This chronological table is intended to offer a first orientation in the field of extraterritorial varieties. It deals with the transportation of English out of Britain. One should mention that the spread of Old English (Anglian) to the Lowlands of southern Scotland, from the sixth century onwards, laid the foundations for what was later to become Scots (Macafee, this volume).

Northern hemisphere

Late twelfth century

As of 1169, the Anglo-Normans and English gained a foothold in the south-east of Ireland, extending up to Dublin and to various points along the coast of Ireland during the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

Late fifteenth century

John Cabot discovered Newfoundland in 1497 but for the following century there was virtually no English presence in North America (though in 1534 the Frenchman Jacques Cartier explored maritime Canada and the Gulf of St Lawrence for the king of France, Francis I). Sir Humphrey Gilbert claimed Newfoundland for the English in 1583 at the behest of Elizabeth I (Newfoundland was England's first colony, self-governing since 1855 and a part of Canada since 1949).

Late sixteenth century

Sir Walter Ralegh led the ill-fated expedition to Roanoke Island in 1584. In 1607 the settlement at Jamestown, Virginia, was founded and was successful. In the 1620s New England was settled after the initial Plymouth colony (near Cape Cod). The Maryland colony followed in 1634, largely as a refuge for Roman Catholics.