History of English I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LP2FyVbymTg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4L7VTH8ii_8

210
Fyrst forð gewat. Flota wæs on yðum,
bat under beorge. Beornas gearwe
on stefn stigon; streamas wundon,
sund wið sande; secgas bæron
on bearm nacan beorhte frætwe,
guðsearo geatolic; guman ut scufon,
weras on wilsið, wudu bundenne.
Gewat þa ofer wægholm, winde gefysed,
flota famiheals fugle gelicost,

For reading, check also the following link
http://www.beowulftranslations.net/beorefs/beowulf-audio-0194a-0224a-benslade.mp3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LP2FyVbymTg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4L7VTH8ii_8

NB! Just like in Oleg Mutt’s Selections from Old, Middle and Early Modern English, a word in capital letters (e.g. FIRST, BOAT) stands for the Modern English descendant of an Old English word.

Fyrst – two different words in Old English, come from two different (though possibly related) Proto-Indo-European roots.
Fyrst 1, FIRST alternative form fyrest – means “first”, superlative of forma, Proto-IE *peri meaning “forward, over, out, through” (cf Russian “переходить”, “первый”, “вперёд”, etc, English “perimeter”, etc).
Cf Present-Day German Fürst (Estonian vürst – early Low German loan) – prince (i.e., first man in the principality)
Fyrst 2, alternative form first, frist - means “time, also: armistice” , has not survived in ´Modern English. Proto-IE *pres, *peres – meaning “before” (cf. Russian перед)
Cf Present-Day German Frist – deadline
In the passage from “Beowulf” fyrst means “time” (i.e., the second meaning)

Metathesis (a type of sound change) I
Pronounced with stress on the second syllable:
me’tathesis (from Greek meta – (involving change) and
thithenai – to place).
Two sounds, at least one of which is a consonant,
change places inside a word. (Cf Oleg Mutt Introduction
p. 26, however, his statement that the sounds need to be
consecutive, i.e. follow one another, is not correct). When
one of the sounds is a vowel,the other is usually /r/.
Fyrst/first/frist – a typical case of metathesis.
Another case in the passage: beorht/briht.

Metathesis (a type of sound change) II
In the Introduction, notice the case of ascian/acsian. Ax in
the meaning of “ask” has survived not only in some British
dialects, but also, e.g. in some circles in New York.
(A true story told to me by a student: an
Estonian translator of an American movie had to translate a
sequence that ran something like the following:
“Why didn’t you do anything about it?”
“But I axed him!” – subtitle: “Aga ma ju lõin teda
kirvega!”)

Metathesis (a type of sound change) III
Hors/hros – some theories claim that
“Russian” comes from “hros”

Metathesis (a type of sound change) IV
Metathesis present in many languages, a universal
phenomenon.
For Instance, Proto-Indo-European had two
roots – *spek- and the metathetical *skep-, both
with the basic meaning of “look, observe, examine”. The
first is behind Latin words that produced such
English loans as spectacle, spectator, expect,
inspect, perspective, etc. The second is behind
the Greek word for “examine” with the derivatives sceptic,
sceptical, scepticism (one who examines things inevitably
becomes sceptical about them!).

Psycholinguistic reasons for the universality of metathesis I
Metathesis, essentially in the same sense, is also
a term used in psycholinguistics.
People assemble whole words in the brain,
before actually uttering them. Thus, it is not
unusual for slips of the tongue to happen in which
sounds of the same word change places. e.g. “brake fluid”
turns into “blake fruid”
“past fashion” > “fast passion” (Freudian?)

Psycholinguistic reasons for the universality of metathesis II
The same principle applies to whole phrases
and even sentences, which shows that they,
too, are largely preassembled in the mind
before being uttered.
On the sentence level sometimes the term
“spoonerisms” is used < Reverend Spooner (19th
century) – famous for metathetic slips of the
tongue:
“You have tasted two worms” (pro “You have
wasted two terms”).

Psycholinguistic reasons for the universality of metathesis III
The defining feature in the case of
metathesis is that all sounds remain in the
word (sentence), they just change places. It
is this feature that allows psycholinguists to
infer that words and sentences are preassembled
in the mind: all sounds are there but the order gets
mixed up in the process of actual
uttering/pronouncing.

Psycholinguistic reasons for the universality of metathesis IV
NB! Slips of the tongue in which sounds of a word or sentence are not dropped but merely change places
are made possible by preassembling and therefore
serve as evidence of preassembling.
What causes slips of the tongue, including
metathetical slips of the tongue, in the first
place, and why some people are more prone to
them than others is not yet clear: more needs to be
known about how the brain works. However, for the
present purposes this question is immaterial.

For language history it is important that
sometimes the metathetical slips of the
tongue “catch on”, i.e. the new form remains
in the language, at times parallel to the old
form, often later replacing it.
Why?

Why do metathetical forms oust old forms? I
Basic reason: ease of pronunciation.
Cf children’s language:
Estonian
Traktor> tarktor
Ketshup> kepsut
Spagettid> pasketid
Inimene> iminene
Ignoreerima> irgoneerima
General “mistake” in Estonian suhkrut> suhkurt
NB! Not all forms in child language are
metathetical (could be, e.g., assimilation: “tellikult”
pro “tegelikult”).

Why do metathetical forms oust old forms? II
NB! Ease of pronunciation differs in
different languages (i.e., varies with the language),
depending on the language’s phonotactic rules
(see Part 2, Pronunciation).
Notice that all examples from child language have
to do with loan-words. Sp would be easy for an
Italian or a speaker of English, but is difficult
for Estonians.

Why do metathetical forms oust old forms? III
Another reason (related to ease of
pronunciation): analogy.
Nucular pro nuclear
Cf circular, muscular

Why do metathetical forms oust old forms? IV
Phonotactic rules change in the course of
the history of a language and differ from
one dialect to another. Change in
phonotactic rules brings about the
establishment of new, metathetical forms.

Fyrst forth gewat – Time forth went
gewat – praeterite (i.e., past) form of
gewitan – to go
(has not survived).

flota wæs on ythum – ship was on the
waves.
flota – ship (FLOAT not only a verb but
also a raft, a buoy, cf also FLEET)
yth – wave (poetic synonym, has not survived, see below). On ythum – Dative Plural

Beorg – Proto-IE *bherg- meaning “high; with derivatives referring to hills and hill-forts” (logical metonymic relationship: towns, in order to be able to defend themselves and serve as forts, had to be built on hills/mountains, cf Estonian “linnus” = “linnamägi”). Cf German Berg – hill, mountain, Russian берег (kallas), Estonian perv (a loan-word).

Proto-Germanic
1)*bergaz (hill, mountain) and
2)*burgs (hill-fort)
Old English
1) beorg (hill, mountain)
2) burg, burh, byrig (town).
Modern English
1) BARROW (kalme, burial place with a pile of stones on it), ICEBERG
(via Middle Dutch bergh);
2) BOROUGH, -
BOROUGH (e.g. SCARBOROUGH), -BURY
(CANTERBURY), -BURGH (EDINBURGH).
Modern German Berg and Burg – exactly the old Proto-Germanic meanings.

The “travellling” of words
Proto-Germanic *burgs >
> Late Latin burgus >
> Old French burg >
> Modern English (late loans from French!) BOURG (cf Cherbourg!) BOURGEOIS
BURGESS BURGLAR
(cf Estonian pürjel – linnakodanik)

bat – cf Modern English BOAT, Estonian
“paat” (old Low German loan)
(other words for “ship” in this extract – flota,
stefn, naca, wudu, cf. Oleg Mutt
Introduction p. 37).

The abundance of synonyms caused not exactly by the
importance of the notion but rather the requirements of
alliterative poetry. (For instance, the linguistic myth that the
Eskimos have hundreds of words for snow is wrong, they
actually have four or five). However, in alliterative poetry
which, moreover, required repetition, numerous synonyms
for most frequently used notions were inevitable. Most of
these synonyms went out of the language or survived in
special constructions when continental poetic
conventions, including end-rhyme and excluding
alliteration, were introduced.

Bat under beorge - the ship under the cliff
(the action is laid in Southern Sweden,
where steep mountains “grow out” of the
sea).

Beorn (plural beornas) – poetic synonym for “man”, went out of use together with the demise of alliterative poetry. Other synonyms for “man, warrior, hero” (these were the same!) in the extract: secg (plural secgas – again went out of the language when alliteration ceased to be used and the need for numerous synonyms disappeared), guma (plural guman, has survived in BRIDEGROOM), wer (plural weras, has survived in WEREWOLF).

Old forms in general survive more easily in
compound words (BRIDEGROOM, WEREWOLF),
place names (SCARBOROUGH, CANTERBURY),
idiomatic phrases (e.g. OVER HILL AND DALE, HALE AND HEARTY),
rarely used archaic words with special meanings (e.g. WROUGHT IRON, where “wrought” is the old Past Participle form of “work”).

gearwe – ready, eager (cf Scottish, i.e.
archaic English YARE)
stefn – stern (“ahter”), stem of the ship,
metonymically: ship (STEM, Estonian “tääv”)
stigon – stepped (simple past = praeterite),
from stigan (infinitive) (cf Present-Day
German “steigen”, “aufsteigen” – to go up)

Assimilation (a type of sound change)
Stefn > STEM – assimilation (cf Introduction p.
25).
Assimilation, like metathesis, related to ease
of pronunciation. Cf Latin loans: “incredible”,
“illegible”, “immoral”, “irreligious”: the original negative
prefix in- changed according to the environment.
In the Estonian word “tääv” /v/ has survived, in
the English word “stem” - /m/ as a nasal (close to
/n/ - another nasal, the inermediate form was
“stemn”)

Beornas gearwe on stefn stigon –
Men ready (eager) on the stern (of the ship) stepped

Stream (plural streamas) – stream
(STREAM) – a metonymical synonym for
“sea”. Other synonyms for sea in this
extract: yth (wave – has been
dropped from the language), sund (sea,
strait, large channel, swimming), waeg-
holm (surging sea, literally “way over the
hill”) (see, again, Introduction p. 37)

wundon (praeterite from windan) – wound,
curled
windan > TO WIND /waind/
the same root as WIND (noun) /wind/
Why is the present-day pronunciation of “to
wind” and the noun “wind” different?

Lengthening of vowels I (a type of sound change)
Cf Introduction p. 23.
Short /i/, /u/ became long before consonant combinations -ld, -nd, -mb.
Thus, cild /kild/ became /ki:ld/, wild /wild/ became /wi:ld/, windan /wind/ became /wi:ndan/, bindan became /bi:ndan/, sund /sund/ became /su:nd/. However, if the combination was followed by yet another consonant, there were too many sounds in the syllable for the vowel also to become long. Later, during the Great Vowel Shift (from 16th century onward, some linguists say from 14th century onward – difficult to pin down) long vowels turned into diphtongs, e.g., /i:/ into /ai/ and /u:/ into /au/. Short vowels, however, remained unchanged.

Lengthening of vowels II
Hence, today we have “child” /tSaild/ but the plural has remained “children” /tSildren/, we have /waild/, but /wildərnis/ (“wilderness”, earlier “wildreness”), OE sund has become “sound” /saund/. We also have the verb “wind” /waind/ but the noun “wind” /wind/. The reasons for the latter case are not entirely clear. The most plausible hypothesis is that the word wind was very often used in the compound windmill, which yielded ndm – three consonants, enough to stop the vowel from becoming long.

sund – sound, strait, sea, swimming
(SOUND not in the meaning of “heli/звук”
– this is a loan from Latin “sonus”>
French “son”, but SOUND in the
meaning of “strait/väin”, cf Present-Day
German Sund – this is a perfect case of
homonymy)

with – here in the meaning of “against”.
Originally stood for direction and not necessarily closeness,
now closeness has ousted direction. Metonymical
change.
However, we still have “fight with somebody” exactly in the
same meaning as “fight against somebody” (think of
wrestling!).
Also, “with” has the meaning of “against” in the present-day
compound words “withstand” (=resist, be against), as well
as “withdraw” and “withhold” (both of the latter also
involve the opposite direction, e.g. “withdraw one’s
content”, “withhold information”).

Sund with sande – sea/waves [beat/buffeted] against the sand (shore).

secgas – men, warriors, heroes (see above)
bæron – praeterite plural from beran – to bear, carry (TO
BEAR)
bearm – lap (poetic, has not survived)
nacan – genitive singular from naca – ship (poetic, has not
survived, see above)
on bearm nacan – onto the lap of the ship
beorht/briht – bright (BRIGHT), see metathesis above
frætwe – weapons (cf FRET in the meaning of an “ornamental design
contained within a band or border, consisting of repeated, symmetrical
and often geometric figures”).
Why were weapons carefully decorated/adorned?

Fret ornament

Why were weapons carefully decorated/adorned?
The earliest known runic script – 3th
century, on a helmet. “God protects me – I
am invulnerable”.
Magic function of ornamentation!

guth-searo geatolic – war-gear/weapons
splendid (poetic words, have gone out of the
language). Notice the reversed repetition:
“bright weapons,/
weapons/war-gear splendid”.

beorhte fraetwe, guth-searo geatolic (a Viking sword)

guma – man (cf above), guman - Nominative
Plural
BRIDEGROOM (Old English bryd-guma)–
the /r/ sound inserted later
(when “guma” was already out of the
language) on analogy with “groom” (folk
etymology, i.e. explanations based not on
scientific etymological research but surface
analogy).

ut – out
The spelling changed in the Middle English period under the influence of French where ou stands for /u:/.
The pronunciation changed much later: during the Great Vowel Shift (16th century onward), when /u:/ > /au/.
Cf German “Kuh” /ku:/ (“lehm/корова”), Modern English “cow” /kau/, German “nun”, Modern English “now” /nau/ (Old English “nu”).

scufon – shoved (praeterite plural)
(infinitive: scufan), SHOVE.
f pronounced as /v/ (between vowels!).
sc turned into /S/ (chiefly before /i/ but also
elsewhere)
guman ut scufon - men out shoved

wer (plural weras) – man, warrior, hero (cf above).
Incidentally, in Early Old English wer stood for a
human being (like Estonian “inimene” or Russian
“человек”).
wer-man(n) – male human being
wif-man(n) – female human being
Later metonymic change, man(n) and wer both
started to denote the male of the species, wif-
man(n) > woman

wil-sith – desired journey (cf Estonian “sõit”)
weras on wil-sith – men on the desired
journey
wudu – wood, metonymically “ship”, WOOD
wudu bundenne – timber-bound ship
bindan – to bind /baind/ cf windan above.

tha – then
holm – islet in a bay, hill (in Proto-IE - *kel- - to be prominent, hill; cf Stockholm – again town related to hill! Russian холм. Latin derivatives from *kel- have given a number of loans, such as COLONEL, COLUMN, etc).
gefysed – past participle of fysan – to move, drive, FAZE, FEEZE (Am. English – to move emotionally, to disturb, to disconcert, to shock, esp. in, e.g., “he remained UNFAZED”, but also “this did not FAZE her at all”).

Gewat tha ofer waeg-holm - went then
over the surging sea (metaphorical!)

wind – WIND
winde gefysed – driven by the wind
fami-heals – foamy-necked (cf. Present-
Day German Hals – neck)

fugol – bird, German Vogel, FOWL
Spelling changed in the Middle English
period (fowl /fu:l/),
pronunciation during the Great Vowel Shift
(/faul/, cf above ut, cu, nun).

Semantic triangle
Signifier(“table”)
Meaning
/denotation/thought Referent
(TABLE)

Semantic triangle
Signifier (“table”)
Denotation Referent
(TABLE)

Prototypes I
What kind of bird (table) do you think of
when the word “bird” (resp “table”) is
uttered? This is the prototypical bird for
you.
(Eleanor Rosch)

Prototypes II
A notion introduced by Eleanor Rosch, stands
roughly for the most typical specimen of a
category. For instance, penguin and chicken are
less prototypical birds than, say, pigeon or
sparrow. A prototypical bird is the one that first
comes to mind when one has to think of a bird.
Prototypes vary with the period, the people, etc.

In my experience, urban Estonians usually name “sparrow” as a prototypical bird, but “swallow” is also mentioned. With Russian students I have heard even the “eagle” pointed out as a prototypical bird, also “pigeon” is mentioned more often than in the case of Estonians. The British prototypical bird tends to be robin. Usually, what is relevant for a person becomes also prototypical (since it is more noticed).

Robin – the English prototypical bird these days

Meaning changed on the basis of the change of the prototypical bird
Old English “bird” stood for a small bird, the prototypical
bird, denoted by “fugol>fowl”, was large (like a fawk, a
partridge, a goose); with industrialisation and urbanisation
the prototypical bird turned into a small bird, the word
“bird” started to mean generic birds, “fowl” got a more
special meaning (=poultry), i.e., its meaning was narrowed,
as opposed to the extension of the meaning of “bird”. The
old meaning survived in
FOWLER (also a surname), also Biblical idioms such as
“FOWL IN THE AIR” and phrases such as “WILD FOWL”.

gelicost – most like
lice – original meaning: body, shape
Has survived in LIKE (similar) and the
adjectival and adverbial endings –LY (as in
“friendly” and “beautifully”).
German Leiche – dead body
Cf Estonian “laip” – not a loan but a word coined by
Johannes Aavik, who was subconsciously influenced by
the German word. Other “new” words coined by Aavik that
were subconsciously modeled on Indo-European words
include “roim” (crime!), “siiras” (English “sincere”, French
“sincère”), etc.

Lychgate
As a noun, lice has
survived in very rare
compounds were the first
part is “lych-”.
LYCHGATE – a deep gate under which the hearse with the coffin of the dead stopped, waiting for the priest to consecrate it so that it could enter the sacred territory (see also next slide).

Another example of a lychgate

flota fami-heals, fugle
gelicost – foamy-
-necked ship, most like a bird.