The English language has experienced all kind of transformations since the beginning of its existence. Certainly, it has been influenced by a great number of languages. For instance, Nordic languages had a great influence around the 9th century while they cohabited in England. Moreover, English incorporated new words and concepts from Romance languages, as Latin and French, due to the influence of religion, and the conquest of England by the Normand around the 11th century (OS?). Later, the influence of the colonies caused also significant transformations mainly on the English vocabulary. However, not only other languages have prompted changes on English; also English writers have had a main role in some of these transformations. Specifically, Shakespeare and Chaucer had a significant influence in the use of English. Moreover, the changes that took place in the 15th and 16th century have made of English the language that it is today. Consequently, there are a great number of words that have suffered different transformations due to the several influences. The aim of this paper will be to analyze the transformations that the word axe has suffered through the years. Thus, this paper will begin defining the etymology of the word and looking at its semantic changes. Moreover, this paper will analyze the spelling and syntactic changes of the word. Finally, it will look at actual samples of different contexts along the time.
To begin with, the word axe belongs to the English