The English language has never really evolved as such, its roots lay deep in the language of the original inhabitants of these isles and over the years many cultures and invaders have brought elements of their language to the us. These migrant words and phrases have been absorbed, adapted and shamelessly stolen by us over the past millennia, and are what have become our language.

There are three facets that make up this journey; not only do David and Hilary Crystal take us way back to the very origins of English, but we get to meet the key people that have the shaped the words, sounds and spelling and they take us across the UK to the places where these pivotal moments linguistic development happened. In their journey they visited places all around the country, they travelled from the south in Kent to north of the border in Scotland, and all manner of places in between. And not only are the locations diverse, so are the characters that have shaped our language. There are a few writers and poets in their list, as you would hope, but here you will find kings and monks, warriors and coders; who through single minded tenacity have given us dictionaries and shorthand, thesauruses and dialects. There are ancient runes scratched onto stone monuments, the first standard English word and sentence. printing, the magnificent art that is the Lindesfarne gospels, a scattering of blue plaques, and spelling and grammar for the pedants.

Written over the course of 2012, the Crystals travelled all over the UK to bring us this. David’s boundless energy for our language is evident throughout the book, and it is stuffed full of facts and details. Hilary took numerous photos of the places that they visited, and they have provided lots of information and details of the places should you wish to replicate their journey and see the places that crafted our language. Well worth reading for anyone who has an interest in language, it is a book that can be dipped into again and again. ( )