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English is part of the West Germanic subgroup of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family. When the Angles and Friesians arrived in England, Anglo-Saxon – the forerunner of modern English – steadily drove back the Celtic languages to the Western peripheries of the island. At first heavily influenced by Danish (in parts of Northern England, the Vikings’ language was still being spoken in the 11th century), English slowly acquired a semi-standardised written form. After the Norman invasions in 1066, French became the language of the court and the ruling classes, and it also had a lasting influence on the language of the “common” people. In the 14th century, English made its comeback in the fields of law and education, while important works of literature and theology showed that the written language had now reached full maturity. This was the Middle English period (1066-1500), in which the language gradually prevailed against Norman French; Modern English developed in the centuries that followed, and American English differs in many respects from the British variety. The English language is now spoken by 225 million people worldwide, and it has largely replaced French as the international lingua franca.

The Germanic languages developed during the period of mass migrations in Europe. German is now spoken in Austria, Switzerland, Luxemburg, Alsace, and Germany itself, as well as by various minority populations in parts of Europe and the rest of the world. Nearly 100 million people now speak German as their first language.

Art follows bread.
Conti, in “Emilia Galotti“(1772), by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing.

In Act I Scene II of Lessing’s tragedy, Hettore asks the painter Conti what it is that art actually does. Citing a proverb that was already current in the 16th century, Conti replies: “Art follows bread”. In Germany, the phrase is still used whenever someone wants to suggest that art and commerce frequently go hand in hand, or that some artworks owe their existence more to the prospect of a quick buck than to any kind of “pure” inspiration.

We belong to an era in which culture is in danger of being destroyed by the resources of culture. Friedrich Nietzsche 1844-1900

German scholars have made a distinction between the institutions that lend order to human existence (government, society, the legal and educational systems, etc.) and the various activities that attempt to interpret the world: language, art, religion and science. The humanities include the study of art and culture.

The process of rendering a text from one language into another.

"If your life is ruled by reason, you have misunderstood life." Gerd Uhlenbruck