- •Lecture 1.
- •Introductory. General characteristics of germanic languages
- •2. Inner and outer history of the language
- •3. Chief characteristics of the Germanic languages
- •3.1. Phonetics
- •Indo-European Germanic
- •Indo-European Germanic
- •3.2. Grammar
- •3.3. Alphabet
- •Lecture 2. Old english. General characteristics
- •Outer history
- •1.1. Pre-Germanic history of Britain The Celts
- •The Latin Language in Britain
- •Britain’s Roman villas
- •The Names “England” and “English”
- •1.2. Anglo-Saxon Civilization
- •1.3. Introduction of Christianity
- •1.4. Principal written records of the Old English period
- •2. Dialectal classification of Old English written records
- •2.1. The dialects in Old English
- •2.2. Old English written records Runic inscriptions
- •2. Inner history
- •3.1. Phonetics
- •3.2. Spelling
- •3.3. Grammar
- •3.4. Vocabulary
- •Lecture 3. Middle english. General characteristics
- •1. Outer history
- •1.1. The Scandinavian Invasions in England
- •1.2. Effect of the Scandinavian Invasions
- •1.3. The Norman Conquest
- •1.4. Effect of the Norman Conquest on the linguistic situation
- •1.4. Early Middle English dialects
- •5. Formation of the National language
- •2. Inner history
- •2.1. Phonetics
- •2.2. Grammar
- •Some grammatical features viewed diachronically
- •Тнe problem of spelling pronunciation
- •Lecture 4. New english. General characteristics
- •1. Outer history
- •1.1. Emergence of the nation
- •1.2. Establishment of the literary norm
- •Geographical expansion of English in the 17th – 20th centuries and its effect on the language
- •Cultural Development in the 14th Century
- •Pre-renaissance culture
- •English renaissance
- •2. Inner history
- •2.1. Phonetics
- •2.1.1. The system of stress
- •2.1.2. Consonants
- •2.1.3. Vowels
- •2.2. Grammar
- •2.3. Word-stock
- •Lecture 5.
- •1. Old english vowels
- •1.1. Origin of Old English vowel phonemes
- •1.2. Changes in Old English vowel phonemes
- •1.2.1. Breaking
- •1.2.2.Palatal mutation
- •Monophthongs
- •1.2.3. Effect of palatal mutation upon grammar and word-stock
- •Verb Verb
- •Old english consonants
- •Voicing of Fricatives in Proto-Germanic (Verner’s Law)
- •Lecture 5. Old english grammar. The nominal system
- •Old English grammar
- •2. General survey of the nominal system
- •Grammatical categories of declinable parts of speech
- •2. The noun
- •2.1. Gender
- •Masculine
- •Feminine
- •2.2. Number
- •2.3. Case
- •Nominative plural
- •Declensions in Old English
- •Vowel-stems. Declension of a-stem nouns
- •Consonant stems. Declension of n-stem nouns
- •Declension of a-stem nouns
- •Declension of n-stem nouns
- •Declension of root-stem nouns
- •Declension of root-stem nouns
- •2.4. Homonymity of forms in Old English and its influence on the further development of noun forms
- •3. The pronoun
- •3.1. The personal pronoun
- •Masculine feminine neuter
- •Singular dual Plural
- •Declension of the personal pronoun Ic
- •3.2. Other pronouns
- •Declension of the demonstrative pronoun sē
- •The adjective
- •4.1. Declension of adjectives
- •Declension of adjectives
- •4.2. Degrees of comparison
- •Summary
- •Lecture
- •1. General survey of finite and non-finite forms of the verb
- •Ic зā tō drincenne (I go to drink)
- •2. Grammatical categories of the finite forms of the verb
- •2.1. Person
- •2.2. Number
- •3. Morphological classification of verbs lecture 6 changes in the phonetic system in middle english and new english
- •Changes in the Phonetic System in Middle English
- •Vowels in the unstressed position
- •Vowels under stress
- •1.2.1. Qualitative changes
- •Diphthongs
- •1.2.2. Quantative changes
- •Consonants
- •Summary – Middle English
- •2. Changes in the phonetic system in New English
- •2.1. Vowels in the unstressed position
- •2.2. Vowels under stress
- •2.2.1. Qualitative changes
- •Middle English New English
- •Influence of the consonant “r” upon the Great Vowel Shift
- •Middle English New English
- •Summary – New English
- •Vowels – qualitative changes:
- •Vowels – Quantitative changes:
- •3. Changes in alphabet and spelling in Middle and New English
- •Lecture 7 changes in the nominal system in middle english and new english
- •1. General survey of grammar changes in Middle English and New English
- •2. The noun
- •2.1. Middle English
- •2.2. New English
- •2.2.1. Morphological classification
- •2.2.2. Origin of modern irregular noun forms
- •2.2.3. Grammatical categories
- •3. The adjective
- •Degrees of Comparison
- •Comfortable – more comfortable.
- •Summary
- •Lecture 8 changes in the verbal system in middle and new english
- •1. Non-Finite forms (verbals)
- •I thanked him for brining the happy tidings.
- •2. Morphological classification of verbs in Middle English and New English
- •2.1. Strong verbs
- •2.1.1. Classes of the strong verbs
- •2.1.2. Principal forms of the strong verbs
- •2.2. Weak verbs
- •2.2.1. Classes of the weak verbs
- •2.2.2. Principal forms of the weak verbs
- •2.3. Origin of modern irregular verbs
- •3. Grammatical categories of the English verb
- •Summary
- •Lecture 9 english vocabulary
- •1. Old English
- •General characteristics
- •1.2. Means of enriching vocabulary
- •1.2.1. Internal means of enriching vocabulary
- •Vowel interchange:
- •2. Middle English
- •3. New English
- •Lecture 12
- •2. Native element in Modern English
- •2.1. Common indo-European stratum
- •2.2. Common Germanic stratum
- •3. Foreign element in Modern English (borrowings)
- •3.1. Latin element
- •3.2. Scandinavian element
- •3.3. French element
- •4. Word-hybrids
- •5. Etymological doublets
- •6. Sources of the new words in modern English
2.2. Old English written records Runic inscriptions
The word rune originally meant “secret”, “mystery” and they are believed to be magic. There is no doubt that the Germanic tribes knew the runic writing long before they came to Britain. The first runes were found in Scandinavia. The runes were used as letters; each symbol indicated a separate sound.
The runic alphabet is a specifically Germanic one, which cannot be found in other Indo-European languages. The shape of preferred, this is due to the fact that all runic inscriptions were cut in hard material: stone, bone, wood.
The number of runes in different Old Germanic languages greatly varied from 28 to 33 runes in Britain against 16 or 24 on the mainland. Runes were used only for short inscriptions on the objects in order to bestow some special power or magic on them and they were not used in writing.
The two best known runic inscriptions in England are “Franks Casket”, and “Ruth well Cross”. Both records are in Northumbrian dialect.
The first English manuscripts were written in Latin letters. The center of learning was monasteries and the monks were practically the only literate people. The religious services were conducted in Latin and the first English writings appeared in Latin letters. English scribes modified the Latin script to suit their needs: the shape of some letters was changed and new symbols which indicated the English sounds, for which Latin had no equivalents, were added.
The first English words were personal names and place names inserted in Latin texts, and then came glosses and longer textual insertions.
The first official documents were written in Latin, but later they were written in local dialects, because not many people knew Latin. Among the earliest insertions in Latin texts are pieces of poetry. Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum written in Latin in the 8 th c. contains an English fragment of five lines known as “Bede’s Death Song” and a religious poem of nine lines, “Cadmon’s Hymn” Old English poetry is mainly restricted to three subjects: heroic, religious and lyrical. Most of poetry is believed to be composed at that time when there was no writing and they existed in oral form and handed down from one generation to another.
The greatest poem of the Old English period was Beowulf, an epic of the 7th c. As some linguists and historians Consider this epic was composed in the Mercian or Northumbrian dialect, but came to the present time in West Saxon dialect. Beowulf consists of several songs arranged in three chapters (over 3 000 lines in all). It is based on old legends about the ancient Teutons. It depicts the life and fight of the legendary hero Beowulf, some extracts of the epic describes the real historical events.
In the 10th c. when the old heroic versus began to decline, some new poems were composed which were the picture of the real historical events. Among them were the chronicles: the battle of Brunanburh, the Battle of Maldon. They depicted the wars with the Scots, the Picts and the invaders from Scandinavia.
Old English poetry is characterized by the so-called system of versification Old Germanic alliterative verse. The structure of this verse is this: the line is divided into two halves with two strongly stressed syllables in each half and is bound together by the use of the same sound at the beginning of two stressed syllables in the line. The lines are not rhymed and the number of the syllables in a line is pee.
There is another specification in Old English poetry: the use of metaphorical phrases as hēapu-swāt – “war sweat” (blood). The greatest written monument of the Anglo-Saxon poetry of that time was the poem “Beowulf” that was created early in the 7th century and had 3182 lines full not only of masterful descriptions and dignified speeches but also of fine lyrical feeling which is in keeping with the whole body of early Anglo-Saxon poetry.
The plot is simple enough: in the first part of the poem Beowulf, a young hero of the Geats (a tribe that lived in the southern part of Sweden), hears of a sea monster Grendel preying upon Hrothgar the king of the Danes killing his warriors right after their feast in the “middle hall” called Heorot. So he goes with his men to kill this monster and free the Danes from the terror of the monster. He mortally wounds him in the single combat with his bare hands and then kills another, who is more terrible and much stronger than the first. It is Grendel’s mother who wants to take revenge upon Beowulf and the people for her son’s death. Beowulf kills the second monster in her cave with the magic sword that he wrests from the enemy. The poem symbolized a triumph of human courage over the hostile forces of nature.
The second part of the poem greatly influenced by Christianity after its introduction into the early Germanic society tells about Beowulf where he is an aged king an ideal king of the tribal society who peacefully and wisely rules the Danes. At that time appears a fire-breathing monster that hoards the gold and a plenty of treasure in a cave and becomes a grave menace for people. Gold is shown here as a force which threatens the tribal society, that brings discord and destruction. Desire of gold is the root of all evil and Beowulf dies protecting his people from the great menace of gold which is implied in the image of this monster.
Literary critics highly appreciate the aesthetic quality of “Beowulf” considering it to be the masterpiece of the old Germanic prose. Some of them think that this poem was written by one author, probably acquainted with the traditions of the Latin epic narrative. They concluded it on the bases of comparisons which were made on Virgil’s “Aeneid”. There was another opposite opinion, classifying the poem as a sort of synthesis of the Germanic epics and the topic of the Biblical stories, treating Grendel as a descendant of Cain and making allusions to the struggle of God and Satana in connection with hero’s struggle against evil forces.
The earliest sample of prose works are: the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles which are of no great importance as a literary work but are of great interest for the linguists because they were written in spoken language and they are much better than sophisticated Translations from Latin.
The flourishing of learning and literature began in the times of reign of King Alfred. He was a learned man and realized that culture hat to be developed in mother tongue. He translated from Latin books on geography, history, philosophy. One of his most important contributions is the West Saxon version of Orosius’s World History (Historiarum Adversus paganos Libri Septem “Seven books of history against the heathens”). This is the description where the Germanic languages were spoken, the story of two voyages which were made one by Ohthere, a Norwegian, who sailed along the coast of Scandinavia into the Write Sea and the other Wulfstan, a Dane, who had traveled round the Baltic Sea. Another work is book for instructions for priests Pastoral Care (Cura Pastoralis) by Pope Gregory the Great.
Another outstanding writer of the Old English period was Aelfric who created the alliterative prose work “The Lives of the saints”. He was the first to translate from Latin some parts of the Holy Bible. He was known also as educator he wrote a Latin Grammar giving Old English equivalents of Latin forms and constructions.
Wulfstan was the prominent late West Saxon author, was an Archbishop of York in the early 11th c.