Some early Middle English dialect features in the South East Midlands:

An onomastic study.

Ela Majocha

Dialectology

Study of variation:

synchronic/diachronic

Expect variation: Weinreich, Labov

& Herzog (1968)

Uniformitarian principles: Lass

(1997)

Orientation

Old English (OE) >1100

Early Middle English (eME) 1100-

1300

Late Middle English (LME) 1300-1500

Dialectology of text

languages Data from written source: manuscripts

Linguistic analysis after data

collection

Respect the data even if looks messy

Stop bashing the scribe!

Data collection for LME

c. 1950- 1985 Edinburgh-Glasgow

Unis: Linguistic Atlas of Late

Mediaeval English (LALME, 4 vols

1986)

Michigan Uni

Data collection for eME c. 1990-2007 Edinburgh Uni:

Linguistic Atlas of Early Middle

English

e-LAEME (1.1)

http://www.lel.ed.ac.uk/ihd/laeme1/laeme1.

html

Comparability across text types

Paucity of material

Collect all the data possible

I can help!

Data from place names

Electronic corpus

Digitised: scanned, OCRed

XML markup

Bespoke parsing tools

Database, search results into GIS

software

Easy ...

minster on the hill

monster on the hell

...years later

scripsilibrum

Place name: STANBRIDGE (41: pa Stanbridge SP9624, BED)

Place name: STANBRIDGE (41: pa Stanbridge SP9624, BED)

Period: 1201-1250, spelling: <a>~<au>

Stanbru(g)g(e) 1220 LS, 1242 Fees 867,

Stanbrig(g)e, Stanbrygge 1202, 1227, 1240 Ass,

1247 Ass, Cl, Staunbrig(g) 1227 Ass, 1247 Ass,

Stanburgh 1227 Ass, Stantbrig 1240 Ass; (half-

hundred Stanbridge, SP9624, p. 113): Stanbrigge

1207 P, Stanburgh 1227 Ass

Area investigated

Summary of results Map 1: Attestations for OE

variables brad, ac, stan OE /ɑː/ brycg, rycg, byrig, myll(e)n OE /y/ hæth, mæd, sæ OE /æː/ fen, five, ford, sæte [f-]/[v-] and [s-]/[z-] voicing

of initial fricatives

OE /ɑː/ to /ɔː/

change was in progress by the 12th century, “coming to fruition in the late twelfth to early thirteenth century, ... despite its variable implementation in different texts and different areas” (Lass 1992: 46).

Place names? brad-, ac-, stan- vs. -brad, -ac, -stan

Analysis in 50-year subperiods:

1101-1150

1151-1200

1201-1250

1251-1300

why?

we deal with a continuum in time and space and the

sub-divisions are not to be the focus but an aid to the

analysis.

12th century

<a> exclusively 1150-1200

additionally

<a>~<au> 1150-1200 in stan

stan~staun

1201-1250 vs. 1251-1300

ac~oc(k) 5 names

brad~brod 10

names

stan~ston 24

names

10 names

21 names

38 names

Variation on the maps

Graph 1 oak-

Variation on the maps

Graph 2 broad-

Variation on the maps

Graph 3 stone-

Summary: by 1300

OE ac > eME <o>, <o>~<a> (PDE 100% <oa>,<o-

e>)

OE brad > eME <o>~<a> (PDE 25% <oa>)

OE stan >eME <o>~<a>~<au>~<ai> (PDE 10% <o-

e>)

each word has its own history

ME Dialect Map

Northern

West Midland

East Midland

Southern

South-Eastern

ME dialect maps

“The mistake lies in thinking of dialect as a thing at all... Rather we should think in terms of dialectal continua... If, as a result of investigation, it should appear that the dialect material for some given county is homogeneous and distinctive, ... [this] would be of interest; but there is no ground whatever for building such and assumption into the investigation at its very start.” (Benskin 1994)