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What did English sound like in early medieval Southwell? People spoke and wrote Old English in early medieval Southwell. How much do we know about their language? What did it sound like? What other languages were there in the area? This talk will give an overview of the Mercian dialect of Old English using text examples written at the time, including Beowulf, The Peterborough Chronicle, The Lord’s Prayer and place-names from the Southwell area. It will be fascinating to see how close our own modern form of English is to the earliest East Midlands dialect. All welcome — no prior experience with medieval language required.