Lesson three

EARLY MODERN PERIODS (1500-1750): SOME CHARACTERISTICS; THE

RENAISSANCE ENGLISH; CHANGES IN GRAMMAR

INTRODUCTION

The study of the Modern period of English (i.e. from Chaucer to Samuel Johnson

roughly 1400 -1800) will be incomplete without reference to the time referred to as early

modern periods, which some scholars have conveniently put at the beginning of 1500 to

around 1750. Some placed it earlier at 1400 - 1450, immediately after Chaucer. Those who

put it around 1500 consider the effects of printing revolution, but the coming of printing

which many consider as the key factor of the modern period, began in 1476, when William

Caxton set up a printing press at Westminster. There is no consensus about when the early

modern period actually started. The period, i.e. 1500 -1650 was also called the period of the

Renaissance.

1. Some Characteristics of Early Modern Periods (1500-1750)

Printing technology which was developed in Germany in the 15th century had a significant

impact on the vernacular (native) languages of Europe. In England, it had so far reaching

effect that in about a century later, manuscript books (hand written) were completely replaced

by printed ones. Printing made such a rapid progress that before the end of 1500, printed

books in Europe reached about 35,000. Though majority of these were in Latin, the effects of

printing on modern languages like English was no doubt overwhelming. By 1640 over 20,000

titles appeared in English, ranging from pamphlets to large texts. Books were no longer an

exclusive luxury of the upper class; everyone had access to it now because it was possible to

reproduce a thousand copies or more of one book exactly like the other.

Another important factor for the growth of English, which was also a feature of the early

modern period, was the rapid growth of popular education. In the later 17th and 18th

1
centuries, education became much more accessible, with increase in the number of available

schools and colleges. With this kind of progress in education, the printing press was able to

exert an unforgettable influence on language as well as learning. Not just in the early modern

period alone, it is noticeable that the influence of commerce, transportation and rapid means

of communication has had a great impact on language.

Another important factor was social consciousness. This means people’s general tendency to

identify with certain social or economic groups. Under modern democracies, a man can easily

rise to a higher economic or social class and would likely make some efforts to adopt the

standards of grammar and pronunciation of the people of his new class.

2. The Renaissance Period

Two forces to be identified here are (1) a radical force to produce a change in the

vocabulary of English, and (2) a conservative force which aimed at preserving the existing

status of the English grammar. The printing press, new reading habits and the spread of ideas,

which came with growth in communication all promoted the extension of vocabulary, while

these same factors together with social consciousness as we described above, worked actively

towards the maintenance of standards especially in grammar and usage. While education for

example showed some influence in promoting grammar, spelling and pronunciation, people

were still unconsciously assimilating some features of less Standard English through the

reading of books, newspapers or magazines. In modern times, you will discover that changes

in grammar are less compared to changes in vocabulary. This was not the case during the

earlier English periods. At that time, changes in grammar were extensive. Remember that it

was during the Middle English period that the structure of English, where verb follows the

subject, was stabilized.

2
However, we can say that the general interest in the English of the Renaissance focused on

vocabulary. And let me remind you that the period from the time of Caxton (1476) until

around 1650 was called the Renaissance – a time of great change in Europe.

During the 16th century, following the development of printing there was a flood of new

publications in English as a result of renewed interest in classical languages and literature and

in the rapid growing fields of science, medicine and the arts. As new concepts, techniques and

inventions were being experienced in Europe, words in the languages were either insufficient

or not available at all to express these new ideas, so writers began to borrow new terms. Most

of the words that came into English at this time were taken from Latin, French, Greek, Italian,

Spanish and Portuguese. And as the period of world-wide exploration came underway, words

from over 50 other languages including indigenous languages of North America, Africa and

Asia came into English.

3.

4. Changes in Grammar and Pronunciation

By the time of the Renaissance, major shifts in English grammatical structure had already

taken place. Words had already lost most of their inflections. Few changes in English syntax

could still be noticed. For example several features of the verb use show a marked difference

today.

(i) my life is run his compass (Julius Caesar) where today we should say my life has run its

compass.

(ii) verbs developed wider use of auxiliaries e.g. speak he the truth?(does he speak the truth?

Is he speaking the truth?)What makes you? (What are you making?) It judges me (I judge…)

It benefits me not (It does not benefit me) etc. Me thinks he did (I think he did).

(iii) Sentences tend to be too long, loose and linear, with repeated ‘and’ and ‘then’

coordination, mostly introduced by ‘which’ or ‘that’

3
(iv) There were constructions involving a double negative e.g. I. cannot do no wrong

(v) A number of verbs inflections (speaketh, pleaseth, know’st, spake etc) fell out of standard

use

(vi) Adjectives lost their inflections, though not completely. Expressions like most unkindest

or more longer, were no more in use

(vii) Pronouns like ‘thou’ ‘thee’ ‘thine’ ‘thy’ ‘thyself’ ‘ye’ fell into disuse except in poetry;

‘you’ was substituted for ‘ye’ normative; ‘its’ came into use as the possessive of it.

(viii) The pronoun ‘who’ as a relative pronoun developed in the 16th century.

(ix) The ‘s’ plural became general

(x) Some unchanged plural remained e.g. Sheep, Swine.

(xi) New conjunctions emerged: ‘because’ for example first appeared in Chaucer, but ‘for’

and ‘that’ remained the normal way of expressing cause until the early 17th century. Participle

constructions (use of verbs ending with –ed –en or –ing) became mostly common. This added

to the length of sentences. The search for stability in the language continued until the 18 th

century.

The Renaissance, being a period of great social and economic change also brought

with it some inevitable changes in the English language. Changes in grammar were slight

while changes in vocabulary were more dynamic because of the new waves of scientific

explorations and increase in knowledge. And we can therefore conclude that social changes

have great influence on language, because language functions as a means of express meaning

within specific social contexts.

5. Influences on early modern English

Dictionaries of difficult words; William Shakespeare and the King James Authorised

Version of the Bible were three important influences on the 16th and 17th century English,

4
especially on the development, enrichment and stability of standard vocabulary of the English

language. Shakespeare and The King James Bible especially demonstrated how English was

used during the period and helped to maintain standard in the English vocabulary, grammar

and usage.

The very first attempt to produce a comprehensive list of all the words in the English

language was Nathaniel Bailey’s Universal Etymological English Dictionary published in

1721. The earliest English dictionaries were those that merely explained difficult words. The

first of this was A Table Alphabetical of Hard Words written by Robert Crawdrey, and

published in 1604. It explained some 3,000 terms. This was followed in 1616 by John

Bullkar’s English Expositor, while Henry Cockeram published the English Dictionaries in

1623. Again in 1658, Edward Philips published New World of Words. All these dictionaries

and later compilations only treated difficult words.

A new wave of dictionaries was to be experienced in the first half of the 19th century

in order to keep pace with increases in knowledge and terminologies that were the result of

the industrial revolution and progress in science and medicine. However, Dr. Samuel

Johnson’s dictionary of 1755 was the first to account for the extensive additions that had been

made to the language and helped to enhance their adoption into general use. Dictionaries of

hard words attempted to provide meaning to difficult English words during the early part of

the 17th century. This was necessary because of extensive additions to the English

vocabulary, some of which generated a lot of controversy. The dictionaries also helped to

facilitate the use of the words that had been generally adopted.

William Shakespeare’s contribution to the enrichment of the English vocabulary was a

major feature of the 17th century English. His wide and creative use of words gave the

language a wide stock of words, some of which have become part of modern every day

English.

5
Similarly, the King James Authorised Version of the bible illustrated the Standard English,

and helped to sustain stability since it was every body’s Bible. Many of the Bible idioms for

example have been modernized and added to every day usage. These three influences on the

English language of the 17th century were significant ones.