Ivy Panda has created a World Map Timelapse of the spread of the English language from the 5th century to date. You can watch it in its entirety below or click on the links to jump to a specific time period:
- 0:00 Intro
- 0:09 5th-15th century
- 0:26 16th century
- 0:49 17th century
- 02:15 18th century
- 04:04 19th century
- 06:56 20th century
- 10:52 2000-2018
- 11:40 2019-Present
I hope you enjoy it!
Was a little puzzled as to why it never showed English as the dominant official language in England.
Didn’t it?! Hadn’t noticed that 😀
Speaking as an English person, I am very lucky that it became the widely-spread language it is today. You had Greek at one time, but it faded away. One day, Chinese will replace English, I am sure.
Best wishes, Pete.
It may yet happen but I honestly think it more likely that a hybrid may emerge. Fun thing, linguistics 🙂
Very interesting video – strange how the spread was not in any particular pattern, kind of jumped around – I guess that is because of waves of exploration. I tried to read the legend to understand the various colors – couldn’t get it to enlarge.. I am always so fascinated as to how different languages are, and how similar other languages are. Thanks for sharing this – now I have even more things to ponder.
A pleasure! Thanks for watching. And yes, it’s fascinating how there seems to be little method to the spread.
A pleasure! Thanks for watching. And yes, it’s fascinating how there seems to be little method to the spread.
The legend reads, “Unofficial, official, co-official, non-English-speaking territories”