Latin loans in dif. historical periods of English

Latin has been the most long-lasting donor of borrowings to English because its influence started before the 5^th A.D. (when Anglo-Saxons still lived on the Continent) and continues up to present day.

Usually Latin borrowings in OEare classified into the following layers:

1)Continental borrowings – words that the West Germanic tribes borrowed from Latin while they still lived on the Continent. Later, when they conquered the British Isles, they brought these words with them. These words are present in all the Germanic languages.

Semantic fields:

concrete objects(household (cup, pillow, etc.), food (cheese, butter, etc.), animals (mule, turtle, etc.));

units of measurement(mile, pound, inch, etc.).

2)Borrowings after the Roman Invasion of the British Isles (through the Romanised Celts) that lie within the following semantic areas:

-trade(trade, deal, chest, flask, etc.);

-building(chalk, file, copper, etc.);

-domestic life(dish, kettle, etc.);

-military affairs(wall, street, pile, etc.);

-place names:

castra(“castle”)(Chester, Lancaster, etc.);

wich(“village”) (Norwich, Woolwich, etc.);

port(“port“) (Bridport, Devonport, etc.).

3)Borrowings after the Introduction of Christianity(597) that lie within the following semantic areas:

-religion(angel, hymn, idol, pope, psalm; from Greek through Latin – anthem, bishop, candle, apostle, etc.);

-learning(school, scholar, master, verse, accent, grammar, etc.);

-everyday life(plant, pine, radish, cap, sock, etc.).

Plus there appeared a lot of so-called translation loans – words that were translated part-for-part from Latin (e.g. Monday (“moon day”, from Latin Lunae dies), goldsmith (from Latin aurifex (auri = gold, fex = worker)), etc.).

All Latin borrowings in OE underwent assimilation, i.e.:

-changed their spelling according to the English rules;

-underwent some phonetic changes according to the English rules;

-were used in derivation and compounding;

-acquired grammatical categories of the English parts of speech.

ME

After the Norman Conquest the main spheres of the Latin Language remained: church, law; academic activities.

-abstract concepts(anticipate, exact, exaggerate, explain, fact, dislocate, accommodation)

-affixes de-(demolish, destroy, etc.),

-ex-(extract, , explore, explain, etc.),

-re-(reread, retell, retry, etc.),

-ate(locate, excavate, etc.),

-ent(apparent, present, turbulent, etc.),

-ct(correct, erect, etc.)

Fate of these Borrowings in English:

1)Many of them underwent a shift of meaning:

e.g. Lat. musculus (literally “little mouse”) à Eng. muscle;

2)Many of them formed the basis for international terminology:

e.g. Latin borrowings: facsimile, introvert, radioactive, relativity

3)Many of them increased the number synonymsin English:

kingly(native germ. Word) – royal(Fr.bor.) – regal (Latin borrowing)

56) OE poetry + Beowulf

The peculiarities of Old English poetry:

-written in Old Germanic alliterative verse:

-the lines are not rhymed;

-the number of the syllables in a line is free;

-the number of stressed syllables in a line is fixes;

-the line is usually divided into 2 halves, each half starts with one and the same sound; this sound may be repeated also in the middle of each half

The style of OE poetry is marked by the wide use of metaphorical phrases compounds, describing the qualities of the thing. This kind of metaphor led to the composition of riddles (contained description of nature, all kinds of everyday objects = a sort of encyclopedia)

The two best known Old English poets are Cædmon and Cynewulf (Northumbrian authors).

The topics of Old English poetry:

-heroic epic(“Beowulf”)

-lyrical poems(“The Wanderer”, “The Seafarer”, etc. Most of the poems are ascribed to Cynewulf);

-religious poems(“Fate of the Apostles” (probably Cædmon), “Dream of the Rood”, etc.).

“Beowulf”- the oldest in the Germanic literature, 7^th c., was written in Mercian or Northumbrian but has come down to us only in a 10^th c. West Saxon copy. It is based on old legends about the tribal life of the ancient Teutons and features the adventures and fights of the legendary heroes.

-vocabulary ( is not used in everyday life since it is epic: hero, warrior, battle, kind of weapons, sea, ship /are not Br. but Scand.)

- alliteration repetition of consonants (as good as gold), the word with alliteration should be given more prominence. The poem was intended to be read & heard.

- kenning – a double metaphor (2 parts) wudu bundenne

-synonym: ship (flota, bat, naca, wudu bundenne)

Warrior (beornas, weras, зuman)

Borrowings in NE.

17c. is characterized by further growth of vocabulary due to borrowing of words from colonial lang-s & also from France. It is connected with growth of intern. commercial ties; words denoted

-products brought into England from the New World

- names of animals

e.g. North Am. canoe, hammock, potato, tobacco

South Am. puma, guano, condor,tapir

French loan words of this period were far more important:

-notions typical for feudal culture (bizarre)

-words of wider meaning (grotesque, naïve, ridicule,suite)

Pronunciation peculiarities:

-the stress often remains on the last syllable

- keep Fr. Pronunciation (naïve, magazine, police /i:/ )

-the digraph –ch=/S/ (chemise)

-final –t is silent (ballet)

18-20ccwords from all over the world

-denoting names of commodities

-denoting ideas, customs peculiar of some countries

(Germ. kindergarten, superman; India: bungalow; Chinese: coolie)

-A number of artificial words derived from Greek roots (telegraph, telephone, oxygen)

-Russian borrowings (samovar, tzar)

-after 1917 words reflecting an idea of building socialism ( udarnik, sputnik, soviet)

1)The OE languages, their classification & principal features

All of these lan-s have common linguistic features

1)Phonetical level

- the system of word accentuation: only dynamic stress& fixed on the 1^st syllable/root or prefix/. Is not movable-the other syllables are weakened-loss of ending== transformation of E. from synthetical l-ge to analytic one (OE sunu-ME sune-NE son)

-the 1^st consonant shift (Grimm’s law) establishes the regular correspondences b/w IE & germ. consonants.

IE Germ

P,t,k f,θ,h

B,d,g p,t.k

Bh,dh,gh b,d,g

2)Grammatical level

-the new way of forming the Past tense of verb by suffixation mainly by using d/t (macian-macode)

-double system of adj.declension (weak & strong)

3) lexical level

All words in Germ.l. show consid. number of words which are not to be found in other Eur. l-es 13% (sea, land, horse, ship)

All the characteristics make it possible to single out G.l-es as a separate group within the IE family alongside Romans, Celtic, Slavonic…

London Dialect

In the 12^th -13^th c.the London Dialect became the literary language and the standard,both in written and spoken form. The reasons why this happened:

-The capital of the country was transferred from Winchester, Wesses, to London a few years before the Norman Conquests.

-The East Saxon Dialect, that was the basis of the London Dialect got, became the most prominent in the Middle English period.

-Most writers and authors of the Middle English period used the London Dialect in their works.

Features of the London Dialect:

-The basis of the London Dialect was the East Saxon Dialect

-The East Saxon Dialect mixed with the East Midland Dialect and formed the London Dialect.

-Thus the London Dialect became more Anglican than Saxon in character à The London Dialect is an Anglican dialect.

Date: 2015-12-18; view: 1692