Country names/adjectives:
English,England,British,French,France,German,Germany
In most cases the adjectival form of a country tracks pretty closely to the nominal form (e.g. France vs French and others) except for the case of England vs English/British, the latter two spike from almost nothing around 1795. I can't think of a good explanation for why those two forms were so rare in comparison with "England" before 1795, anyone have an idea?
In most cases the adjectival form of a country tracks pretty closely to the nominal form (e.g. France vs French and others) except for the case of England vs English/British, the latter two spike from almost nothing around 1795. I can't think of a good explanation for why those two forms were so rare in comparison with "England" before 1795, anyone have an idea?
http://ngrams.googlelabs.com/graph?content=English%2CEngland...