Alternative Names For English
- Sassenach - used to describe the English, by their immediate Gaelic-speaking neighbours: the Scots, and the Irish. The term is derived from the original name of the Anglo-Saxon settlers in what is now Lowland Scotland - i.e. the Saxons.
- The Cornish word for an Englishman is "Sows", and the Cornish word for the English language is "Sowsnek".
- les goddams - During the Hundred Years' War, the French took to calling the English les goddams because of their frequent use of expletives.
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“If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“In a time of confusion and rapid change like the present, when terms are continually turning inside out and the names of things hardly keep their meaning from day to day, it’s not possible to write two honest paragraphs without stopping to take crossbearings on every one of the abstractions that were so well ranged in ornate marble niches in the minds of our fathers.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“He utters substantial English thoughts in plainest English dialects.... Indeed, for fluency and skill in the use of the English tongue, he is a master unrivaled. His felicity and power of expression surpass even his special merits as historian and critic.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)