History of the english language

Old English / Anglo-Saxon (Ænglisc)
Old English was the West Germanic language spoken in the area now known as England between the 5th and 11th centuries. Speakers of Old English called their language Englisc, themselves Angle, Angelcynn or Angelfolc and their home Angelcynn or Englaland.
Old English began to appear in writing during the early 8th century. Most texts were written in West Saxon, one of the four main dialects. The other dialects were Mercian, Northumbrian and Kentish.
The Anglo-Saxons adopted the styles of script used by Irish missionaries, such as Insular half-uncial, which was used for books in Latin. A less formal version of minuscule was used for to write both Latin and Old English. From the 10th century Anglo-Saxon scribes began to use Caroline Minuscule for Latin while continuing to write Old English in Insular minuscule. Thereafter Old English script was increasingly influenced by Caroline Minuscule even though it retained a number of distinctive Insular letter-forms.
Anglo-Saxon runes (futhorc/fuþorc)
Old English / Anglo-Saxon was first written with a version of the Runic alphabet known as Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Frisian runes, or futhorc/fuþorc. This alphabet was an extended version of Elder Futhark with between 26 and 33 letters. Anglo-Saxon runes were used probably from the 5th century AD until about the 10th century. They started to be replaced by the Latin alphabet from the 7th century, and after the 9th century the runes were used mainly in manuscripts and were mainly of interest to antiquarians. Their use ceased not long after the Norman conquest.
Runic inscriptions are mostly found on jewellery, weapons, stones and other objects, and only about 200 such inscriptions have survived. Most have been found in eastern and southern England.



Notes
The vowel sound of eo (ᛇ) is uncertain, as is the pronunciation of cweorð (ᛢ).
The letter stan (ᛥ) only appears in once in Futhorc writings, and the letters cweorð (ᛢ) and ior (ᛡ) appear only in ABC lists
The letter ger (ᛡ) is written ᛄ in manuscripts