Carol said:
My husband is from Northern Ireland and has a difficult time faking most American accents ... but he can talk like a Texan in a heartbeat ... go figure!
I'd always thought the Irish emigrants had heavily influenced the American accent, and the London convicts the Australian one :mrgreen:
Anyway - the Pilgrim Fathers went over roughly about the time of the James Bible - but the Virginian colony was founded about the time of Shakespeare. America still uses the archaic past tense of get (gotten) whereas UK English is 'got'. Might be more interesting if the roots had been Middle English and then no contact for 5 or 6 hundred years - we'd understand each other less than we do now!
Here's a bit of Chaucer: Start of te Prologue to the Canterbury tales (from memory)....
Whan that Aprillye with his shoures soote,
The droughte of March hath pierced to the roote,
And beythed everich veine in swiche liquere,
By which vertu engendred is the fleure,
An Zephyrus eke with his sweet breathe,
Inspyred hath in everich holt and heathe,
The tendyre croppes, and the yonge sonne,
Hath in the Ram, his half course yronne,
An smale fowles mayken melodye,
That slepen al the night with open eye,
So pricketh hem nature in hir courauges,
Than longen folkes to go on pilgrimauges,
And palmers fer to seeke starnge strondes,
In ferne hallowes, couthe in sondry londes....