Germanic languages have four common characteristics:

1. Great consonant shift ( Grimm’s Law)

2. Adjectival declension

3. Stress system

4. Verb system

Great consonant shift: p --- f

t --- th

k --- h

e.g. Sanscrit p pitar pad

Latin pater pes,pedis

OE f father foot

Sanscrit t trayas

Latin tres tenis (CR.) tanak (CR.) trn

OE th three thin thorn

Sanscrit k cata cunas

Latin centum caput canis

OE h hundred head hund

--------------------------------------------

b --- p

d --- t

g --- k

e.g. CR. dubok slab

OE deep sleep

Latin duo domare

OE two tame

Latin genu ego

OE knee Ic

-------------------------------------------

b’ --- b

p’ --- p

g’ --- g

e.g. Sanscrit b’u b’har

OE be bear

Sanscrit d’a d’var

OE do door

Sanscrit g’ans g’ostis

OE goose guest (Latin hostis)

Adjectival declension - weak and strong

e.g. se goda man (weak)

(an ) god man (strong)

Stress system

family, familiar, familiarity (stress shifts)

love, lovely, loveliness, loveless (stress stays on the same syllable)

Verb system

lufian - luvode ( to love) weak (today regular verbs)

singan – sang - sungon - gesungen strong ( today irregular)

OLD ENGLISH PERIOD

(600-1100)

OE Consonants

All consonants were pronounced, no silent consonants (e. g. writan,

gnawan, cnawan)

Letter c pronounced as /k/ or /č/.

/k/ in the vicinity of back vowels e.g. coin, boc, corn

/č/ in the vicinity of front vowels e.g. cild, cirice, cealk

Letter g was pronounced as /g/ or /y/

/g/ back vowels of consonants e.g. guma (man); grindan ( grind), gold

/y/ in the vicinity of front vowels e.g. gievan (give), gear (year), halig

(holy), daeges (days)

(So “give” is not an Anglo-Saxon word, it came from Scandinavian)

Consonant group /sc/ pronounced as /š/ e.g. sceap ( sheep), scort (short),

scafian (shave)

Letter f was pronounced as /f/ or /v/

e.g. wif (wife), fot (foot),

wifes /vives/ Intervocalically as /v/

Letter s was pronounces as /s/ or /z/.

e.g. ceas /s/

ceosan /z/ Intevocalicaly as /z/

OE Vowels

Long a: ham ( home) Short a man

ae: daed (deed) ae glaed

e: fet (feet) e well

i: wif (wife) i sittan

o: god (good) o God

u: hus (house) u ful

y: mys (mice) y synn

I-mutation

Change of back vowels into front vowels under the influence of i/j

1. Plural of nouns gos + /iz/ ges

fot + /iz/ fet

boc + /iz/ bec

2. Abstract nouns lang + /ithu/ length

strang + /ithu/ strength

full + /ithu/ fylth (foul - filth)

3. Verbs from nouns fod + /jan/ fedan ( feed)

blod + /jan/ bedan (bleed)

from adjectives full + /jan/ fyllan ( fill)

4. Comparatives and

superlatives old + /ira/ eldra

old + /ista/ eldsta

Angla + /isc/ English Wales + /isc/ Welsh

Morphology

NOUNS OE gender was grammatical and natural

e.g. wifman (woman) was masculine in OE because it is a compound

and the last part is man (masculine). So grammatical gender masculine

but natural gender feminine.

Declensions

a. Masculine declension of words ending in a consonant

N hund hundas

G hundes hunda

D hunde hundum

A hund hundas

b. N-declension (masculine)

N oxa oxan

G oxan oxena

D oxan oxum

A oxan oxan

c. Neuter declension ending in a consonant

N sceap sceap

G sceapes sceapa

D sceape sceapum

Also:: deer, swine, horse, gear (years today but two-year-old child)

e.g. His hors were gode (His horses were good)

d. Declension with I-mutation (masculine and feminine)

N gos ges

G gese gosa

D ges gosum

A gos ges

PRONOUNS

Personal pronouns

N Ic we u (thou) ge

G min ure in (thine) eower

D me us e (thee) eow

A me us e (thee) eow

N he heo hit hie (they)

G his hiere(heore) his hiera

D him hiere him him

A hine hie hit hie

Interrogative pronouns

N hwa (who) hwaet (what)

G hwaes hwaes

D hwaem hwaem

A hwone hwaet

Reflexive pronouns

Accusative of personal pronouns used for reflexive

E.g. He hit hine (he hit himself)

seolf (self) was used only for emphasis

Adverbs

Three ways of forming adverbs

1. hlud (loud) + e hlude freondlic + e freondlice (friendly)

2. glaed + lice glaedlice (gladly)

3. adding -es ones (once), elles (else), nightes (nigths)

daeges (days)

Verbs

inf. p.t.sg. p.t. pl. p.part.

strong: drifan - draf - drifon - gedrifen ( to drive)

ceosan - ceas - curon - gecoren ( to choose)

singan - sang - sungon - gesungen

weak: (d/t) hieran - hierde -hierdon -gehierd (to hear)

settan -sette - setton -gesett ( to set)

lufian -lufode -lufodon - gelufed ( to love)

Present tense

strong verbs: sg. I drif-e pl. drifath

thu drif-st

he drif-th

weak verbs: sg. I lufi-e pl. lufiath

thu luf -ast

he luf-ath

Past tense

strong verbs sg. draf weak verbs lufode

drife lufodest

draf lufode

pl. drifon pl. lufodon

In ME plural forms were not used any more.

VOCABULARY

Words borrowed (loanwords) from Indo European

day, sun, night, moon, wind, thunder, earth, fire water, cow, goose,

mouse, wolf

erian (to plough); mawan ( to maw)

Latin influence

three periods 1. infuence on the continent

2. during Christianisation

3. after Christanisation

1. Words accepted on the continent

e.g. street (strata via); wall (vallum) mile (mille passus), pound

(pondus), biship (episcopus); church ( gr. kiriakon); cheese (caseus), wine

( vinum)

Names of the days of the week are related to Gods:

Saturday - Saeturnesdaeg ( day of Saturn)

Sunday - (day of the sun)

Monday - (day of the Moon)

Tuesday - Tiu (god of war)

Wednesday - (Woden, Roman god Mercury)

Thursday - Thor ( or Jupiter)

Friday - Frei or Frigi (equivalent to Venera)

2. Words accepted before Christianization

A small group of words like: castra - OE caester like Winchester,

Lancaster. Word lake ( from Latin lacus)

3. After Christianization

Language connected to church: alms, abbot, angel, candle, church,

deacon, devil, martyr, minister, monk, mass, nun, priest, psalm, pope, etc.

Transformations: monasterium - munasterium - mynster - minster. Or

moneta - muneta - mynet -minst

Some words were translated: trinitas becomes thrines (MN trinity),

evangelium translated as godspell (OE good story)

Some pagan words got Christian meaning : bledsian ---bledan ---bless

Words from common vocabulary: lily, palm, pine, capon, peacock,

trout, turtle, dish, chalk, cup, fork. Verbs like: offer, shrive, spend, stop

adjectives like: crisp, short

CETLIC words

Small amount: dry (wizard); druid; brat (cloth); rug. Mostly geographical

terms like: London (protected place); Aberdeen (mouth of the Dee); the

Avon; the Thames.

SCANDINAVIAN influence

Geographical terms (endings) : -by (Whitby); -toft (Lowestoft); -thwaite

(Brathwait); -thorpe (Athorp).

English endings are: -ham (Horsham); tun,-ton (Alton);- bury

(Canterbury)

Words with: k, g, sk e.g. kid, kilt, kirk

give, gift, get, egg,

skin, sky,

OE scyrta (shirt, skirt)

diphtong /ei/ imported from Scandinavian; they, raise, great, bait

Common words; sister, husband, knife, fellow, awe (adjectives): big,

wrong, (verbs): get, give take. (pronouns): she, they, them, their;

prepositions: fro, till

Middle English Period

(1100-1500)

OE period ends with William the Conqueror in 1066. Great influence of

French in this period. The beginning of the standard language with

Chaucer.

ME phonology

OE ME

Long a: ham ( home) o: hoom

ae: daed (deed) e: deed

e: fet (feet)

i: wif (wife)

o: god (good)

u: hus (house)

y: mys (mice) i: mys, mice

Short a man

ae glaed a glad

e well

i sittan

o God

u ful

y synn i sinn

Shortening of vowels:

1. before two or more consonants : OE fedde - ME fedde (fed)

2. threesyllabic words : OE haligdaeg - ME holiday

3. before the suffix : wisdom from wise; shepherd from sheep, gosling

from goose

Orthography (under the influence of French)

u ou (hus house)

cw qu (cwen queen)

c ch (cild child)

Introduction of v instead of f: OE lufu ME love

Introdution of letter z (Zephyrus)

Morphology

Simplification and loss of endings as a general tendency

a. Masculine declension of words ending in a consonant

sing. pl.

N hound houndes (for all cases)

G houndes

D. hound

A. hound

b. N-declension (masculine)

N oxe

G. oxen oxen

D. oxen

A. oxen

c. Neuter declension ending in a consonant

N. sheep

G. sheepes sheep

D. sheep

A. sheep

d. Declension with I-mutation (masculine and feminine)

N. fot

G. fote fet

D. fot

A. fot

PRONOUNS

Personal pronouns

N Ich we thou ye

G min our thine your

D me us thee you

A me us thee you

N he she hit,it they

G his hir(e) his their

D, A. him hir (e) hit (it) them

Interrogative pronouns

who, whom, whose for persons and what for things

Reflexive pronouns

1. seolf (self) was used only for emphasis.

2. Now also for reflexive: make himselven wood (made himself crazy).

3. Accusative of the personal pronouns still for reflexive (and born him

well - born himself well)

Relative pronouns

That used most. Sometimes which in the genitive function like: of

which virtue. One can also leave out the relative pronoun: Ther was a

plowman, was his brother.

Adverbs

1. Ending -e e.g. faire, sore, smerte

2. -lice in the form of liche but more often now as -ly e.g. soothly,

fetishly. In Chaucer still liche in word of French origin: rudeliche,

royaliche

3. -es ( originally genitive) e.g. ones, thryes, elles

Verbs

OE ridan - rad- ridon - (ge) riden

ME ryden -rood - riden - (y) riden

OE singan - sang- sungon (ge) sungen

ME singen - sang,song - songen (y) songe(n)

Present tense

Endings from the Northern dialect where we find -es in the third person

singular:

sg. -e

-est

-es

But we still have -eth in the literary language, for exmaple, in the Bible.

Syntax

Nouns: -es in the genitive of nouns. But in this period we also have the

introduction of “of” for the genitive. It came from French “de”.

examples: at his beddes heed ( at his bed’s head); the reule of seint Maur

(the rule of St. Maur).

In the declension where there was not -es in the genitive we find: in his

lady grace, by my fader soule

Adjectives: The only ending is -e. Adjective usually stand in front of the

nouns; “smale fowles” but under the influence of French we also find:

“servyse dyvine”. Adjective can also be turned into nouns: a wantoun and

a merye

The loss of grammatical gender. Only natural gender

Impersonal constructions: OE me thinketh it accordant to resoun but

also it seemed me

Question formation:

1. with a question particle - what needeth wordes more?

2. Inversion: seyde he nat thus?

3. rarely with do: why do ye wepe?

Negation formation:

1. Negative particle: I ne saugh

2. With nought, nat, not after the verbs: He yaf nat

3. Double negation: He ne lafte nat.

Contractions: ne was = nas; ne wolde = nolde; ne woot = noot ne wiste

= niste

Word order: With a great loss of endings the word order became more

fixed and played a more important role. Prepositions playing a greater

role instead of endings. Also personal pronouns.

Middle English vocabulary

French words in ME 1250- 1400

From Purely Germanic to mixed vocabulary

French was spoken on the court, in schools until the 14th century

Words coming from two dialects: Northern and Central French

N /k/ catch /č/ catch /w/ warden

C /č/ chase /s/ chase /gu/ guardian

Feudal system: domain, castle, court, manor house or villa

villeins ( village) /tun =town/

Titles: earl (E) - (F) count, countess; duke, duchess, marquis, viscount,

baron (E)- king, queen, earl, knight, lord, lady

Food: sheep - mutton; pig-pork; cow - beef; calf - veal

Meals: breakfast (E) - dinner, supper, banquet, bottle, table, servant,

butler, master

Law: trespass, cheat, treason (theft, thief, murder (E))

justice, judge, jury, verdict, punish, prison, prisoner, court

Military: battle, assault, siege, banner, fortress, arms, tower

Craft: common (E): smith, baker, skinner

(F): barber, carpenter, grocer, tailor, jeweller

Church hierarchy: (E) priest, bishop. (F) abbot, abbess, curate, cardinal,

friar, deacon, archdeacon

connected with church: service. clergy, parish, apostle, conscience,

confession, penance, prayer, absolution

Medieval science: (general) mercy, pity, charity, beauty, courtesy,

repentence (astrology): influence, disaster, jovial, mercurial,

saturnine (medicine): humor, choleric, sanguine, cordial, physic

Literature: tragedy, comedy, drama

Family relations: uncle, aunt, nephew, niece, cousin (E) grandmother,

sire, dame

Synomyms:

E kingdom folk wish child bloom wed ask

F realm people desire infant flower marry demand

E friendship hearty hut

F amity cordial cottage

Latin regal legal

French royal loyal

Replaced by French: riht – justice; frith - peace; cyneholm – crow;

earm - poor; halga - saint;

French and English: love and charity; make and endyte,

faire and fetisly

MODERN ENGLISH PERIOD 1500 -

East Midlands 1589 London dialect as the literary language

1450 printing press

Great Vowel Shift

Raising of vowels

e: fet i: feet

o: gos u: goose

Diphtongization

i: lif ai life

u: hus au house

a: name ei name

: home ou home

Short vowels do not change

i ---- i bit

e ---- e get

o ---- o good

a ---- ae glad

u ---- u full

Some other changes:

Diphtongs

eu (u) --- ju: new, due

ai ---- ei day, raise

au ---- o: awe, autumn

a before l --- au --- o talk, walk

a before lf, lv, lm --- a: calf, calves, calm

Consonants

s, t, d, + j palatalized pension, ambition, soldier

Loss of consonants

k, g, w, ---- 0 (kn, gn, wr) knowledge, gnaw, write

b --- 0 /mb comb, lamb (lim --- limb)

h ---- 0 hit ---it ; hour ; h ---- f enough, laugh

gh --- 0 might, brought

t --- 0 in the middle position whistle, Christmas

Spelling (orthography)

k, g, w although not pronounced

gh night, though (niht)

doubling of consonants inn, kiss, sell

cry - cried; beauty - beautiful flour - flower

Modern English Morphology

Nouns: Plural of nouns and genitive singular lose the vovel from the

inflectional ending: houndes hounds or hound’s (becoming thus one

syllabic words). The loss in the genitive indicated by an apostrophy.

Dativ ending -e completely lost.

Adjectives: The -e ending completely lost. Comparative and superlative

by -er and -est but also more and most.

Adverbs: The ending -ly becomes predominant

Pronouns: Complete loss of the distinction between thou and ye. One

form: you and your. The older forms used only in the Bible, poetry and

in some dialects. Reflexive pronouns: myself, yourself, ourselves etc.

Verbs: Some use of the endings -est and -eth in the early period.

Completely lost with the only ending -s in the third person singular.

In the past tense the two forms are lost and only the singular form is used

for singualr and plural (sang, loved). Prefix gey 0 is completely lost.

The suffix -en remained in some of the forms like: written, chosen, eaten,

shaken (drunk: drunken , forgotten: forgot)

Modern English Syntax

The category of case (nouns) is indicated only with Saxon genitive.

Personal pronouns have the case markings like I -me - mine, etc.

Gender category is marked in personal pronouns: he – she - it. This is not

grammatical gender but only natural gender.

Syntactic relation that did not exist in OE or Mid. English is genitive

relation such : the leg of the table and also the word order: Give the man

the book.

Comparative and superlative forms also expressed with more and most.

Double comparison existing only in the early Mod. English such as: This

is the most unkindest cut of all (Julius Caesar)

Differentiation of the use of pronouns like who, which, that. In the early

Mod. English which was used for persons.

Introduction of past tenses like present perfect (I have gone), plusperfect

(I had gone) and he progressive tenses ( I am writing)

Regular introduction of do in questions ( What do you say?) and in the

negative ( He does not know)

Double negation not allowed in this period. Two negations give a positive

meaning. (This is not unknown to you = This is known to you)

Fixed word order (Subject verb object). Functional change of words and

phrases like “hit-me-of-you-dare expression”.

Modern English vocabulary

Words from classical languages:

There was an attempt to introduce a lot of words from Latin and Greek

and some of those words stayed: industry, maturity, temperance,

artificiality, negotiation, geology, geography, philology, psychology,

ideology, criterion, phenomenon, crisis, thesis, formula, locus, index,

genus, datum, memorandum.

Later in the 16-th century words specifically from Latin: genius, medium,

senior, junior, area, animal, circus, specimen, census, series, species,

apparatus. The whole phrases like: ex catedra, ab inition, vice versa.

Some inventions like: locomotive, tractor, velocipede, motor.

Greek: Mostly through Latin: acrobat, alphabet, asylum, chemist, cycle,

character, cardiogram. The result of the influence from classical

languages is the difference between the noun and the corresponding

adjective: eye -optical, moon -lunar, sun-solar, house - domestic

French words

-et: cadet, coquette. -esque: picturesque, -oon: buffoon, baloon, -ade:

parade, promenade

Also:ballet, beau, belle-lettres, salon, etiquette, debut, souvenir, boudoir,

fiancee, regime, guillotine, tricolor

In the 19th century words from arts and literature, clothing, furniture,

food, social like. Words like the following; atelier, genre, blouse,

costume, beret, ensemble, chic, brassier, chifonnier, cafe, restaurant,

menu, mayonnaise, cab, parvenu, soiree, debutant, barrage, camouflage,

attache,

Italian words

Most of them came through French, connected to music, painting etc.:

alarm, florin, piano, violin, viola, cello, aria, scherzo, sonata, primadonna,

maestro, fresco, studio, sonnet, canto, motto, fiasco, influenza, umbrella,

fascist, fascizm

Spanish words

armada, mosquito, cherry, canyon, negro, cigar, cargo, embargo,

picaresque, cafeteria, matador, toreador

Portuguese words

marmelade, port (wine), caste, tank

German words

protestant, kindergarten, aestetics, subjective, objective, complex,

introvert, extrovert, overtone, chromosome, dynamo, relativity, bacillus.

Music terms like: waltz, yodel. Political and war terminology: state

socialism, social democrat, class-conscious, gestapo, Fuhrer, blitzkrieg.

Food: saurekraut, delicatessen

Dutch words

yacht, dock, deck, buoy, cruise, skipper, landscape, easel, sketch

Scandinavian words

fiord, geyser, viking, easy, saga

Celtic words

clan, whiskey, slogan, plaid, flannel, bog, tory

Words from Slavic languages

steppe, tundra, mammoth, samovar, vodka, bolshevik, soviet, commissar,

kulak, sputnik, mazurka, robot, karst, vojvoda, kolo

Jewish words

amen, hallelujah, cherub(in), manna, Jehovah

Persian words

caravan, divan, bazzar, dervish, tiger, azure

Arabic words

alcohol, alkali, algebra, alchemy, almanac, sheik, bedouin, harem,

Moslem, Islam, Koran, fakir, sofa, orange, lemon, sugar, candy, zenith

(they mostly came through French, Italian and Spanish)

Turkish words

jackal, turban, kiosk, horda, fez, coffee, bosh

Anglo-Indian

bungalow, shampoo, jungle, cot, cashmere, pyjamas, khaki

Japanese: rickshaw, kimono; Malasian: lorry, orangoutant; Chinese: tea,

business: from the American continent: cocoa, tomato, tapioca, tabacco,

potato, tomahawk, wig-wan, totem, toboggan, moccasin

Orientation questions for the history of the English language

1. Indo-European family of languages.

2. Four common characteristics of the Germanic branch of languages.

3. Great Consonant Shift or Grimm’s law.

4. OE consonants and their pronunciation.

5. OE vowels, short and long with examples.

6. I-mutation in different categories with examples.

7. OE gender.

8. Four declensions in OE.

9. Personal pronouns in OE.

10. Interrogative pronouns.

11. The formation of adverbs.

12. Verbs in OE, strong and weak.

13. Present and past tense in OE.

14. The formation of the reflexive pronouns.

15. Borrowed words in OE from the Indo-European.

16. Celtic words in OE.

17. Latin words in OE.

18. Scandinavian influence in the OE vocabulary.

19. Changes in long and short vowels in ME.

20. Spelling changes in ME.

21. Declensions in ME, what changed in comparison to OE.

22. Personal pronouns in ME.

23. Verbs in ME.

24. Reflexive pronouns.

25. ME syntax: nouns, adjectives, pronouns, relative pronouns

26. Shortening of vowels in ME.

27. Changes of consonants in ME.

28. Spelling changes.

29. Middle English vocabulary - French influence in different categories.

30. Great vowels shift.

31. Short vowels in Mod. English.

32. Diphtongs in Mod. English.

33. Some other changes

34. Mod. English morphology.

35. Mod. English syntax.

36. Mod. English vocabulary.

Literature

Barber, Charles. (1993). The English Language, A Historical

Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Baugh A.C. & T. Cable (1993). A History of the English Language.

London: Routledge

Clark, John. (1964). Early English. New York Andre Deutch

Görlach, M., The Linguistic History of English: An Introduction,

Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, London: Macmillan Press

Ltd., 1997.

Jespersen, Otto. (1972). Growth and Structure of the English

Language. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Pyles, Tomas. (1971). The Origins and Development of the English

Language. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich