Old English give certain evidence of an influence on syntax. The change to Old English from Old Norse was substantive, pervasive, and of a democratic character. Old Norse and Old English resembled each other closely like cousins and with some words in common, they roughly understood each other; in time the inflections melted away and the analytic pattern emerged. It is most "important to recognize that in many words the English and Scandinavian language differed chiefly in their inflectional elements. The body of the word was so nearly the same in the two languages that only the endings would put obstacles in
Longest word in English major English language dictionaries is "pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis", a word that refers to a lung disease contracted from the inhalation of very fine silica particles, specifically from a volcano; medically, it is the same as silicosis. The word was deliberately coined to be the longest word in English, and has since been used in a close approximation of its originally intended meaning, lending at least some degree of validity to its claim. The "Oxford English Dictionary" contains "pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism" (30 letters). "Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary" does not contain "antidisestablishmentarianism" (28 letters), as the editors found no widespread, sustained usage of the word in its