For those interested in the actual reasons behind the myriad eccentricities of English vocabulary, grammar, and spelling, there is an excellent podcast on that

For those interested in the actual reasons behind the myriad eccentricities of English vocabulary, grammar, and spelling, there is an excellent podcast on that subject called simply "The History of English Podcast" [1]. The short short version is that English began as a Germanic language, which bumped into Greek-influenced Latin at regular intervals. Then the Norman French conquered England in 1066, and ruled it for a few hundred years, which brought in a huge French (and, because French is a Romance language, Latin) influence. Then the UK conquered much of the earth, and absorbed thousands of words from many world cultures. As a result, English today is like a German christmas tree decorated with so many ornaments that you can hardly make sense of it when you see it. That's my summary, the podcast is better :) https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/ https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/