WHAT IS AN /ˈæŋɡloː/?
by Brian Grindrod
This essay will explore the definition of the word “Anglo” and its application using etymology from The Oxford English Dictionary, academic sources such as The English Language: A Linguistic History (Brinton and Arnovick), published by Oxford University Press, and A Gentle Introduction to Old English (McGillivray), published by Broadview Press, in addition to historical facts.
Short But Bittersweet
The one-sentence definition of “Anglo” is the following: perhaps as a shortening of Anglo-Canadian (“Anglo,” The Oxford English Dictionary).
Therefore, “Anglo” remains a part of a combined adjective derived from Latin that, when attempted to be used as a noun, is meaningless and absurd. It belongs in the same nonsensical word category as “tangy” and “zesty.” It means nothing.
Angel, Angol, Angul, Ongol
The word “perhaps,” as used in the definition of “Anglo” by The Oxford English Dictionary, is an adverb assigned to make doubtful or conjectural statements: to conjecture or speculate (“perhaps,” The Oxford English Dictionary). Therefore, “Anglo” by itself is nothing but an adjective used in a combining form that is borrowed from Latin. It existed within the vocabulary of the Holy Roman Empire during its emergence to denote the people originally known as the Anglus and Anglī living in England (The English Language: A Linguistic History). It is borrowed again from post-classical Latin as an adjective in combined form to refer to the people from Wessex and Mercia, who were the last nationalist kingdoms standing against the Viking invaders. Temporarily adhering to Danelaw in order to prepare for their cultural survival, King Alfred the Great and his successors would not only defeat the Scandinavian overlords but thrive as a united kingdom to be known as England (The English Language: A Linguistic History). They were referred to as the Anglosaxo and Anglo-Saxon, combining Anglus English (“Angle,” The Oxford English Dictionary). In Old English texts, it is written as Angel-Seaxe, Angol-Seaxe, Angul-Seaxe, and Ongol-Seaxe.
The word “Angle,” borrowed from the Latin words “Anglus” and “Angli,”formerly defined a member of a Germanic-speaking tribe originally from Angeln (a part of the region of northern Germany and southern Denmark now known as Schleswig), who settled in the region north of the Thames and ultimately founded the kingdoms of Mercia, East Anglia, and Northumbria (“Angle,” The Oxford English Dictionary). It’s not a far stretch of the imagination to believe that the commanders and soldiers of the Roman Legion recognized their language as resulting from their ongoing war with the Germanic tribes of Germania, Italy, Gaul, Spain, and North Africa.
Bede the Venerable’s (673–735) Ecclesiastical History of the English People states that the Jutes, Angles, and Saxons were welcomed by the people of the island as saviours and protectors against the Roman Empire, whose armies stationed in Britannia had abandoned the conquered territory in order to reinforce their troops in Europe during the 5th century. While Saint Bede’s work is one of history’s most valuable documentations about the early history of England, it is debated that he may have purposely distorted the facts in order to not arouse past transgressions that could result in civil war against the descendants of these Germanic tribes, who were not welcomed immigrants but invaders when Britannia was left defenseless. Whether the Saxons were welcomed or not does not negate the fact that they were the founders of the kingdoms of Essex and Wessex. The successors of King Cerdic, first ruler of Wessex, and his subjects are the first to be called Anglo-Saxons. This is found within the original manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, created late in the 9th century during the reign of Alfred the Great (r. 871–899). The term “Anglo-Saxon” had dissipated by 1014 to be replaced by engliscan (Old English term for Englishman) to describe the people living in the kingdom founded by King Æthelstan.
That Bastard!
That is, until the Norman (Norsemen) Invasion of 1066 led by William the Conqueror. A descendant of the Scandinavian Vikings, Rollo the Walker (first king of Normandy, as decreed by France’s King Charles), William, and his army—formed of Bretons, Franks, Normans, and Scandinavian mercenaries—invaded England when King Æthelred the Unready (Noble counsel, No counsel) declared genocide upon the descendants of the Vikings who had immersed and living peacefully among the Anglo-Saxons of England and Wales. The word “Anglo” in the compound adjective Anglo-Norman is used once more to refer to the Normans in England after the conquest, who ruled as a single realm between 1066 and 1204 (“Anglo-Norman,” The Oxford English Dictionary). After the Anglo-French War (1202–1214), Normans became English, and French Normans became French. Nobody is Anglo-Norman, and the word “Englishmen” (Englisce men) gets a second life with English priest Laȝamon’s (ca. 1190–1215) Laȝamon’s Brut, which chronicles the history of Britain.
Working on a group project for my class History of the English Language course, it came to my attention and was confirmed by my professor that the English language made multiple borrowings of the same word. This was sometimes due to the historical texts that had been safeguarded by priests and to manuscripts dating back to Ancient Greece and other civilizations scholars had come across during the English Renaissance era. Combined with the greatest invention ever created—the printing press—words from a bygone era were reintroduced during the period of Modern English. Using post-classical Latin in 1586, topographer and historian William Camden revived the term “Anglo-Saxones” (original spelling), which had not been used since the Norman Conquest (“Anglo-Saxon,” The Oxford English Dictionary). Once again, that combined adjective makes another comeback.
As the English language mutates and morphs, “Anglo” is used in compound words with other adjectives and nouns to refer to joint adventures or conflicts with the British as well as to define a person of white English (or British) heritage or descent (“Anglo,” The Oxford English Dictionary). Therefore, compound words such as Anglo-American, Anglo-Canadian, Anglo-Indian, and Anglo-African are now parts of the English lexicon.
The New Noun in Town
Thirty-seven years after the Treaty of Paris is signed between the kingdoms of France and Great Britain and forty-one years before the Act of Union is passed in British parliament does “Anglo” become attributed as a noun. It is first printed in the February 22, 1800, edition of the Upper Canada Gazette: “The inference to be drawn, is the closest union between the Anglo and trans-atlantic Anglos.” It will take another 159 years before it is read again in printed form, this time within the February 14 edition of Maclean’s: “The scientific, technical and commercial faculties, areas once left to the ‘Anglos’, are booming.” The British Broadcasting Corporation’s magazine, The Listener, also prints the word in its August 1, 1968, edition: “The Conservatives attempted vaguely to… qualify their traditionally Anglo party to pick up some Quebec seats.” In its April 4, 1977, edition, Maclean’s uses the word once again as an assertive noun: “Whether Quebec separates or not, there is a feeling among Anglos that things will never be the same for them as the province moves to ‘francicize’ business and restrict the right to English-language education for newcomers.” The February 22, 1991, edition of the Toronto Star follows Maclean’s lead to make “Anglo” a noun: “Not everyone who looks and sounds like an Anglo-Canadian is an actual Anglo.”
There is no doubt that Maclean’s and the Toronto Star were branding the word to define the white descendants of Great Britain residing in Canada and not Canadians identifying the English language as their mother tongue. The 1977 statement by Maclean’s is one of hostility towards the descendants of La Nouvelle France. Similar to what King Alfred the Great did to protect the language and culture of Wessex, by instilling nationalism and pride, French Quebecers are doing the same for their language, culture, and history, something Canadian Prime Minister John A. Macdonald and his successors have attempted to eradicate but have failed, although their psychopathic methods have worked to perfection in eliminating the language, culture, and history of several First Nations people.
Damn Those Unassimilable Kebeckers!
It is to be noted that the etymology and definition of Canada was first written in 1545 by French explorer and navigator Jacques Cartier to designate the land within the St. Lawrence River in his Bref récit, et succincte narration de la navigation faicte es ysles de Canada (Le français au Québec, Plourde et Georgeault). In 1568, explorer André Thevet’s publication Les singularitez de la France Antarctique, translated in English that same year, was the first to print the word Canadien to refer to the French settlers from the lands that lead to the St. Lawrence River: “The amiable maners of these Canadiens” (original spelling). This fact is stated in the 1887 publication of Transactions of the Manitoba Historical Society: “After the term Canadian came to refer to all persons in the Canadas, and later to all citizens of the Dominion of Canada, English speakers often used it (and sometimes still use it) in such a way as to exclude their French-speaking compatriots” and “Thirty years ago, we, who speak French, were called by everyone purely and simply ‘Canadians’; others were known as English, Scotch or Irish. Lately the fashion has grown up of calling others Canadians and distinguishing us as French.”
The assertion that the word “Canadian” was once used to refer to the descendants of the French but was eventually used to ostracize them as the English and Scottish appropriated the term starts with the February 20, 1813, edition of The Montreal Herald: “We must convince our foe (the United States) that a Briton and a Canadian are synonymous terms” (A Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, Gage Educational Publishing). Originally printed in 1862 in Robert F. Burton’s second edition of The City of the Saints, and across the Rocky Mountains to California, the word “Québecquois” is used to describe a descendant of France living in the province of Québec: “The County and town of Joliette preserve the name of another distinguished Canadian, a Québecquois, Louis Joliette” (“Québécois,” The Oxford English Dictionary). In order to distinguish themselves from the eventual definition of “Canadian,” as politically reconceptualised by The Montreal Herald, the English, and the Scots, the original Canadiens now call themselves Québécois.
Since 1977, “Anglo” is a morpheme that has been perverted into an inane word by Anglo-Canadians or those representing them to denote the federalists who identify with the English language as their mother tongue or the one in which they prefer to communicate. Historically and presently, the anti-Francophonie enforce it as the superstratum language—the dominant one—of Canada as well as Quebec and to reduce the French language to a substratum one, which is to be dominated.
CONCLUSION
Mediatized by anti-Quebec Canadians as a noun but not recognized as such by The Oxford English Dictionary, which is internationally regarded as the accepted authority on the English language, /ˈæŋɡloː/ remains part of a combined adjective derived from Latin. If anti-Francophonie still insist on morphing it into a noun to continue their self-proclaimed victimization by Quebecers, they’ll have to accept that they are the self-entitled descendants of the white British privileged class that has and still dominates not only French Quebecers but French Canadians, as well as every other ethnic and visible minority Quebecers and Canadians.
About Me
I am in the process of obtaining a bachelor’s degree in English Literature from Concordia University while assisting the CIUSSS West-Central Montreal as a COVID-19 Beneficiary Assistant for CIUSSS West-Central Montreal. My course credits include History of the English Language, L’Histoire de la langue française au Québec, Quebec History to 1867 and Viking Prose and Poetry.