Better still, it does so in a particularly elegant way, relating to the three (ish) main sources of words. Anglo-Saxon words are still, in the main, read as simple, easy to understand, or even crude. French words are somewhat more sophisticated. Those who’d like others to know about their level of education but can’t quite bring themselves to wear their degree classification on a t-shirt will favour words derived from Latin. Occasionally and delightfully, these three sources will each provide one word for the same thing, as occurs with ‘kingly’ (as said by the peasant), ‘royal’ (as said by the courtier) and ‘regal’ (as said by the scholar). Eight hundred years ago, each of these people would be speaking a different language; now, they use a different vocabulary that nonetheless maps on to almost exactly the same social distinctions. English history is encoded on the English language, and though it doesn’t say much for social mobility, there’s still something pleasing in how it plays out in the language today.