booklet_3rd_12

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ME [ks] > NE [Öz] eDxamine, eDxhibit

ME [t∫] > NE [dʒ] knowledge (< ME. knowleche), but: Greenwich [DÖrinidʒ].

4.3.4. Development of new sibilants and affricates:

[t + j] > [t∫] Dculture, Dcentury, but: Dtune, Dstudent

[s + j] > [∫] DRussian, DAsia, Dnation, but: Dsuit, aDssume; [z + j] > [ʒ] deDcision, Dusual, Dmeasure, but: reDsume; [d + j] > [dʒ] Dsoldier, but: Dduty, inDduce.

Test yourself:

1.Which new digraphs for vowels were introduced?

2.Why did the Great Vowel Shift make English spelling and pronunciation still further apart?

3.Which consonant groups were simplified?

4.How did new sibilants and affricates develop?

5.What changes are called combinative?

6.What happened to ME diphthong [aυ] in ENE?

7.How did vowel [a] develop before voiceless fricatives?

8.Which Middle English vowels were delabialized?

9.What happened to endings after the syllables with short vowels?

10.How did the liquid [r] change in ENE?

11.Which ME diphthongs remained unchanged in ENE?

12.In what position were fricatives voiced in ENE?

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Historical Development of Grammar and Vocabulary

Historical Morphology

English grammar is so complex and confusing for the one very simple reason that its rules and terminology are based on Latin, a language with which it has precious little in common.

Bill Bryson

Starter activity

You may know the rhyme given below. In small groups, discuss the possible reasons for obvious difference in modern English grammar:

The Funniest Language?

We'll begin with a box and the plural is boxes. But the plural of ox should be oxen, not oxes.

The one fowl is a goose but two are called geese, Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

You may found a lone mouse or a whole set of mice, Yet the plural of house is houses not hice.

If the plural of man is always called men, Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?

If I speak of a foot and you show me your feet, And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?

If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,

Why should not the plural of booth be called beeth? Then one may be that and three would be those,

Yet hat in the plural wouldn't be hose.

And the plural of cat is cats and not cose. We speak of a brother and also of brethren,

But though we say Mother, we never say Methren, Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,

But imagine the feminine she, shis and shim, So English, I fancy you will all agree,

Is the funniest language you ever did see.

(Anonymous)

You might find it interesting to know that…

The most significant change between Old and Modern English is the shift from many to few endings and the introduction of grammatical words such as prepositions (Elly van Gelderen).

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Topic 1. The Noun

The structure of a PG noun was root / stem-building siffix / ending: Goth. sunus = sun / u / us. The paradigm of the noun depended on its stem-building suffix. In OE the stem-building suffixes often fused with the endings.

The OE noun distinguished three genders, four cases, two numbers. Each noun traditionally belonged to one of the declensions.

Vowel (Strong) Declensions:

Table 1.1 a – stem declension (M, N)

Table 1.3 u – stem declension (M, F)

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Table 1.4 i – stem declension (M, F, N)

Consonant (Minor) Declensions:

Table 1.6 r – stem declension (M, F)

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Table 1.7 root – stem declension (M, F)

Topic 2. The Adjective

In OE the Adjective distinguished three genders, two numbers, five cases (in masculine and neuter genders). The adjectives could decline according to either weak or strong declension, thus showing the definite or indefinite meaning. In addition to that the adjective had three degrees of comparison (positive, comparative and superlative). If there was a demonstrative or possessive pronoun before the noun which was modified by the adjective, the meaning of this adjective was definite, and it declined according to the weak declension, otherwise the adjective declined strong.

There were some adjectives that always declined strong (eal, maniʒ, oþer), while

several others were always weak (adjectives in the comparative and superlative degrees, the adjective ilca ‘same’).

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Test yourself:

Noun and Adjective

1.What category of the OE noun has proved to be the most stable?

2.What were the main structural parts of an OE word?

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3.Which OE noun declension was the most important and why?

4.In which period of the English language history did the analytical form of degrees of comparison develop?

5.Which OE noun declensions were strong?

6.When was the weak declension of OE adjectives used?

7.How can you characterize the category of gender of the OE noun?

8.Which category of the OE adjective has proved to be the most stable?

9.Which OE nouns belonged to (e)s– and r– stem declensions?

10.What were the markers for the degrees of comparison of OE adjectives? 11.What was the paradigm of an OE noun determined by?

12.How did the category of case of the noun rearrange in the ME period?

Topic 3. The Pronoun

OldEnglishPersonalPronouns:

The OE personal pronouns possessed three persons and four cases. Personal pronouns of the 1st and 2nd person had three numbers: singular, dual, and plural, while the 3rd person pronouns distinguished three genders in singular.

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Old English Demonstrative Pronouns:

OE demonstrative pronouns declined like adjectives according to a five-case system. They were frequently used as noun determiners and through agreement with the noun, indicated its number, gender and case.

The OE demonstrative sē, which functioned both as a demonstrative with the meaning ‘that’ and as the equivalent to present-day English ‘the’, played a crucial role.

Table 3.2

Demonstrative Pronoun 'that' ('those')

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Topic 4. The Adverb

OE adverbs were either primary (original) or derived from adjectives. Among the primary / original / simple adverbs were the following: adverbs of place – hw r ‘where’, a r ‘there’, hwonan ‘from where’, aanon ‘from there, thence’; adverbs of time – hwanne, hwan, hwon ‘when’, aanne, aonne, aeonne ‘then’, aā ‘then’; adverbs of manner

– hwæare ‘though, however’, hwōn ‘a little’, a r-bi ‘thereby, by that means’, a r-æfter

‘thereafter, from time to time’.

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Topic 6. The Numeral

•13 – 19: cardinal numeral + –īene / –tyne (þrīotīene / þrīotyne, fēowertīene, fīftīene);

•20 – 60: cardinal numeral + –tiʒ (twentiʒ, þrītiʒ, fēowertiʒ);

•70 – 90: hund + cardinal numeral + –tiʒ (hundseofontiʒ, hundeahtatiʒ, hundniʒontiʒ;

•100 – hund, hundred, hundtēntiʒ, hundtēontiʒ;

•120 – hundtwelftiʒ

•1000 – ðūsend;

•22nd – twā and twentiʒoða