The English language is regarded as the most wonderful communicative instrument in the world. It owes its greatness to a uniquely rich, variegated and expressive vocabulary - some 500,000 words, more than three times as many as any other language. Yet how has the language developed?. The story of where the words originated is as remarkable as the vocabulary itself - the "pae jamahs" we sleep in come from Persia via India, the "chocolati" we eat from Mexico via Spain. These sources reveal the lives of the people who made English what it is. They prove that words can tell us how our linguistic ancestors lived, where they travelled and with whom they came into contact.