A short history of Britain. Part 4.

Christianity and writing come to Britain .

St. Augustine was sent to Britain in 597 A.D by Pope Gregory.He quickly converted king Aethelbert, who was married to a Frankish Christian princess called Bertha, and built a monastery at Canterbury.Augustine was consecrated bishop (obispo) and from that day to the present there has been an unbroken (ininterrumpida) succession of Archbishops of Canterbury.The conversion of the English to Christianity took about a century to complete and it was carried out (llevada a cabo) from two directions, the Celtic Church penetrating from the Northwest and the Roman Church penetrating from the Southeast.

With Christianity came writing.The English had already a form of writing : runes but they were suitable (apropiadas) only for short inscriptions not for texts. The word "rune" also meant "mystery , secret" and the inscriptions were thought to have magical powers.

The language of the Church was Latin so it is not surprising that many of the new words derived from Latin refer to religion, such as altar, mass (misa), school,monk (monje) and nun (monja) .