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This is a list of English words inherited and derived directly from the Old English stage of the language. This list also includes neologisms formed from Old English roots and/or particles in later forms of English, and words borrowed into other languages (e.g. French, Anglo-French, etc.) then borrowed back into English (e.g. bateau, chiffon, gourmet, nordic, etc.).
Generally, words coming from French often retain a higher register than words of Old English origin, and they are considered by some to be more posh, elaborate, sophisticated, or pretentious. However, there are exceptions: weep , groom and stone (from Old English) occupy a slightly higher register than cry , brush and rock (from French).
The meanings that the OED lists for 'mouse-hawk' are short-eared owl, hen harrier and rough-legged buzzard, but 'mouse-hawk' is an alternate name, not the main name. The Middle English word busard was borrowed around 1300, ultimately from Latin būtēo. [1] ryðða: 'mastiff'. The word mastiff was borrowed around 1387, ultimately from Latin. [1]
Archaic and rare words are also omitted. A bigger listing including words very rarely seen in English is at Wiktionary dictionary. Given the number of words which have entered English from Arabic, this list is split alphabetically into sublists, as listed below: List of English words of Arabic origin (A-B) List of English words of Arabic origin ...
The words in brackets are implied in the Old English by noun case and the bold words in brackets are explanations of words that have slightly different meanings in a modern context. What is used by the poet where a word like lo or behold would be expected.
In any case, the fact that modern Greeks can still wholly or partly understand texts written in non-archaic forms of ancient Greek shows the affinity of the modern Greek language to its ancestral predecessor. [39] Ancient Greek is often used in the coinage of modern technical terms in the European languages: see English words of Greek origin.
Lexical archaisms are single archaic words or expressions used regularly in an affair (e.g. religion or law) or freely; literary archaism is the survival of archaic language in a traditional literary text such as a nursery rhyme or the deliberate use of a style characteristic of an earlier age—for example, in his 1960 novel The Sot-Weed ...
Lich is an archaic English word for "corpse"; the gate at the lowest end of the cemetery where the coffin and funerary procession usually entered was commonly referred to as the lich gate. This gate was quite often covered by a small roof where part of the funerary service could be carried out. [3]