What significant thing happened in the 15th century to do with the english language?
A lot of the grammar and vocabulary of standard English were formed in the 15th century by the owners of the first printing presses. There were so many dialects of English that a book printed in one local dialect would not be understood elsewhere. For this reason, the printers created a sort of mixed dialect whose grammar and vocabulary would be understood in most parts of England. This form of English was nobody’s native dialect, but it became the basis of today’s standard English. Printers were also instrumental in expanding the English vocabulary. To put it in modern terms, in order to stay in business and keep selling books, they needed “content”, just as TV stations need today. The fastest way to get this was to translate foreign books — often in Latin — into English. The printers had a problem, because this literature contained a lot of concepts that English had no words for. Sometimes the printers coined new English words, but they very frequently just used the Latin words, an
