- •The Germanic languages. The Germanic tribes.
- •3.The North Germanic languages.
- •4.The West Germanic languages.
- •5.The periods in the History of English.
- •6.The Old English dialects and the formation of English language.
- •7.Middle English dialects and the formation of the National Literary English Language.
- •8.The Anglo –Saxon conquest and its historical and linguistic importance.
- •9.The historical background of Middle English.
- •10.The development of Middle English dialects.
- •11.The development of the English Vocabulary.
- •12.The English Basic Word Stock.
- •13.Foreign Influences upon English and their importance.
- •14.The Celtic influence.
- •15.The Latin influence.
- •16.The Scandinavian influence.
- •17.The French influence.
- •18.Phonetic peculiarities of Germanic languages.
- •19.The Germanic phonetic system.
- •20.First Consonant Shift (Grimm’s and Verner’s law).
- •21.Principles oe phonetic changes (breaking,I-umlaut (mutation) lengthening of vowels).
- •After sk’ k’
- •2. After j
- •22.Consonant changes in oe. Oe alphabets.
- •Voicing or devoicing
- •After sk’ k’
- •2. After j
- •23.Middle English spelling change and principal sound changes.
- •24.Weakening of Unaccented Vowels and its results.
- •25.Consonant changes in Middle English.
- •Voicing of Fricatives
- •The Great Vowel Shift and its importance.
- •Modern English consonant changes (Vocalization of r, appearance of sibilants in new positions, loss of consonants).
- •Phonetic analysis of Old English sound changes.
- •Phonetic analysis of Middle English and Modern English phonetic change.
- •The Evolution of the Old English phonetic system.
- •Middle English spelling change and principal sound changes.
- •The evolution of the English Noun.
- •The evolution of the Verb.
- •The evolution of the English Adjective.
- •The evolution of the English Pronoun.
- •The evolution of the English Numeral.
- •The evolution of the English Syntax.
- •The discovery of Sanskrit.
- •The Indo-European Family.
- •Grimm’s Law.
- •The Romans in Britain. Romanization of the Island.
- •The Latin Language in Britain.
- •The Anglo-Saxon Civilization. The names “England” and “English”.
- •The Periods in the History of English.
- •The dialects of Old English.
- •Verner’s Law
- •The Definite Article.
- •The Norman Conquest. The origin of Normandy.
- •The Influence of Christianity on the Vocabulary.
- •80. Preterite-present and suppletive verbs.
- •81. The development of analytical tenses.
- •84. Wessex dialect.
- •85. Old English dialect and formation of the English language.
- •86. The periods in the history of English.
- •88. The main oe dialects.
- •89. The development of the English vocabulary. The English Basic Word Stock
- •92. Me phonetic system. Weakening of the unaccentedwords.
- •2.Development of oe å
- •94. Modern English phonetic changes. The Great Vowel Shift.
- •95. Modern English phonetic changes. Vocalization of “r”.
- •96. The importance of the Anglo-Saxon Conquest.
- •100. The definite article
- •Vikings and their influence on English.
- •Grammatical changes in Old English.
- •Grammatical changes in Middle English.
- •Grammatical changes in Early Modern English.
- •Loss of case system in Old English.
- •English as a Germanic language. Periods in the history of English.
- •Main Germanic historical written monuments.
- •London dialect. Formation of National language.
- •Phonetic changes in Germanic languages.
- •Word Stress
- •Consonants. Proto-Germanic consonant shift
- •Phonetic changes in Old English.
- •Phonetic changes in Middle English.
- •Phonetic changes in Early New English. Great Vowel Shift.
- •Word-building in Old and Middle English periods.
- •Main sources of borrowings in Old English.
- •Main sources of borrowings in Middle English.
- •Main sources of borrowings in Modern English.
- •The Noun. Main categories, declensions.
- •Main causes of losing the case system in English.
- •The adjective.
- •Development of degrees of comparison of adjectives.
- •Personal pronouns.
- •Possessive pronouns.
- •Demonstrative and indefinite pronouns.
- •Development of the articles.
- •Strong verbs in the history of English.
- •The periods in the History of English.
- •Middle English Prosody
- •Latin Borrowings
- •Scandinavian Borrowings
- •French Borrowings
- •Celtic Borrowings
- •Greek Borrowings
- •Semantic Borrowings
The evolution of the Verb.
The development of the verb in ME and NE was marked by two contradictory tendencies. On the one hand the verb system got simplified, on the other hand it became more complicated.
Simplification affected synthetic means of building verb forms. As a result the English verb lost its person and number distinctions in many positions.
Alongside this the system of the English verb gained its complexity by developing new categorial forms and new categories. These new forms and categories came to be expressed analytically.
|
Old English |
Middle English |
Modern English |
tense |
Present Past |
Present Past + analytical tenses |
16 tenses |
mood |
Imperative Subjunctive Indicative |
Imperative Subjunctive Indicative |
Imperative Subjunctive Indicative |
number |
Singular Plural |
Singular Plural |
Singular Plural |
person |
First Second Third |
First Second Third |
First Second Third |
voice |
Active |
Active, passive |
Active, passive |
The grammatical analysis of OE, ME, Mod E.
The evolution of the English Adjective.
Old English:
Adjectives could be weak or strong. If preceded by a determiner, the weak ending was added to the adjective. If no determiner preceded the adjective, then the strong endings were used. They also agreed in gender, case and number with the nouns they described. The comparative was formed by adding -ra to the adjective, while the superlative had many endings: -ost, -ist, -est, and -m. Eventually the -ost and -m endings combined to form the word "most" which is still used before adjectives in the superlative today.
Middle English:
Adjectives lost agreement with the noun, but the weak ending -e still remained. The comparative form became -er and the superlative became -est. Vowels tended to be long in the adjective form, but short in the comparative form (late - latter). The demonstratives these and those were added during this period. And the adverb ending -lič became -ly; however, some "flat" adverbs did not add the -ly: fast, late, hard.
Early Modern English:
Adjectives lost all endings except for in the comparative and superlative forms. The neuter pronoun it was first used as well as who as a relative pronoun. The class distinctions between formal and informal you were decreasing, so that today there is no difference between them. More strong verbs became weak and the third person singular form became -(e)s instead of -(e)th. There was a more limited use of the progressive and auxiliary verbs than there is now, however. Negatives followed the verb and multiple negatives were still used.