that were spoken in England after the Norman Conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century, roughly coinciding with the High and Late Middle Ages. The Middle English dialects displaced the Old English dialects under the influence of Anglo-Norman French and Old Norse, and were in turn replaced in England by Early Modern English.
Middle English had significant regional variety and churn in its vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and orthography. The main dialects were Northern, East Midland, West Midland, and Southern in England, as well as Early Scots and the Irish Fingallian and Yola.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Middle English” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.
Gallery (2)
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