Etymological characteristics of the English vocabulary.

Etymology as a branch of Linguistics. The etymological background of the English vocabulary

The term etymology (E.) is derived from Greek word ‘etyman’ which means true, original meaning of the word.

E. is a brunch of linguistics which studies the origin of words, their change & development, the linguistic & extra-linguistic forms modifying their structure, meaning & usage.

Acc. to the etymological principles English voc. May be devided into 2 groups of words: native words (which make up about 30% of English voc.) & borrowings (which make up about 70%).

Native words are words which belong to the original word-stock.

Borrowed words are words adopted from foreign languages.

Though native words constitute only 30% of the English voc., they make up the greatest part of the basic word-stock.

Basic word-stock is the stable stock of the most frequently used 3 or 4.000 words which constitute the core of the voc. preserving the national peculiarities of the language. The changes in the basic stock are very slow & are not easily perceptible.

Native words in English

Native words are words which belong to the original word-stock. Characteristic features of the native words are:

- Highly frequent

- Used in spoken and written speech and are familiar to every English person

- Include most of the pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, numerals, strong verbs, the definite & the indefinite articles

- Mostly monosyllabic (short)

- Polysemantic

- Possess great word-building power

- Used in set-expressions & proverbs

- W-, wr-, tn-, dn-, sh-, sw-, wh-, th-, -ng, -y, -ah, -ew, -ee-, -oo-

Acc. to their origin native words may be divided into 3 large groups: native words of the Indo-European origin, of the Common-Germanic origin & English proper words.

1) Native words of the Indo-E. origin are the oldest. They have correlated words in Indo-E. languages: Romanic, Slavonic, Germanic, Sanskrit. Here belong such words as:

-father, mother, son, brother, daughter

-bull, wolf, goose, cow

-nose, heart, foot

-to stand, to sit, to be, to eat, to know

-quick, slow, red, new, glad, sad

-one, two … hundred

-tree, birch, corn

-pronouns (except they)

-sun, moon

-day, night

E.g. the native English words mother (OE moder) has correlated words in Icelandic mothir, in German Mutter, in Russian мать, in Latin mater, in Greek meter, in Sanskrit matr.

2) Native words of Common-Ger. stock have the correlated words in the languages of the Germanic group only: in German, Dutch, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic. Here belong such words as:

-head, hand, arm, finger, bone

-summer, winter, spring ( not autumn)

-storm, rain, ice, frost

-oak, fir, grass

-bear, fox, calf

-house, bench, room, ship, boat

-sea, land

-hat, shoe

-life, hope

-to go, to tell, to speak, to say, to answer, to see, to hear, to drink, to sing, to make, to learn, to have

-green, gray, blue, dead, small, thick, high, old, good

-all, each, self, such, here, there, near

E.g. the native English word hand has correlated words in Dutch hand, in German Hand, in Icelandic hind.

English proper words, or specifically English words have no cognates (words of the same etymological root) in other languages. They are:

-boy, girl, lord, lady, woman, bird, always, daisy

Borrowings in the English vocabulary; main groups of loan words in English: Latin, French, Scandinavian and Celtic borrowings

Borrowings are words borrowed from other languages. Borrowings have always been one of the most important means of replenishing of the English voc. There are many words in English (more then 70%) that are of foreign origin. The language, from which the loan word was taken is called the source of the borrowing. The original language to which the borrowed word may be traced is called origin of borrowing.

E.g. paper < French papier < Latin papyrus < Greek papyrus (source of borrowing – paper, origin of borrowing – papyrus)

Main groups of loan words in English are represented by borrowings from Latin, Scandinavian and French.

Latin borrowings are numerous in English. They constitute about a quarter of the English voc. Acc. to the historical period of adoption they are divided into 3 groups:

1) Ancient B. – 1^st c. BC. The firs Latin B. appeared when Anglo-Saxon tribes, which belonged to the Germanic tribes, were still on the continent of Europe & came into trade contacts with the Romance (dish, cup, kitchen, milk, butter, cheese, wine, plant, cherry, plum, pear, pepper).

2) B. of the Christianity period – 6^th or 7^th c. When Christianity was introduced in Great Britain in the 6^th c. a lot of new words appeared in the English language. Latin was the official language of the Christian church & as a result new words connected with church were borrowed from Latin (abbot, altar, candle, saint, bishop, monk, nun, pope, priest, school).

3) B. of the Renaissance period – the 14^th c. They appeared during the revival of classical art and learning. Many of them are words connected with science, study, etc. (juniors, senior, minor, major, except, educate, collect, basis, idea, create, phenomenon).

There are over 650 words in English borrowed from the language of Scandinavian tribes. So, from 8^th to 11^th c. England underwent several Scandinavian invasions which inevitably left the trace on the English voc. Scandinavian settles spoke Old Norse. Characteristic features of Scandinavian borrowings are:

- Combination of ‘sk’, ‘sc’: skill, skirt, scare

- Sound ‘g’ before front vowels: give, get, forget

French borrowings are numerous in English – the largest group of borrowings, they are divided into Old (Norman) & Parisian borrowings.

1) In 1066 the English were defeated by the Norman under William the Conqueror. Under the Norman Conquest, French (or rather northern French) became the official language of England & it became a bi-lingual country. That is why a lot of French words were borrowed in the language which is used today (soldier, army, lieutenant, court, country, war, justice, office, government, furniture, chair, table, dinner, supper, jelly, sausage, soup, to boil, joy, pleasure, delight, comfort, beauty, color).

2) In the 17^th c. there was a change in the character of the French borrowings. New borrowings mainly from the Parisian dialect were adopted (campaign, machine, café, ballet).

Celtic borrowings are of high historical importance for the English language. When Anglo-Saxons leaved Europe & came to the British Isles in the 5^th c. they met the Celts (or Britains), who were the native inhabitants of the British Isles. So, through numerous contacts with the Celts, Anglo-Saxons adopted a number of Celtic words, esp. the names of places (river).

Assimilation of borrowings, types of assimilation, degree of assimilation

When a new word enters the voc. system of language, it undergoes the process of assimilation. That is the process of adjusting itself to the phonetical, graphical & lexico-gr. norms of the language.

There are 3 main types of assimilation: phonetical, grammatical, lexical assimilation.

1) Phonetic assimilation is a partial or total conformation of a sound form of a borrowed word to the phonological system of the receiving language. Loan words that are not assimilated phonetically: police, unique, machine, chauffeur, garage, prestige, ballet.

2) Grammatical assimilation is a partial or total conformation of a borrowed word to the morphological standards of the receiving language. Loan words which are not assimilated grammatically: alumnus-alumni, phenomenon-phenomena, stratum-strata, datum-data. They preservethe original plural inflexions.

3) Lexical assimilation is a partial or total conformation of a borrowed word to the semantic system of the receiving language. This means that the borrowed word may either participate in word building or acquire a new meaning in the receiving language.

E.g. comfort (French word) but it participates in word building = comfortable

Loan words which are not assimilated lexically: sombrero, tsar, pizza, krone, ruble.

Acc. to the degree of assimilation borrowings can be subdivided into:

1) Completely (fully) assimilated borrowings are borrowings which correspond to all phonetic morphological & semantic standards of the English language. Many of them belong to the native word-stock. (cheese, street, husband, fellow, die, want, window, table, dinner, chair, get, they)

2) Partially assimilated borrowings are those, which have retained foreign pronunciation or foreign morphological characteristics or are not assimilated semantically. (restaurant, machine, phenomenon, sputnik, vase, ballet, police, café, sombrero)

3) Unassimilated borrowings are words which are not assimilated in any way (barbarisms). (adio, arrividerci, ad libitum, dejavu, alter ego, a la mode, ciao)

Translation loans and semantic borrowings. Folk or false etymology

Borrowings are words adopted from foreign languages. Semantic borrowing is the development in an English word of a related word in another language.

E.g. the word pioneer existed in the English language with the meaning of explorer, but under the influence of Russian word пионер it has acquired a new meaning – a member of a pioneer organization.

Sometimes, an unfamiliar borrowed word is wrongly associated with the native word, resembling it only in sound. This change of a borrowed word on the basis of fancied analogy with some well-known word is called folk (false) etymology.

E.g. cotlet, mushroom, may-day

Translation loans are words and expressions formed from the material already existing in the language, but according to patterns taken from another language by way of literal, word-for-word or morpheme-for-morpheme translation.

E.g. wall newspaper – стенная газета/ collective farm – колхоз/ five years – пятилетка/ superman – ubermensch/ wonder child – wunderkind/ first dancer – prima-balerina

International words and etymological doublets in English

Among borrowed words in English there are international words, which came from the same source and are found in many different languages. They express notions belonging to science, medicine, technology, culture, politics and everyday life.

E.g. motor (L), tragedy (Gr), corridor (It), coffee (Turkish), restaurant (Fr)

International words which come from English are: football, out, match, jersey, pullover, nylon, club; from Russian: balalaika, tsar, ruble, vodka, soviet.

Etymological doublets are 2 or more words of the same language derived originally from the same root, but having entered the vocabulary at different periods of time or from different sources. They are different in form & often different in meaning.

E.g. the Old French word pris gave 3 doublets: price-prize-praise

Among groups of etymological doublets are:

1) Doublets from different languages:

- English & Scandinavian: shirt (E) – skirt (Sc)/ shabby (E) – scabby (Sc)

- English & Latin: eatable – edible / naked – nude

- English & French: bench – bank / name – noun / word – verb

- Latin & French: senior – sir

- French & Latin: Madame – Madonna / study – studio

2) Doublets from different periods of the same language:

- Norman French – Parisian French: corpse – corps / cavalry – chivalry / card – chart

- Earlier Latin – Later Latin: camp – campus

3) Doublets from different changes within English itself:

- Loss of initial syllable: acute – cute / history – story / defense – fence

- Vowel interchange: clench – clinch / mode – mood / parson – person

Etymological triplets occur very rarelynh

E.g. hospital (L)- hostel (NFr)- hotel (PFr)/ to capture (L)- to catch (NFr)- to chase (PFr)