GT, Shakespeare alone invented over 1,000 words, though of course not all of them stuck. ("Dusky" and "snow white," did; "barky" did not.) People don't realize how recent some of our really common words are, such as "environment" from Thomas Carlyle in the 19th century.) There are plenty of remnants of the older Germanic language. We only have 3 words with the German -en ending left (brethren, oxen, children). And but for the Great Vowel Shift from the 13th century through the 16th we would sound a lot more German.