Development of Vocabulary in Mod E

There were different sources of enriching the Eng vocabulary – they were Latin and Celtic in Old English , Scandinavian and French in Middle English , the Mod E state of things is characterized more by Eng. Influence on the other languauges than by the reverse. New words appeared in the l-ge built by traditional word building process –derivation, compounding, semantic word building > derivation, conversion.

Derivation. The most productive suffixes of the period were :

Noun-sufixes –er 9 trader, manager, explorer)

Now suffixes – ing ( forming, stocking, acting)

Adjective suffixes – y ( healthy, wavy)

Adjective suffixes – ful (beautiful, hopeful)

Adj. prefixation un-, mis- ( unfortunate)

Noun suffixes – ment ( treatment, amazement)

Suffix – able (removable, enjoyable)

Compounding – productive way of making new words. Schoolboy, long-faced, heartbroken. Clipping – long borrowed words were shortened: gent –gentleman; cab (cabriolet), exam ( examination), bus( omnibus) , doc(doctor)

Zero –derivational conversion – like any other l-ge Old English had a distinctive suffix of the infinitive and denominal verb. In ME with the leveling of ending these pairs were love – loven, rest-resten. Finally the endings were lost and the noun and the verb coincided in form love n.-love – love v., rest n. – rest v.

Among the nouns turned into verbs in the Early New English: clean, empty, heand.

46. The Linguistic Consequences Of The Scandinavian invasion

TheScandinavian invasions had far-reaching linguistic consequences which became apparent mainly in ME; the greater part of lexical borrowings from Old Scandinavian were not recorded until the 13^th c.

A considerable part of the vocabulary was common to English and to Scandinavian dialects. In many words the root was the same, while endings were different. Compare the following list of OE words and their Scandinavian counterparts:

OE SCANDINAVIAN

Fisc(fish) fiskr

Cynin(king) konongr

Stan (styone) stein

Heorte (heart) hiarta

Another part of Scandinavian vocabulary did not correspond to English. It is in this sphere that Scandinavian dialects influenced English. This influence covered a considerable semantic field: they mostly pertain to everyday life and do not differ from native words, e.g. wrang ‘wrong’, skye ‘sky’, ‘cloud’, sister. Both in ME and nowadays it is difficult to distinguish Scandinavian loans form native words. The only criteria are some phonetic features of borrowed words: the consonant cluster [sk] is a frequent mark of Scandinavian loan-words, e.g. sky, skill. The sounds [S] and [sk] are sometimes found in related words in the two languages: native shirt and the Scandinavian loan-word skirt are etymological doublets (which means that they go back to the same Germanic root but have been subjected to different phonetic and semantic changes.

Other criteria of the same type are the sounds [k] and [g] before front vowels, which in native words normally became [C] and [G]. Cf. kid (from O Scand) and chin (native, from OE cin), girth (from O Scand) and yield (from OE Zieldan).

Only the earliest loan-words deal with military and legal matters and reflect the relations of the people during the Danish raids and Danish rule. These early borrowings are Late OE barda, cnearr, sceZþ(different types of ships), cnīf (NE knife), liþ ‘fleet’, orrest ‘battle’. Among legal terms are Late OElagu ‘law’, ūtlaZu ‘outlaw’, feolaZa ‘fellow’, hūsbonda ‘husband’, and also the verb tacan ‘take’.

The word law is derived from O Scand lóg which meant ‘that which is laid down’. It was adopted as early as the 10^th c. and was preserved together with its derivatives: ME outlaw, NE in-law, lawyer;ME bylaw goes back to bÿr ‘town’ and lawe and denotes ‘town’ or ‘local law’. The word husbandwas originally a legal term ‘house holder’, one who owns a house; similarly fellow which stemmed from O Scand fēlagi indicated one who lays down a fee, as a partner or shareholder. In the subsequent centuries many Scandinavian military and legal terms disappeared or were displaced by French terms.

Even the 3^rd person plural personal pronoun was taken over from Scandinavian into English. The Scandinavian þeir penetrated into English and, superseding the OE pronoun hīe, became ME they. In a similar way the Genitive of the Scandinavian pronoun, þeirra, superseded the native hira and became ME their, and the Dative þeim superseded the native him and became ME them.

Scandinavian elements became parts of many geographical names, e.g. by ‘village’ in Kirkby, Whitby, Derby; toft ‘grassy spot’, ‘hill’ in Langtoft; beck ‘rivulet’ in Troutbeck; ness ‘cape’ in Inverness, Caithness, etc.

Date: 2015-12-24; view: 1049