Comparing characteristics of old and middle english

Comparing Characteristics of Old and Middle English

Characteristic Old English Middle English

Nouns

• Nouns could be of three genders: masculine, feminine or neuter. These

were assigned arbitrarily.

• Numbers could be either singular or plural.

• There were four cases: nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive.

• There were seven groups of declensions for nouns.

• Middle English lost the case suffixes at the ends of nouns.

• The generalized plural marker became -s, but it still competed with -n.

Verbs

• The infinitive of verbs ended in -an.

• In the present tense, all verbs had markers for number and person.

• The weak past tense added –de.

• The strong past tense usually involved a vowel change.

• Old English also had many more strong verbs than modern English.

• The third person singular and plural was marked with -(e)th; but the

singular also competed with -(e)s

Adjectives

• Adjectives could be weak or strong.

• If preceded by a determiner, the weak ending was added to the adjective.

• If no determiner preceded the adjective, then the strong endings were used.

• Adjectives agreed in gender, case and number with the nouns they

described.

• Adjectives lost agreement with the noun, but the weak ending -e still

remained.

Adverbs • Adverbs were formed by adding -e to the adjective, or -lic. • The adverb ending -lič became -ly;

syntax • The syntax of Old English was much more flexible than modern English

because of the declensions of the nouns.

• Syntax was stricter and more prepositions were used.

• New compound tenses were used,

• The use of the verbs will and shall for the future tense were first used too

Pronunciation

• Pronunciation was characterized by a predictable stress pattern on the first

syllable.

• The length of the vowels was phonemic as there were 7 long and 7 short

vowels.

• Pronunciation changes:

o Loss of initial h in a cluster (hleapan - to leap; hnutu - hut)

o [w] lost between consonant and back vowel (w is silent in two, sword,

answer)

o [v] lost in middle of words (heofod - head; hæfde - had)

Writing system

• Characters Used in Old English Writing

o æ (a ligature of "a" and "e)

o œ (a ligature of "o" and "e.")

o þ (now written "th)

o ß (for the "ss" or "sz" sound)

• The writing system changed dramatically in Middle English:

o þ and ð were replaced by th

o c before i or e became ch

o sc became sh

o an internal h was added after g

o hw became wh

o cw became qu

Pronouns

• Old English had distinctive forms for all genders, persons, and cases

• Old English had a set of forms for two people or two things—the dual

number

o ic (I)

o wit (we two)

o wē (we plural)

• The dual number disappeared in the pronouns

• The dative and accusative became the object forms of the pronouns.

• “She” started being used for the feminine singular subject pronoun

• “You” (plural form) was used in the singular as a status marker for the

formal.