首页
登录
职称英语
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed
游客
2024-02-27
46
管理
问题
The rise of English is a remarkable success story. When Julius Caesar landed in Britain nearly two thousand years ago, English did not exist. Five hundred years later, English, incomprehensible to modern ears, was probably spoken by about as few people as currently speak Cherokee (an American Indian language)-and with about as little influence. Nearly a thousand years later, at the end of sixteenth century, when William Shakespeare was in his prime, English was the native speech of between five and seven million English people and it was, in the words of a contemporary, "of small reach, it stretched no further than this island of ours, never not there over all. "
Four hundred years later, the contrast is extraordinary. Between 1600 and the present, in armies, navies, companies, and expeditions, the speakers of English-including Scots, Irish, Welsh, American, and many more-traveled into every corner of the globe, carrying their language and culture with them. Today English is used by at least 750 million people, and barely half of those speak it as a mother tongue. Some estimates have put that figure Closer to one billion. Whatever the total, English at the end of the twentieth century is more widely scattered, more widely spoken and written, than any other language has ever been. It has become the language of the planet, the first truly global language.
The statistics of English are astonishing. Of all the world’s languages, it is arguably the richest in vocabulary. The compendious (简明) Oxford English Dictionary lists about 500,000 words; and a further half million technical and scientific terms remain uncatalogued. About 350 million people use the English vocabulary as a mother tongue: about one tenth of the world’s population, scattered across every continent and surpassed, in numbers, though not in distribution, only by the speakers of the many varieties of Chinese. Three quarters of world’s mail, and its telexes and cables, are in English. So are more than half the world’s technical and scientific periodicals: it is the language of technology from Silicon Valley to Shanghai. [br] When did English appear as a language spoken by few people?
选项
A、In Julius Caesar’s time.
B、In Shakespeare’s time.
C、2000 years ago.
D、2500 years ago.
答案
D
解析
见第一段"When Julius Caesar landed in Britain nearly two thousand years ago, English did not exist. Five hundred years later, English, incomprehensible to modern ears, was probably spoken by about as few people as... "
转载请注明原文地址:https://tihaiku.com/zcyy/3488518.html
相关试题推荐
IntheU.S.,highschoolEnglishclasses___________(往往把重点放在)improvingwritingski
Thereasonforoursuccessisourpeopleand____________(他们是被如何对待的以及他们对公司的感受如何
[originaltext]TherearethreegroupsofEnglishlearners:beginners,interm
[originaltext]TherearethreegroupsofEnglishlearners:beginners,interm
[originaltext]SomepeopledividetheEnglishlearnersintothreegroups:be
[originaltext]Thequestforsuccessalwaysbeginswithatarget.AsYogiBe
[originaltext]Thequestforsuccessalwaysbeginswithatarget.AsYogiBe
[originaltext]Thequestforsuccessalwaysbeginswithatarget.AsYogiBe
[originaltext]W:Well,Charles,Imustsaythatyourshopisprettyremarkable.
[originaltext]W:Well,Charles,Imustsaythatyourshopisprettyremarkable.
随机试题
Totracethe______oftheIrishproblem,wehavetogobackoverthreehundred
ChoosingaForeignLanguagetoStudyItisnoteasytochooseaforeignlanguage
高级神经活动类型为活泼型,其气质类型为()A.胆汁质 B.多血质 C.粘液
D根据定义,不合未知参数的样本函数才是统计量。
某异地开发的信息系统集成项目以程序流程图、数据流程图等为主要分析设计工具。由于用
净制时,需分离不同的药用部位的药物是A:山茱萸B:麻黄C:栀子D:乌梅E
唐太宗即位之初,依据德才兼备和当时官员的职责,制定了选拔和考核官员的严格标准,即
2007年比2001年中小学校舍建筑面积增加了()。 A.27%
根据下面资料,回答96-97题 某金融机构卖给某线缆企业一份场外看涨期权。为
3根以上绝缘导线穿同一根管时,导线的总截面不应大于管内净面积的40%,并应满足
最新回复
(
0
)