Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that can help answer the question.
Query: What language did the Anglo-Saxons speak?
Old English (Ænglisc, Anglisc, Englisc, pronounced[ˈæŋliʃ]), or Anglo-Saxon,[2] is the earliest historical form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers probably in the mid-5th century, and the first Old English literary works date from the mid-7th century. After the Norman conquest of 1066, English was replaced, for a time, as the language of the upper classes by Anglo-Norman, a relative of French. This is regarded as marking the end of the Old English era, as during this period the English language was heavily influenced by Anglo-Norman, developing into a phase known now as Middle English.
The end of Roman rule in Britain facilitated the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, which historians often regard as the origin of England and of the English people. The Anglo-Saxons, a collection of various Germanic peoples, established several kingdoms that became the primary powers in present-day England and parts of southern Scotland. They introduced the Old English language, which largely displaced the previous British language. The Anglo-Saxons warred with British successor states in Wales, Cornwall, and the "Hen Ogledd" (Old North; the Brythonic-speaking parts of northern England and southern Scotland), as well as with each other. Raids by Vikings became frequent after about AD 800, and the Norsemen settled in large parts of what is now England. During this period, several rulers attempted to unite the various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, an effort that led to the emergence of the Kingdom of England by the 10th century.
During the Anglo-Saxon migration, which began in the fifth century CE, Germanic-speaking tribes from continental northern Europe, such as the Angles, Jutes and Saxons, arrived in Britain, where their own culture—with its accompanying language and pagan religion—became dominant across much of eastern Britain. Those Romano-British peoples still residing in these areas either adopted and integrated with this incoming culture or migrated westward. The Anglo-Saxons brought with them their own heterogenous forms of burial practice, which were distinct from those of the British peoples living in western and northern Britain during the Early Medieval, having more in common with those of pagan continental Europe. However, not all of those given an Anglo-Saxon burial at this time were necessarily migrants or the descendents of migrants from continental Europe. Some may have been ethnically descended from the earlier Romano-British people, but who had adopted Anglo-Saxon culture as it became dominant across southern and eastern Britain. An example of such cohabitation can be seen at Wasperton and Stretton-on-the-Fosse in Warwickshire, where Anglo-Saxon graves were found alongside those that were Romano-British in character.
The name Walton comes from settlement/farmstead of Wealas — native Celts which is what the new Anglo Saxon speaking peoples called the native inhabitants of England.
There is strong evidence that in many areas of England taken over by Germanic speaking settlers, the native British (Wealas) remained undisturbed, farming the same land they did when the Romans left.
Over time they just adopted or forgot their Celtic tongue (similar to Old Welsh/Cornish) for the language and culture of the newcomers in order to climb the social ladder or were coerced to do so.
It was in the Anglo Saxon interest that the native British carry on as usual to ensure the economy produced food and goods for the new landowners.
The word "pagan" is a Latin term that was used by Christians in Anglo-Saxon England to designate non-Christians. In Old English, the vernacular language of Anglo-Saxon England, the equivalent term was "hæðen" ("heathen"), a word that was cognate to the Old Norse "heiðinn", both of which may derive from a Gothic word, "haiþno". Both "pagan" and "heathen" were terms that carried pejorative overtones, with "hæðen" also being used in Late Anglo-Saxon texts to refer to criminals and others deemed to have not behaved according to Christian teachings. The term "paganism" was one used by Christians as a form of othering, and as the archaeologist Neil Price put it, in the Anglo-Saxon context, "paganism" is "largely an empty concept defined by what it is not (Christianity)".
Most of the French vocabulary now appearing in English was imported over the centuries following the Norman Conquest of 1066, when England came under the administration of Norman-speaking peoples. William the Conqueror invaded the British Isles, distributing lands and property to the Normans. As a result, Anglo-Norman French became the language of culture and the administration. The majority of the population of England continued to use their Anglo-Saxon language, but it was influenced by the language of the ruling elite, resulting in doublets. Consider for example the words for the meats eaten by the Anglo-Norman nobility and the corresponding animals raised by the Anglo-Saxon peasants: / , / , / , / , or pairs of words pertaining to different registers of language: / , / , / , / , / , / , / . Words of French origin often refer to more abstract or elaborate notions than their Anglo-Saxon equivalents (e.g. / , / ), and are therefore of less frequent use in everyday language. This may not, however, be the case for all English words of French origin. Consider, for example: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , and . 
Jefferson had a lifelong interest in linguistics, and could speak, read, and write in a number of languages, including French, Greek, Italian, and German. In his early years he excelled in classical language while at boarding school where he received a classical education in Greek and Latin. Jefferson later came to regard the Greek language as the "perfect language" as expressed in its laws and philosophy. While attending the College of William & Mary, he taught himself Italian. Here Jefferson first became familiar with the Anglo-Saxon language, especially as it was associated with English Common law and system of government and studied the language in a linguistic and philosophical capacity. He owned 17 volumes of Anglo-Saxon texts and grammar and later wrote an essay on the Anglo-Saxon language.
The Anglo-Saxons were a cultural group who inhabited Great Britain from the 5th century, and the direct ancestors of the majority of the modern British people. They comprise people from Germanic tribes who migrated to the island from continental Europe, their descendants, and indigenous British groups who adopted many aspects of Anglo-Saxon culture and language; the cultural foundations laid by the Anglo-Saxons are the foundation of the modern English legal system and of many aspects of English society; the modern English language owes over half its words – including the most common words of everyday speech – to the language of the Anglo-Saxons. Historically, the Anglo-Saxon period denotes the period in Britain between about 450 and 1066, after their initial settlement and up until the Norman conquest.[1] The early Anglo-Saxon period includes the creation of an English nation, with many of the aspects that survive today, including regional government of shires and hundreds. During this period, Christianity was established and there was a flowering of literature and language. Charters and law were also established.[2] The term Anglo-Saxon is popularly used for the language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons in England and eastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century. In scholarly use, it is more commonly called Old English.[3]
By the sixth century CE, when the practice of building burial mounds is first adopted by the Anglo-Saxons, it was also being practiced by other Germanic-speaking peoples on continental Europe. In the German region of Thuringia, several important chamber burial barrows have been excavated, including at a cemetery in Trossingen which dates to c. 580 CE, thereby being contemporary with similar Anglo-Saxon sites. More importantly for the development of Anglo-Saxon barrow burials, the practice had been adopted by the Merovingian dynasty Franks, who lived in what is now France, from the mid fifth century CE. It was from these Merovingian Franks that the Anglo-Saxons likely adopted the practice.
The Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain resulted in Anglo-Saxon (or English) displacement and cultural assimilation of the indigenous culture, the Brythonic-speaking British culture, causing the foundation of a new kingdom, England. As in what became England, indigenous Brythonic Celtic culture in some of the south-eastern parts of what became Scotland (approximately the Lothian and Borders region) and areas of what became the Northwest of England (the kingdoms of Rheged, Elmet, etc.) succumbed to Germanic influence c.600—800, due to the extension of overlordship and settlement from the Anglo-Saxon areas to the south. Cultural and linguistic assimilation occurred less frequently between the Germanic Anglo-Saxons and the indigenous people who resided in the Roman dominated areas of England, particularly in the regions that remained previously unconquered. Anglo-Saxons occupied Somerset, the Severn valley, and Lancaster by c. 700 where they remained dominant. Over time, the Anglo-Saxons, with their distinct culture and language, displaced much of the extant Roman influence of old.
On the European continent, the eastern remnant of Francia developed into the Kingdom of Germany, which became the most important part of the Holy Roman Empire proclaimed by Otto I in 962 AD. The Holy Roman Empire included all remaining Germanic-speaking groups from the 10th century. In the Late Medieval to Early Modern period, some groups split off the Empire before a "German" ethnicity had formed, consisting of Low Franconian (Dutch, Flemish) and Alemannic (Swiss) populations.
The core of English language descends from Old English, the language brought with the Angles, Saxon, and Jutish settlers to what was to be called England in and after the 500s. The bulk of the language in spoken and written texts is from this source. As a statistical rule, around 70 percent of words in any text are Anglo-Saxon. Moreover, the grammar is largely Anglo-Saxon.
But the consensus among experts today, influenced by research in contact linguistics, is that political dominance by a fairly small number of Old English-speakers could have driven large numbers of Britons to adopt Old English while leaving little detectable trace of this language-shift. The collapse of Britain's Roman economy and administrative structures seems to have left Britons living in a technologically similar society to their Anglo-Saxon neighbours, making it unlikely that Anglo-Saxons would need to borrow words for unfamiliar concepts. If Old English became the most prestigious language in a particular region, speakers of other languages may have found it advantageous to become bilingual and, over a few generations, stop speaking the less prestigious languages (in this case British Celtic and/or British Latin). This account, which demands only small numbers of politically dominant Germanic-speaking migrants to Britain, has become 'the standard explanation' for the gradual death of Celtic and spoken Latin in post-Roman Britain.
Helena Hamerow has made an observation that in Anglo-Saxon society "local and extended kin groups remained...the essential unit of production throughout the Anglo-Saxon period". "Local and extended kin groups" was a key aspect of Anglo-Saxon culture. Kinship fueled societal advantages, freedom and the relationships to an elite, that allowed the Anglo-Saxons' culture and language to flourish.[203]
If the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" is to be believed, the various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which eventually merged to become England were founded when small fleets of three or five ships of invaders arrived at various points around the coast of England to fight the Sub-Roman British, and conquered their lands. The language of the migrants, Old English, came over the next few centuries to predominate throughout what is now England, at the expense of British Celtic and British Latin.
The name Walton comes from settlement/farmstead of Wealas - native Celts which is what the new Anglo Saxon speaking peoples called the native inhabitants of England. 
There is strong evidence that in many areas of England taken over by Germanic speaking settlers, the native British (Wealas) remained undisturbed, farming the same land they did when the Romans left. 
Over time they just adopted or forgot their Celtic tongue (similar to Old Welsh/Cornish) for the language and culture of the newcomers in order to climb the social ladder or were coerced to do so. 
It was in the Anglo Saxon interest that the native British carry on as usual to ensure the economy produced food and goods for the new landowners.
The name Walton comes from settlement/farmstead of Wealas - native Celts which is what the new Anglo Saxon speaking peoples called the native inhabitants of England. 
There is strong evidence that in many areas of England taken over by Germanic speaking settlers, the native British (Wealas) remained undisturbed, farming the same land they did when the Romans left. 
Over time they just adopted or forgot their Celtic tongue (similar to Old Welsh/Cornish) for the language and culture of the newcomers in order to climb the social ladder or were coerced to do so. 
It was in the Anglo Saxon interest that the native British carry on as usual to ensure the economy produced food and goods for the new landowners. 
During the Early Medieval period, Ireland and Britain were culturally, linguistically and religiously divided into various peoples. The languages of the Celtic Britons and Gaels were descended from the Celtic languages spoken by those of Iron Age Europe. In Ireland, parts of western Scotland, as well as the Isle of Man, people were speaking an early form of Gaelic known as Old Irish. There may have been another pre-Indo-European language spoken by the Erainn up until the 8th century in what is today Kerry, but this is likely to have been Celtic or some other Indo-European language. In Western Britain, which includes; Cornwall, Cumbria, Wales, and Southwest Scotland, the Celtic Brythonic languages were spoken, with modern descendants such as Welsh and Cornish still being used. In Northern Britain, past the Forth and Clyde rivers which constitutes a large portion of modern-day Scotland, dwelled the Picts who spoke the Pictish language. Due to the scarcity of writing in Pictish, all of which can be found in Ogham, views are conflicted as to whether Pictish was Celtic like the southernly languages, or perhaps even a non-Indo-European language like Basque. However, most inscriptions and place names hint towards the Picts being Celtic in language and culture. Most peoples of Britain and Ireland had already predominantly converted to Christianity from their older, pre-Christian polytheistic religions. In contrast to the rest of the isles though, much of southern Britain was considered to be part of Anglo-Saxon England, where Anglo-Saxon migrants from continental Europe had settled during the 5th century CE, bringing with them their own Germanic language (known as Old English), a polytheistic religion (Anglo-Saxon paganism) and their own distinct cultural practices. By the time of the Viking incursions though, Anglo-Saxon England had too become mostly Christian.
Chapter 2, 'The Rise of English', focuses on the much debated question of whether English, and particularly Old English, shows any sign of contact between the West Germanic-speaking immigrants who became the Anglo-Saxons and the speakers of British Celtic and Latin whom these immigrants encountered during the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain around the fifth century CE. The chapter argues that Middle English betrays the belated appearance of contact features, which had been previously obscured by the literary conservatism of Anglo-Saxon writing, but focuses on Old English phonology. It argues that this contains features strikingly similar to Old Irish (particularly regarding the Old English vowel-changes known as '"i"-umlaut' and 'breaking'), and that in these respects Old Irish may provide good evidence for the kind of Celtic spoken in south-eastern Roman Britain at the time of the Anglo-Saxon settlements. Thus it argues that Old English does show Celtic influence.
In most of what was to become England, the Anglo-Saxon settlement and the consequent introduction of Old English appear to have caused the extinction of Vulgar Latin as a vernacular. The Anglo-Saxons, a Germanic people, spread westward across Britain in the 5th century to the 7th century, leaving only Cornwall and Wales in the southern part of the country and the Hen Ogledd in the north under British rule. The demise of Vulgar Latin in the face of Anglo-Saxon settlement is very different from the fate of the language in other areas of Western Europe which were subject to Germanic migration, like France, Italy and Spain, where Latin and the Romance languages continued.
In the so-called "Dark Ages", which followed the end of the Roman Empire, major changes occurred in most of the part of Great Britain now called England. (Brythonic-speaking Cornwall was an exception, more akin to Welsh toponymy.) The language of this region became Old English, also known as Anglo-Saxon, a Germanic language originating in north-west Germany and Denmark. Traditionally, this has been supposed to be due to a mass migration of Angles and Saxons into Britain, "pushing back the Celts into Wales and Scotland". Due to this linguistic replacement, most placenames in modern England are discernibly Anglo-Saxon. A large proportion of these contain personal names, suggesting that they were named after the first Anglo-Saxon to dwell there. Personal names are less common in Brythonic placenames.
Outside Anglophone countries, both in Europe and in the rest of the world, the term Anglo-Saxon and its direct translations are used to refer to the Anglophone peoples and societies of Britain, the United States, and other countries such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand – areas which are sometimes referred to as the Anglosphere. The term Anglo-Saxon can be used in a variety of contexts, often to identify the English-speaking world's distinctive language, culture, technology, wealth, markets, economy, and legal systems. Variations include the German "Angelsachsen", French "Anglo-Saxon", Spanish "anglosajón", Portuguese "Anglo-saxão", Russian "англосаксы", Polish "anglosaksoński", Italian "anglosassone", Catalan "anglosaxó" and Japanese "Angurosakuson". As with the English-language use of the term, what constitutes the "Anglo-Saxon" varies from speaker to speaker.
There are, however, isolated indications of its survival in the Celtic population. Pockets of spoken Latin may have survived as isolates in regions otherwise dominated by Anglo-Saxon Germanic. As late as the 8th century, the Saxon inhabitants of St Albans, near the Roman city of Verulamium, were aware of their ancient neighbour, which they knew alternatively as "Verulamacæstir" (or, under what H. R. Loyn terms "their own hybrid", "Vaeclingscæstir", "the fortress of the followers of Wæcla") interpretable as a pocket of Romano-Britons that remained within the Anglo-Saxon countryside, probably speaking their own local neo-Latin.
Before Roman rule ended, Brittonic had remained the dominant language in the highland zone. However, the speakers of Vulgar Latin were significantly but temporarily boosted in the 5th century by the influx of Romano-Britons from the lowland zone who were fleeing the Anglo-Saxons. These refugees are traditionally characterised as being "upper class" and "upper middle class". Certainly, Vulgar Latin maintained a higher social status than Brittonic in the highland zone in the 6th century. 
Drout has both a nostalgic love of the Anglo-Saxon language, and academic expertise in its linguistic basis for the modern English Language; he maintains a growing collection of recorded Anglo-Saxon on Anglo-Saxon Aloud.
The Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain describes the process which changed the language and culture of most of what became England from Romano-British to Germanic. The Germanic-speakers in Britain, themselves of diverse origins, eventually developed a common cultural identity as Anglo-Saxons. This process occurred from the mid-fifth to early seventh centuries, following the end of Roman power in Britain around the year 410. The settlement was followed by the establishment of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the south and east of Britain, later followed by the rest of modern England.
With the Anglo-Saxon invasion and settlement of Great Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries, the British languages were gradually marginalised to the western parts of the island, to what is now Wales and Cornwall.
The transition may not necessarily present itself as a mass immigration with a substantial replacement of population, but rather could involve the arrival of a new elite installing their culture and language as a superstrate. A similar process happened as the Gaels installed themselves over the formerly Pictish-speaking populations in Northern Britain. There seems to have been a period of British-Saxon syncretism during the 6th century, with British rulers bearing Saxon names (as in Tewdrig) and Saxon rulers bearing British names (as in Cerdic).