That the Anglo-Saxons came to britain and established themselves as the dominant people on the island is undeniable due to the see of genetic, archeological and linguistic evidence as others pointed it out already.
However, the mixup happens when people assume that there was an invasion involving military conflict. Iirc, the originator of the myth was Bede, who had his own reasons to try and invent a narrative where his own people are seen as conquerors. There wasn't an invasion, there is zero evidence for it. Instead, all the other evidence (genetic, archeological, linguistic) points toward the fact that it must have been a gradual, long-lasting migration on a massive scale, where the Anglo-Saxons simply outnumbered the indigenous Brythonic people slowly, them having to assimilate to the germanic migrants gradually, for their culture and language garnered a higher status than their own. There is debate as to why that stratification developed, but I would say that the sheer numbers were a key factor, and the Anglo-Saxons might have had more aggressive socio-economical practices.
I might have left some thing out, but that's pretty much what I was taught at the university at a historical linguistics class.
Lazerhorze t1_iraj2av wrote
Reply to Where did the English language REALLY come from? by MagicRaptor
That the Anglo-Saxons came to britain and established themselves as the dominant people on the island is undeniable due to the see of genetic, archeological and linguistic evidence as others pointed it out already.
However, the mixup happens when people assume that there was an invasion involving military conflict. Iirc, the originator of the myth was Bede, who had his own reasons to try and invent a narrative where his own people are seen as conquerors. There wasn't an invasion, there is zero evidence for it. Instead, all the other evidence (genetic, archeological, linguistic) points toward the fact that it must have been a gradual, long-lasting migration on a massive scale, where the Anglo-Saxons simply outnumbered the indigenous Brythonic people slowly, them having to assimilate to the germanic migrants gradually, for their culture and language garnered a higher status than their own. There is debate as to why that stratification developed, but I would say that the sheer numbers were a key factor, and the Anglo-Saxons might have had more aggressive socio-economical practices.
I might have left some thing out, but that's pretty much what I was taught at the university at a historical linguistics class.