Welcome to the History of English Podcast, a podcast about the history of the English language.

This is Episode 166, the Art of War.

In this episode, we're going to look at one of the most famous events in English military

history, the invasion of England by the Spanish Armada.

It was the culmination of more than a decade of simmering conflict between England and Spain.

But the Armada wasn't the only thing that came from Spain during this period.

During the Elizabethan era, lots of words were also pouring into England from Spain.

In fact, English was borrowing words from Spain and Italy like never before, and not surprisingly,

many of those words related to warfare.

So this time, we'll examine how the language of modern warfare was shaped by the romance

languages of southern Europe.

And we'll see how the Spanish Armada changed the trajectory of English as a global language.

But before we begin, let me remind you that the website for the podcast is historyofenglishpodcast.com,

and you can sign up to support the podcast and get bonus episodes at patreon.com slash

historyofenglish.

Now this time, we're going to look at the events of the late 1580s, when the ongoing rivalry

between England and Spain erupted into a full-fledged war.

For many years, the two countries had been challenging each other around the world,

in the open seas, in the new world, in the Netherlands, and in Ireland.

Part of the dispute between the two countries concerned religion.

Spain was staunchly Catholic under Philip II, and England was firmly Protestant under Queen

Elizabeth.

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