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Old English Phonology, Morphology and Syntax.The system of vowels in Old English included seven long and eight short vowels The length of the vowel was a phonemic quality. The words having long and short vowels differed in meaningthe sound might change when it was preceded or followed by some other sound or sound cluster. There are two types of assimilation - regressive and progressive assimilation. If a sound influences the preceding sound, the assimilation is regressive, if it influences the following it sound - it is called progressive assimilation. Both types of assimilation are found in Old English. So: 1. Breaking (fracture). This is the process of formation of a short diphthong from a simple short vowel when it is followed by a specific consonant cluster. Thus: a + r+cons, 1+cons = ea, æ + h+ cons = ea, e + h final = eo, hard-heard 2. Palatal mutation (i-umlaut) is that a back sound, a or o, changes its quality if there is a front sound in the next syllable. 3. Diphthongization after palatal consonants.Diphthongs may have resulted from another process in Old English - diphthongization after palatal consonants sk', k' and j (in spelling sc, c, ã) 4. Velar (Back) Mutation – a vowel acquired more back articulation before r, l, p, b, f, m: i-io=hira-hiora (their) 5. Mutation before h.Sounds a and e that preceded h underwent several changes, mutating to diphthongs ea, ie and finally were reduced to i/y: - naht - neaht - nilit - nieht - nyht (night). 6. Contraction.When h was placed between two vowels the following changes occurred:e + h + vowel > eo sehen - seon (see) Consonants: 1. Voicing of fricatives in intervocal position: f > v ofer (over) 2.Palatalization of the sounds k", sk' and kg' (marked as c, sc and cj) developed in assibilation, that is formation of a sibilant in places before front vowels.k' > tj cild (child) 3. Assimilation before t. The sound t when it was preceded by a number of consonants changed the quality of a preceding sound.wyrcan —» worhte (work - wrought) 4. Loss of consonants in certain positions. Besides h that was lost in intervocal position, the sounds n and mwere lost before h, entailing the lengthening of the preceding vowel:bronhte - brolite (brought) 5. Metathesis of r. In several Old English words the following change of the position of consonants takes place: cons+ r+ vowel > cons + vowel + r dridda - dirda (third) 6. West Germanic gemination of consonants.In the process of palatal mutation, when j was lost and the preceding vowel was short, the consonant after it was doubled (geminated): fulian - fyllan (fill) Old English was a synthetic language, i.e. there were a lot of inflections. Parts of Speech. In OE 9 parts of speech Noun. Number – Singular (Sg) and Plural (Pl). Gender– Masculine (M), Feminine (F), Neuter (N). Case– Nominative (Nom) (agent), Genitive (Gen) (attribute), Dative (Dat) (instrument, indirect/prepositional object), Accusative (Acc) (recipient, direct/prepositionless object). Types of Declension: strong, weak, root, minor. Degrees of Comparison – positive, comparative, superlative Adjectives. Number – Singular (Sg) and Plural (Pl). Gender – Masculine (M), Feminine (F), Neuter (N). Case– Nominative (Nom), Genitive (Gen), Dative (Dat), Accusative (Acc) + Instrumental (Instr). Instrumental Case was used to express instrumental meaning Pronoun -Personal •Person – 1st, 2nd, 3rd; •Number – Singular (Sg), Plural (Pl) + Dual (1st, 2nd pers. (we both, you both) when only two persons were meant); •Gender– Masculine (M), Feminine (F), Neuter (N) – only in 3rd person!; •Case – Nominative (Nom), Genitive (Gen), Dative (Dat), Accusative (Acc). -Demonstrative They had the following categories: •Number – Singular (Sg) and Plural (Pl); •Gender– Masculine (M), Feminine (F), Neuter (N); •Case– Nominative (Nom), Genitive (Gen), Dative (Dat), Accusative (Acc) + Instrumental (Instr). Date: 2015-12-24; view: 1766
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