3. Verner's Law.

Phenomena that are somewhat more complicated have been formulated in Verner's law. In some words, we find in Germanic languages consonants, which do not fit into Grimm's law. In Germanic words d but not þ corresponds to Indo-European t; g but not h corresponds to Indo-European k, (Compare Latin pater, Greek patēr, Sanskrit pitár and Gothic fadar, Old English fædar; Greek deáks and Gothic tigus). The Danish scholar Karl Verner explained these apparent exceptions to Grimm's law. If an Indo-European voiceless stop was preceded by an unstressed vowel, the voiceless fricative, which developed from it in accordance with Grimm's law, became voiced, and later this voiced fricative became a voiced stop. In the Greek word patēr the voiceless stop t was preceded by an unstressed vowel. Under these circumstances, the voiceless fricative þ, which developed from it in accordance with Grimm's law, became a voiced fricative ð. eventually this voiced fricative developed into the voiced stop d. (t → þ [θ] → ð → d). It is especially evident if we compare two words differing by the position of stress: Greek déka, Ukrainian десять, Russian десять, Gothic taihun but Greek dekás, Ukrainian десятка, Russian десяток, Gothic tigus. These are not exceptions to Grimm's law, but results of a further development of a consonant resulting from this law.

Besides the voiceless fricative consonants resulting from the consonant shift, Verner's law, the consonant s, affects one voiceless fricative consonant. If the preceding vowel is unstressed, s in German languages becomes voiced, that is changes into z. eventually this z becomes r in Western Germanic and Northern Germanic languages (but not in Gothic). This letter change z > r is termed rhotacism (the term is derived from the name of the Greek letter "rhō". This is clearly shown by comparing Gothic hausjan, Old English hieran, German hören; Gothic laisjan, Old English læran, German lehren.

3. Stress in Germanic Languages

Verner's law gives rise to another question, which is fundamental for the problem of the origin of Germanic languages. In all extant Old Germanic texts, the stress falls on the initial syllable (the root syllable) of each word. However, Verner's law shows that in some cases the root vowel in Germanic languages was originally unstressed. This leads to the conclusion that originally stress in Germanic languages had been free. That is, in different words different syllables could be stressed. Such a system was preserved in Slavonic languages, in Greek (with some limitations), and in Sanskrit. The extant literary texts preserve it. In the earliest Germanic texts, we find a system of fixed stress in the first syllable. The system was the result of a change of the original free-stress system, which was superseded by a fixed-stress system. This discovery of Verner had important consequences. Compare glad, gladly, gladden, gladness, gladsome and transit, transition, transitive, transitivity.