Lecture 12

Lecture 12
Prepared by Assanova.A

 The orthography of early ME
 Early ME consonants
 Stress and studies
 His- genitive, group genitive, uninflected
genitive
 Nouns and irregular plurals
 Adjectives and adverbs
 Pronouns
 Verbs

 Y for th ye , you , ‘you all’=ye; - for omission of m or n, thē, thā,
long s ( f)
 Final letter as abbreviation till 19th c.
Mr ,genl ,yt
“Ye Olde Choppe Suey Shoppe”
 i=j till 17th c. Iack (Shakespeare), iasper
Dr. Johnson’s dictionary (1755) puts i/j-words together (till 19c.)
 U=v Liue, vnder (till mid.17th c.)
 H sound was lost but retained in spelling
habit, herbage, homme (Latin words)
False etymology: habundance ( habere-to have), abhominable (L.
ab+homine, away from humanity)
 H after t in foreign words
Throne (OF trone), author (OF autor) (16th c)
[θ] -> theater, thesis earlier had initial [t]
 [š] sch for first sound (Br) , [sk] sch for a Greek loan (N Webster) (16th)
schedule from OF cedule [s]

Losses within the ME period
 [ç] next to front vowels (i,e) by gh: bright, sigh,
weigh
 [x] next to back vowels (u,o) taught, bought
but became [f] in cough, laugh, enough (15th)
 B in –mb climb, b was added after final m: limb
 D in nd (also in spelling) lawn from MidE laund
 D was added in sound, lend (MidE soun, len)
before ME
 Al and au became [ɔ]: talk, walk,
 al became [æ] before f, v: half, salve
 Al became [ɑ] before m: calm, palm
 L of ol: folk, yolk, Holmes

 H has gradually come to be pronounced
humble, host, herb (Am)
 Loss of ‘r’ before sibilants, from 19th before any consonant
Bass, ass, bust, nuss, fust
Barse, arse, burst, nurse, first
 -ture as [әr] after [t/d/s/z]
? Nature, vendure, censure, leisure until 19th c.
‘If this to clouds and stars will venture
That creeps as far to reach centre’ (1843)
 G and k in gn and kn (17th c.)
Gnarl, gnaw, knave, knee
Knack-neck, knight-night (Shakespeare)
 Ing in unstressed in verbs and pronouns =[in]
H.Wyld “This habit obtains in particularly all regional dialects of the South..”
‘See then what mortals place their bliss in!
Next morn betimes the bride was missing’
 Ing as [iŋ] –hypercorrect pronunciation in 19th c.
H.Wyld “has now a vogue among the educated…”

O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword
and fire
Crouch for employment.

 Stress on the 2nd syllable
Character, illustrate, concentrate, contemplate
 Polysyllabic words in –able,-ible had initial stress
‘Tis sweet and commendable in you Nature Hamlet’
(Shakespeare)
 H.Wyld – History of Modern Colloquial English
 John Hart’s An Orthographic (1569) and A Methode or
Comfortable Beginning for All Unlearned (1570)
 William Bullokar’s Booke at Large (1580) and
Bref Grammar for English (1586)
 O. Jespersen’s Modern English Grammar on Historical
Principles
 Thomas Smith “Dialogue concerning the correct and
emended writing of EL” (34)-1568
 John Wallis Grammatica Linguæ Anglicanæ 1653

 -es to all nouns as a genitive sg and caseless pl.
suffix
 Nouns had two forms: sister, sisters
 17th c. sister’s apostrophe was adopted
 18th sisters’
 Mutated-vowel plurals survived
feet, geese, teeth, lice, women
-n plurals remained: eyen, shoon, kine, brethren,
children, oxen.
 Uninflected plurals: deer, sheep, swine, folk,
kind
 Folks, kinds
Mid Eng “His hors were Goode” (till 17th) - horses

 Construction of his, her, and their
“Augustus his daughter” (Augustus’ daughter)
‘Elizabeth Holland her howse” (1579)
‘The House of lords their proceedings’(1667)
Reasons:
1.Topic-comment construction
‘Nilus seo ea hire wielme is nea Ϸam clife’ (OE)
‘Nile, the river-her resource is near the cliff’
2. Genitive ending –s as a variant of his
‘Mars his armor’ led to ‘Mars’s armor’
Genitive –s was confused with:
his in “Mrs.Sands his maid.
by the mixture of 2 spellings
‘Job’s patience, Moses his meekness, Abraham’s faith’
Ys for is as in “Harlesdon ys name”
His was very common

 -s was added to a word that end a phrase
‘King Priam of Troy’s son’
‘the woman I live next door to’s husband’
‘The wife of Bath’s tale’
How to say with his-genitive?
Uninflected genitive for some nouns that were
feminine in OE, for nouns ending in [s], or
preceding words beginning with [s]
‘For conscience sake’
Not recognized: Lady Chapel, Lady Day

 Loss of [ә] – no distinction between pl and sg adj.
 No number, no indefiniteness
 Schwa vowel was spelled
 Became invariable, except: this-these, that
 Comparative degree - -er/more;
Eminenter, more near, more fast
 Superlative degree – est, most
Impudentest, beautifullest, most poor
Double comparison: more fitter, most unkindest
Adverbs did not require suff.–ly
‘grievous sick, indifferent cold, wondrous strange, and
passing fair
‘sure’ was common
‘And sure deare friends my thankes..’ (Hamlet)

 Loss of thou, thee, thy, thine
 Mine before vowel ‘mine ear’, my before
consonant

 3 parts ( Infinitive, preterit, past participle)
 Distinction between W and S verbs less
important
 Preserved a number of personal endings
 He/she V+(e)s/-(e)th
 17th c. V+s prevailed
 Preterit for thou V+est was lost in 16th c.
 Preterit became invariable
 17th c. n’t

1. John Algeo. The origins and development of
the English language. 6th ed. 2009 (p. 139-
179)
2. Charles Barber.The English language. A
historical introduction.2nd ed. (p.185-210)
3. Rastorguyeva Т.А. A history of English,
2003.

Lecture 12

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Lecture 12