Voicing of Fricatives in Proto-Germanic (Verner's Law)

Change illus­trated	Examples
PIE	PG	Non-Germanic	Germanic
	Early Late		old	modern
P	f>v	L caput	Gt haubiþ, O	Sw huvud, G
			Icel haufoð, OE hēafod [v]	Haupt, NE head
		L septern	Gt sibun, OE seofon [v]	G sieben, NE seven
t	θ>ð,d	O Ind	Gt hund, O Icel	G Hundert, Sw
		satam,	hundrað, OE	hundrade, NE
		R сто	hund	hundred
		L pater,	Gt fadar [ð], O Icel	G Vater, Sw fader,
		O Ind pitā	faðir, OE fæder	NE fаthеr
k	x > γ, g	L cunctāri	O Icel hanga, OE han3ian	Sw hänga, NE hang
		L socrus, R свекровь	Gt swaíhro, OHG swigur, OE sweзer	G Schwager
s	s > z	L auris,	Gt auso, O Icel	Sw öra, G Ohr,
		Lith ausis	eyra, OE ēare	NE ear
(Note: [z] inmany languages became [r]) Rhotacism.

Grammar.

Form-building means, synthetic and analytical languages.

Both PG and OG languages had a synthetic grammatical structure, which means that the relationshops between the parts of the sentence were shown by the forms of the words rather than their position or bi auxiliary words.

Synthetic means of form-building: inflective, suppletive, reduplication, vowel gradation, or ablaut.

Ablaut is an independent vowel interchange unconnected with any phonetic conditions. Ablaut was inherited by Germanic from ancient PG. The principal gradation series used in the IE languages – [e~o]- can be shown in Russian examples: нести - ноша. Qualitative and quantitative ablaut. In qualitative ablaut vowels differ only in their quality. Alteration of short and long vowels, and also alteration with zero represent quantitative ablaut. L. Lēgi ‘elected’ – lego ‘elect’, R. беру - сбор.

Gradation series in Gothic strong verbs.

 

Examples of Vowel Gradation in Gothic Strong Verbs

 

IE	e	o	zero	zero
PG	e/i	a	zero	zero
Principal forms	infinitive	Past sg	Past pl	Participle II
Class 1 Class 2 Class 3	reisan кiusan bindan	rais kaus band	risum kusum bundum	risans NE rise kusans choose bundans bind

 

Strong and weak verbs.

The terms were proposed by J.Grimm. The srong verbs built their proncipal forms with the help of root vowel interchanges plus certain grammatical endings. The week verbs are a specifically Germanic innovation, they built the Past Tense and the Participle II by insertiong the dental suffix between the root and the ending.

Simplification of word structure in late PG. Role of stem-suffixes in the formation of declensions.

Originally, in Early PG the word consisted of three main component parts: the root, the stem-suffix and the grammatical ending. In Late PG the old stem-suffix lost its derivational force and merged with other components of the word. The word was simplified: the three-morpheme structure was transformed into a two-morpheme structure: stem+grammaticacl ending. e.g. PG *fisk-a-z, Gt fisks (NE fish).

Most nouns and adjectives in PG, and also many verbs, had stem-forming suffixes; according to them they fell into groups or classes: a-stems, i-stems, ō-stems, etc. This grouping accounts for the formation of different declensions in nouns and adjectives, and for some differences in the conjugation of verbs.

Lecture 3.

OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

Historical Background

Hours

Plan

1. Periodisation of the History of English.

2. Pre-Germanic Britain. Germanic settlement of Britain.

3. Writings in Old English. Old English alphabet and pronunciation.

Literature

Rastorgueva T.A. A History of English. M.,1983; M.,2005. - p.49-74.

Ilyish B. History of the English language. Л. 1972. – p 34-44.

Reznik R.V., Sorokina T.S., Reznik I.V. A History of the English Language. M., 2001. – p. 34-43.

Аракин В.Д. История английского языка. М., 1985. – с. 21-31.

Бруннер К. История английского языка. М., 2003. – Т.1, с. 11-108.

Иванова И.П., Чахоян Л.П., Беляева Т.М. История английского языка. СПб., 1998. с.7-18.

Смирницкий А.И. Древнеанглийский язык. М., 1998. – с. 22-60

 

Periodisation of the History of English.