Re: English Changes or what into Conlangs

Ray Brown wrote:

>Why all those -(e)s plurals?  Might have something to do with an invasion
>of England in 1066 - and even more with the imposition of Norman French as
>the official language of England (and bits of Wales & Scotland the Normans
>managed to capture) over the next three hundred years.
Somehow I doubt this.  IIRC,  the establishment of "-(e)s" as the regular
plural ending happened first in northern England - the part of the country
which was presumably the least subject to French linguistic influence.

It's possible, though, that the influence of French helped facilitate the
spread
of "-(e)s" to Southern English dialects (in which "-(e)n" had been taking over
as the regular plural ending).  I believe that the southward spread of "-(e)s"
began in 13th or 14th century - which would coincide almost perfectly
with the period of greatest lexical borrowing from French.  Hmm...

Matt.