/year

English language

West Germanic language

12 dated entries naming English language, drawn from 12 separate years between 1362 CE and 1888 CE. Nothing here is written by us: each line is the sentence a Wikipedia year article used, and the link beside it opens the exact revision.

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14th century

  • 1362October 13 – The Chancellor of England for the first time opens Parliament with a speech in English. Under Edward III, the Pleading in English Act makes English rather than Law French the official language in English law courts.source

15th century

  • 1417August 12 – King Henry V of England begins using the English language in correspondence back to England from France, where he is leading a campaign, marking the beginning of this king's continuous usage of English in prose, and the beginning of the restoration of English as an official language for the first time since the Norman Conquest, some 350 years earlier.source
  • 1475Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye is the first book to be printed in English, by William Caxton in Bruges (or 1473–74?).source
  • 1484March 26 – William Caxton, the first printer of books in English, prints his translation of Aesop's Fables in London.source
  • 1490June 15 – English printer William Caxton prints his English language translation of the French book, Ars moriendi, which he renders as The art and crafte to knowe well to dye.source

16th century

  • 1557Welsh-born mathematician Robert Recorde publishes The Whetstone of Witte in London, containing the first recorded use of the equals sign, and the first use in English of plus and minus signs.source
  • 1582March – The New Testament of the Douai Bible, the translation into English by Father Gregory Martin from Latin of the New Testament, for use in the Roman Catholic Church, is published. Martin had started his work on October 16, 1578.source

18th century

  • 1733March 25 – English replaces Latin and Law French as the official language of English and Scottish courts following the enforcement of the Proceedings in Courts of Justice Act 1730.source
  • 1737September 1 – The oldest existing English language newspaper in the world, The News Letter, is founded in Belfast, Ireland.source
  • 1753Robert Wood publishes The ruins of Palmyra; otherwise Tedmor in the desart in English and French, making the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra known to the West.source

19th century

  • 1817January 20 – Ram Mohan Roy and David Hare found Hindu College, Calcutta, offering instructions in English on Western subjects, including other European languages.source
  • 1888The Finnish epic Kalevala is published for the first time in the English language, by American linguist John Martin Crawford.source

Named in the same entries