11. Etymology of the English Word-Stock

The English word-stock consists of several extensive strata, the origin of which corresponds to historical and cultural development of the English society. The British Isles used to be conquered by foreign invaders from time to time which resulted in the mixed character of the vocabulary and this makes most particular feature of the English language. Unlike lexical system, the grammar and phonetic system are very stable (unchangeable) and are not often influenced by other languages. A native word is a word which belongs to the original English stock, i.e. of Anglo-Saxon origin. Borrowed words are words taken over from other languages. The etymological linguistic analysis showed that the borrowed stock of words is larger than the native stock of words. In fact native words comprise only 30% of the total number of words in the English vocabulary. The number 30 characterizes the quantity of native words in the vocabulary, but doesn’t give an idea of their frequency and semantic value.

There are the following basic layers of vocabulary in the English language (English belongs to the West Germanic subbranch of languages).

Native words

1. Words from Indo-European stock make the basis of Germanic word-stock. Words of Indo-European origin belong to very important semantic groups. They play an important role in the English language as they have high frequency value, great word-forming power, wide collocability, many meanings and they are stylistically neutral. They include:

- pronouns: I, he, my, your, his, who, whose;

- numerals: one two three, four, five, six;

- prepositions: in, out, on, under, for, of;

- conjunctions: and, but, till, as;

- most of the auxiliary and modal verbs: shall, will, should, must, can, may;

- members of a family: father, mother, brother, son (e.g. English mother, Sanskrit mātar, Greek mātēr, Latin māter);

- words denoting parts of body: head, hand, arm, back, foot, eye (e.g. English nose, Sanskrit nāsā, Latin nasus, German Nase);

- animals: horse, cow, sheep, cat (e.g. English ewe, Sanskrit ávih, Greek ó(v)is, Latin ovis);

- natural phenomena, planets, plants, substances: snow, rain, wind, sun, moon (e.g. English night, Russian ночь, Sanskrit nakti, Greek nýx, German Nacht);

- some common adjectives (e.g. Russian новый, Sanskrit návas, Greek ne(v)os, Latin novus, German neu);

- common actions: do, make, go, come, hear, see, eat, speak, talk (e.g. Russian видеть, ведать, Sanskrit víd «знать», Greek (v)idein, Latin vidēre).

2. Words from Common Germanic language, that have cognates in other West Germanic languages, e.g. English wife, German Weib; English bride, German Braut, Gothic bruÞs, Old Norse brúÞr; English house, German Haus, Dutch huis, Norwegian hus, Swedisg hus.

3. Some isolated words (or words of unknown origin), which are found only in English girl, bad, keep.

Many words of native origin possess large clusters of derived and compound words in the present-day language, e.g. help – helper, helpful, helpfully, helpfulness, helping, helpingly, helpable, helpably, helped, unhelpable.

Borrowings (borrowed words)

Borrowing – 1) (process) resorting to the word-stock of other languages for words to express new concepts, to further differentiate the existing concepts and to name new objects, etc.; 2) (result) a loan word, borrowed word – a word taken over from another language and modified in phonemic shape, spelling, paradigm or meaning according to the standards of the receiving language.

The following types of borrowed words can be distinguished:

- loan words proper – the sound-form and the meaning are borrowed together (sky – Scandinavian, to dance – French);

- translation loans – patterns taken from another language are filled with native English material (English motorway calques German Autobahn, mother-tongue calques Latin Lingua materna);

- semantic loans – a new sense of an English word that appeared under the influence of a related word in another language. Examples from Russian, звезда, идол (идол русского рока), агрессивный (У песни хорошая агрессия).

One should distinguish between the terms “origin of borrowing” and “source of borrowing”. The source of borrowing is a language from which the word was borrowed from. The term “origin of borrowing refers to the language in which the word originated. Let us study the origin of the word paper, for instance. It made its appearance in English the following way: English paper < French papier < Latin papyrus < Greek papyros. The word originated from Greek but it was borrowed from French.

Assimilation of borrowings is the process of change that a borrowed word undergoes while being adopted to the phonetic (stress, pronunciation reason, fillet), grammatical (the acquisition of new grammatical forms on analogy with other English words sputnik(s), kindergarten (s), imbroglio(s)), semantic (development of new senses in the borrowed word: suite, n – 1) ‘a set of rooms’ a luxury suite; 2) computing ‘a set of programs with a uniform design and the ability to share data’ a PC), morphological (word-building paradigms elite, elitism, elitist) and graphical (décor, decor) systems of the host language. The degree of assimilation depends on the importance, frequency, length of use of borrowings and way of borrowing (oral or written). Words that enter the receiving language orally tend to assimilate to a more extent (phonetically, morphologically) rather than those which were borrowed through written speech. The latter are longer felt as foreign words and often function as a special feature of this or that style. According to the degree of assimilation borrowings fall into the following types:

- complete loans are words undistinguished from native words, they completely assume word-building and word-changing paradigms gates, eggs, knives, roots;

- partial loans are phonetically (police), graphically (staphylococci, psychosis, phalanx, gourmet) or grammatically (е.g. datum – data, criterion – criteria, index – indexes/ indices) unassimilated words which are perceived as foreign and refer to bookish style;

• unassimilated words (barbarisms), e.g. ad-lib «импровизация», déjà vu «парамнезия, ложная память», hors d’oeuvre «закуска», qigong «цигун, дыхательная гимнастика», chef d’oeuvre «шедевр, лучшая работа, которую сделал мастер».

The English word-stock borrowed words from many languages such as Scandinavian, French, Latin, Greek and others. Let’s study these groups in detail.

1. Latin borrowings.

Latin was one of the first languages to contact English and enrich it with borrowings. The English language contacted Latin several times.

The first layer is made up by continental loans which were borrowed from Latin during the period when the British Isles were a part of the Roman Empire (before AD 449). They are everyday words, mostly nouns such as Latin. vinum – English wine, uncia – inch, castra – Manchester, stræt – street, vallum – wall, portus – port.

Many Latin words came into English during the Adoption of Christianity in the 6^th century. At this time the Latin alphabet was borrowed which ousted the Runic alphabet. These borrowings are usually called classical borrowings. Here belong learned Latin words, connected with religion bishop, apostle, cross, education school, dean, and some others cancer, cap, alter. Many Greek words were borrowed through Latin: church, angel, devil, anthem.

Latin and Greek borrowings appeared in English during the Middle English period due to the Great Revival of Learning. These are mostly scientific words because Latin was the language of science at the time. These words were not used as frequently as the words of the Old English period, therefore some of them were partly assimilated grammatically, e.g. formula – formulae. Here also belong such words as: cordial, obvious, frigid, absent, correct, desperate, to neglect, to contribute, to comprehend, memorandum, minimum, maximum, veto.

2. Scandinavian borrowings.

By the end of the Old English period (VIII c.) English underwent a strong influence of Scandinavian due to the Scandinavian conquest of the British Isles. Scandinavians belonged to the same group of peoples as Anglo-Saxons and their languages had much in common. As the result of this conquest there are about 700 borrowings from Scandinavian into English such nouns as sister, bull, cake, egg, kid, knife, skirt, dirt, window, such adjectives as: flat, ill, happy, low, odd, ugly, wrong, such verbs as: call, die, guess, get, give, scream and many others. What is special about Scandinavian influence is that the way of borrowing was oral in form; the contact was long and stable and the Scandinavian borrowings don’t denote new notions, e.g. Scandinavian husbonda > husband, taka > takan > take (earlier niman).

Even some pronouns and connective words were borrowed which happens very seldom, such as: same, both, till, fro, though, and pronominal forms with ‘th’: they, them, their. Scandinavian influenced the development of phrasal verbs, which did not exist in Old English, at the same time some prefixed verbs came out of usage, e.g. ofniman, beniman. Phrasal verbs are now highly productive in English, e.g. take off, give in. The phonetic process of assibilation (when an obstruent sound becomes a sibilant one), which occurred in Old English and didn’t take place in Scandinavian, many etymological doublets appeared, e.g. skirt – shirt, shatter – scatter. The borrowed lexical elements stayed in toponymy, e.g. Scandinavian byr «деревня» – Derby.

3. French borrowings.

French influence began with Battle of Hastings (1066), in which William the Conqueror defeated King Harold. French became an official language and English was used by lower classes. Up to the 14^th century borrowings came from the Norman dialect, and since the 14^th century – from Parisian dialect of French.

There are the following semantic groups of French borrowings:

- words relating to government: administer, empire, state, government;

- words relating to court: court, servant, guard, royal, prince; BUT king & queen are native;

• words relating to military affairs: army, war, banner, victory, soldier, battle; BUT knight is of native origin;

- words relating to jury: justice, judge, prison, lien, advocate, petition, inquest, sentence, barrister;

• words relating to religion: religion, sermon, saint;

- words relating to fashion: luxury, coat, collar, lace, pleat, embroidery;

• town trades: tailor, butcher, painter, BUT country trades – smith, shepherd;

- words relating to jewelry: topaz, emerald, ruby, pearl;

- words relating to food and cooking: lunch, dinner, appetite, to roast, to stew BUT swine.

Many English-French synonymic pairs appear as a result of borrowing, they differ in meaning and use, e.g. life – existence, tongue – language, ship – vessel, mouth – oral, tooth – dental.

French influenced not only the vocabulary of English but also its spelling, because they were French scribes who wrote documents as the local population was mainly illiterate, and the ruling class was French. Runic letters remaining in English after the Latin alphabet was borrowed were substituted by Latin letters and combinations of letters, e.g. ‘v’ was introduced for the voiced consonant [v] instead of ‘f’ in the intervocal position lufian – ‘love’, the digraph ‘ch’ was introduced to denote the sound [tʃ] instead of the letter ‘c’ as in chest before front vowels where it had been palatalized, the digraph ‘sh’ was introduced instead of the combination ‘sc’ to denote the sound [ʃ] as in ship, the digraph ‘th’ was introduced instead of the Runic letters ‘θ’ and ‘þ’ as in this, thing, the letter ‘y’ was introduced instead of the Runic letter ‘γ’ to denote the sound [j] as in yet, the digraph ‘qu’ substituted the combination ‘cw’ to denote the combination of sounds [kw] as in queen, the digraph ‘ou’ was introduced to denote the sound [u:] as in house (The sound [u:] was later on diphthongized and is pronounced [au] in native words and fully assimilated borrowings). As it was difficult for French scribes to copy English texts they substituted the letter ‘u’ before ‘v’, ‘m’, ‘n’ and the digraph ‘th’ by the letter ‘o’ to escape the combination of many vertical lines sunu – ‘son’, luvu – ‘love’.

Words were borrowed from French into English after 1650, mainly through French literature, but they were not as numerous and many of them are not completely assimilated. There are the following semantic groups of these borrowings:

a) literature, music, theatre: belle-lettres, conservatorie, brochure, nuance, piruette, vaudeville, matinee;

b) military affairs: corps, echelon, fuselage, manouvre;

c) buildings and furniture: entresol, chateau, bureau;

d) food and cooking: ragout, cuisine, gourmand.

Thus, the share of Roman borrowings in the English word-stock is exceedingly large. We mean words denoting basic notions which are expressed be native words in other languages. Such borrowings go back to Middle English, e.g. table, chair, air, river, money, city, language, victory, dictionary. The total number of French and Latin loans into English is about 57%. Many Latin words entered English through French. Most of these words are terms and learned words possessing low frequency.

4. Other sources.

Italian borrowings.

Cultural and trade relations between Italy and England brought many Italian words into English. The earliest Italian borrowing came into English in the 14-th century, it was the word bank which originated from the Italian banko – ‘bench’. Italian moneylenders and moneychangers sat in the streets on benches. When they suffered losses they turned over their benches, it was called banco rotta from which the English word bankrupt originated. In the 17-th century some geological terms were borrowed: volcano, granite, bronze, lava. At the same time some political terms were borrowed: manifesto, bulletin.

But mostly Italian is famous by its influence in music and in all Indo-European languages musical terms were borrowed from Italian: alto, baritone, basso, tenor, falsetto, solo, duet, trio, quartet, quintet, opera, operetta, libretto, piano, violin.

Among the 20-th century Italian borrowings we can mention: gazette, incognito, altostratus, fiasco, fascist, dilettante, grotesque, graffito, cartoon, lagoon, etc.

Spanish borrowings.

Spanish borrowings came into English mainly through its American variant. There are the following semantic groups of them:

a) trade terms: cargo, embargo;

b) names of dances and musical instruments: tango, rumba, habanera, guitar;

c) names of vegetables and fruit: tomato, potato, tobacco, cocoa, banana, ananas, apricot;

d) ethnic customs: parade, matador.

German borrowings.

There are some 800 words borrowed from German into English. Some of them have classical roots, e.g. in some geological terms, such as: cobalt, bismuth, zink, quarts, gneiss, wolfram. There were also words denoting objects used in everyday life which were borrowed from German:  iceberg, lobby, rucksack, Kindergarten.In the period of the Second World War the following words were borrowed: Volkssturm, Luftwaffe, SS-man, Bundeswehr, gestapo, gas chamber and many others. After the Second World War the following words were borrowed: Berufsverbot, Volkswagen.

Holland borrowings.

Holland and England have constant interrelations for many centuries and more than 2000 Holland borrowings were borrowed into English. Most of them are nautical terms and were mainly borrowed in the 14-th century, such as freight, skipper, pump, keel, dock, reef, deck, leak, cruise, buoy. Others refer to the sphere of painting such as easel, sketch.

Russian borrowings.

There were constant contacts between England and Russia and they borrowed words from one language into the other. Among early Russian borrowings there are mainly words connected with trade relations, such as: rouble, copeck, pood, sterlet, vodka, sable, and also words relating to nature, such as: taiga, tundra, steppe.

There is also a large group of Russian borrowings which came into English through Rushian literature of the 19-th century, such as Narodnik, moujik, duma, zemstvo, volost, ukase, and also words which were formed in Russian with Latin roots, such as nihilist, intelligenzia, Decembrist.

After the Great October Revolution many new words appeared in Russian connected with the new political system, new culture, and many of them were borrowed into English, such as collectivization,  udarnik, Komsomol and also translation loans, such as shock worker, collective farm,  five-year plan.

One more group of Russian borrowings is connected with perestroika and Russian history of latest decades, such as glasnost, nomenklatura, apparatchik, siloviki.

Borrowings continue to appear in Modern English as well. Mostly they are words formed with the help of Latin and Greek morphemes. There are quite a lot of them in medicine (appendicitis, aspirin), in chemistry (acid, valency, alkali), in technology (engine, antenna, biplane, airdrome), in politics (socialism, militarism), names of sciences (zoology, physics). In philology most of terms are of Greek origin (homonym, archaism, lexicography).

Plenty of borrowing into English led to appearance of the so-called etymological doublets. Etymological doublets are two words which were derived from the same basic word but by different routs. They differ in sound-form and meaning. For example, the words shirt and skirt are of Germanic origin, but the latter was borrowed from Scandinavian, that’s why the initial letter combination (sk) hadn’t been palatalized. Some doublets developed within the English language itself, such as Old English sceadu developed into shade, but its indirect case sceadwa resulted in Modern English shadow. Many etymolofical doublets are pairs where one word was borrowed directly from Latin and the other – from French, e.g. camera – chamber.

Some borrowings can be called international words, if they coincide in form and meaning with words of other languages, especially non-cognate ones. These are terms of science, technology, politics, culture, e.g. actual, fact, sonnet, democracy, capitalism, и т.д.