The modern limits are somewhat different, but the above
division of the three chief dialects (excluding Kentish) into
Northern, Midland, and Southern is sufficient for taking a broad
general view of the language in the days before the Norman Conquest.
The investigation of the differences of dialect in our early documents
only dates from 1885, owing to the previous impossibility of obtaining
access to these oldest texts. Before that date, it so happened that
nearly all the manuscripts that had been printed or examined were in
one and the same dialect, viz. the Southern (or Wessex). The language
employed in these was (somewhat unhappily) named "Anglo-Saxon"; and
the very natural mistake was made of supposing that this "Anglo-Saxon"
was the sole language (or dialect) which served for all the "Angles"
and "Saxons" to be found in the "land of the Angles" or England. This
is the reason why it is desirable to give the more general name of
"Old English" to the oldest forms of our language, because this term
can be employed collectively, so as to include Northumbrian, Mercian,
"Anglo-Saxon" and Kentish under one designation.
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