History of English I

As in Part 4 (Beowulf), WORDS IN
CAPITAL LETTERS denote Modern English
descendants of Old English words.

Cadmon’s hymn is the first datable religious Christian poem in Old English. While “Beowulf” contains references to the Bible, it is still essentially a pagan epic. Cadmon, however, had a vision in a dream in which an angel beckoned him to create a song about the creation of the world. He had been unable to sing at all before, but he did create the song in the dream, remembered it after he had woken up and became a devout Christian as a result. He was taken to Abbess Hilda (a remarkable woman in the Old English period) in the Abbey of Whitby, it was decided that his vision had indeed been from God (and not Satan), he remained in the monastery and continued creating songs/poems in the Anglo-Saxon poetic form but on Christian themes. He himself was illiterate so the themes had to be narrated to him by the monks who also wrote down the songs/poems he created. All the above information comes from Venerable Bede’s “Historia ecclesiastica gentis anglorum” (“The Ecclesiastical History of the English people”), a manuscript of which also has the poem attached to it. Originally, the poem was written in the Northumbrian dialect, our version is West Saxon.

Cadmon’s hymn
(in the West-Saxon dialect, the original was in the Northumbrian dialect
Nu (we) sculon herigean heofon-rices weard,
Meotodes meahte, ond his mod-gethanc,
weorc wuldor-faeder swa he wundra gehwaes,
ece drihten, or onstealde.
He aerest sceop eorthan bearnum
heofon to hrofe, halig scyppend.
Tha middan-yeard, moncynnes weard,
ece drihten aefter teode,
firum foldan frea aelmihtig.

http://www.archive.org/details/caedmon_librivox

(Early Northumbrian version of Cædmon's Hymn – just for comparison)
Nu scylun hergan hefaenricaes uard,
metudæs maecti end his modgidanc,
uerc uuldurfadur, sue he uundra gihuaes,
eci dryctin, or astelidæ.
He aerist scop aelda barnum,
heben til hrofe, haleg scepen,
Tha middungeard moncynnæs uard,
eci dryctin, æfter tiadæ
firum foldu, frea allmectig.
(Primo cantauit caedmon istud carmen In the beginning Caedmon sang this poem)

nu – now (NOW).
Spelling changed in the Middle English period (French scribes used ou or ow for /u:/).
Pronunciation changed during the Great Vowel Shift (14th- 16th century, possibly also later) when long /u:/ > /au/
Cf also lecture on Beowulf (Part 4) (ut)

Great Vowel Shift in short (a very simplified account!):
Long vowels turned into diphthongs or other
long vowels and diphtongs into long vowels.
/i:/ into /ai/
/u:/ into /au/
/o:/ into /ou/
/a:/ into /ei/
/e:/ into /i:/
/au/ into /o:/ etc.
GVS did not affect short vowels.

Old English had no future tense. (Only two
tenses: present and past simple or, more properly,
praeterite).
(Praeterite comes from Latin praeteritum – gone
past, is used by grammarians describing Old
English to differentiate Old English past tense – in
the system presen/past – no other tenses – to
avoid confusion with Past Indefinite – in a system
of 16 tenses – and Past Simple – French)

Present-praeterite verbs
sculon – (we) have to, must
See present-praeterite verbs, Oleg Mutt
Introduction p. 67- 68.
Infinitive sculan – have to, be obliged to
(originally “owe” – when one owes
something, one has to repay it).

Present-praeterite verbs 2
Singular Plural
Present: 1. sceal 1. sculon
2. scealt 2. sculon
3. sceal 3. sculon
sculon was earlier praeterite (past simple) plural,
as it acquired the function of the present plural (all
three forms), a new past was created:
scolde.
sceal > SHALL, scolde > SHOULD
How did they come to denote future?

Metonymic changes in grammatical meanings I
When one has to do something, one is
most probably going to do it, i.e. the two notions
are close to each other > potential for metonymic
changes.

Metonymic changes in grammatical meanings II
Cf Estonian: “Ma pean täna veel poest läbi käima
ja külla minema” – actually intention is meant.
Estonians unconsciously transfer it into
their English and use “I must”, which in Modern
English connnotes very strong obligation. The
reaction of an English speaker: “Oh, those poor
Estonians, they always have such heavy
obligations!” Actually the English, now that they
have future tenses, have “forgotten” that they
used sculan – must – exactly the same way.

Metonymic changes in grammatical meanings III
The same mechanism has given the future
function to “will”.
Old English “willan” – to want, to wish
(“want” originally meant “lack”, still has the meaning in
Shakespeare; also often used in American English. For
instance, in answer to asking for directions you’ll often hear
something like “You want to go to the first lights and turn
left”).
Again metonymy: when one wants to do something, one is
likely to be going to do it.

Metonymic changes in gramatical meanings IV
Both SHALL and WILL have, in Modern English, retained a shade of
obligation and wanting, respectively.
“Shall” is used in legal texts, even current and new legal texts,
including contracts, treaties, etc, in the meaning of “be obliged to” (“The
parties to this treaty shall (do something)” – NB! “shall” is obligatory in
these contexts!
Estonian and Russian employ simply indicative present in
the same contexts).
Also in threats: “You shall pay for it!”
“Will you take this woman to thy wife?” – “I will” (in some
parts of England: “I do”).
“I will get him!” (determination, strong will)

Metonymic changes in grammatical meanings V
In fact, some grammarians claim that English still has no morphological
future tense (perhaps the most neutral form “I’ll be seeing you”), since
“shall” and “will” retain the shades of meaning of obligation and
determination.
Present-Day German has completely retained the modal meanings of
these verbs:
sollen – to be obliged to, wollen (ich will) – to want. For marking the
future tense, werden, i.e. to become, is used.
Estonian employs not only “pidama”, but also “hakkama”, the latter
rarely means the same as “algama”, although it is still not regarded as
a morphological marker of future.
(Cf also the Russian verbs where beginning to do something
and the future are expressed by the same prefix!)

Metonymic changes in grammatical meanings VI
To sum up, it seems that languages often
derive their future tenses from forms that
indicate obligation, intention, willingness,
becoming, beginning, etc in the present. All
of these meanings are linked to the future,
which makes metonymical changes
possible.

herigean - to praise highly, to extol (has not survived).
heofon-rice – the kingdom of heaven.
“Kingdom” is used in Modern English since rice has only survived in
the compound word BISHOPRIC (= diocese, piiskopkond, i.e., the area
under one bishop), otherwise replaced by the Frech loan “state”
(Modern French “état”).
In other Germanic languages the root has survived, and it has also
been borrowed by Estonian: riik. Cf German Reich, which, however, is
not use to denote state any more after the collapse of the Third Reich
and the associated shame. Reich, is, however, still used in compounds
like Himmelreich (see next slide).

The related adjective has survived, however:
RICH (cf Estonian rikas).
RICH the pronunciation has been influenced by the Norman French
“riche”. Also, the fact that French had the word (borrowed earlier from
Germanic languages!) helped to retain it in English.
The adjective originally meant “powerful”, which naturally entails also
being rich.
In German the noun and the adjective actually have the same form
today: Reich (noun) and reich meaning “rich” (adjective).
Himmelreich also continues to be used, Estonian taevariik is a
translation loan from this.
For the Proto-Indo-European form see next slides.

Proto-Indo-European *reg-
Meant something like “to move in a straight
line”, with the derivative meaning “to direct in
a straight line, lead, rule”.
Metonymy: to make people (or anything
else!) move in a straight line requires
power.

Some derivatives of *reg- in Modern English Modern English
BISHOPRIC, RICH; RIGHT; (through Latin and French) REALM, RECTOR, REGIME, CORRECT, DIRECT, RECTOR, RECTANGLE, RECTITUDE, REGIMENT; (Latin rex – king: REGAL, REIGN, ROYAL – the last via French); RAKE; RANK; REGULATE, RULE (NB! Cf. The two meanings of RULER); RECKON (Est. rehkendama from German rechnen – to calculate).

weard - guardian (“guardian” is a
French loan, ultimately Germanic; the word
has survived in WARD – hoolealune, e.g., a
person under somebody’s guardianship,
again a metonymical meaning change).

meotod – maker, creator (TO METE OUT
cloth, fig. TO METE OUT justice, cf German
messen – to measure).
The noun has not survived. However, English has
a number of loanwords from, e.g., Greek and Latin
that can ultimately be traced back to the same
Proto-Indo-European root or to a close Proto-Indo-
European root (see next slide).

Proto-Indo-European *med-
(to take appropriate measures) > meotod, TO
METE OUT
Via Latin: MEDICATE, MEDECINE,
REMEDY (to take appropriate measures> to
take care!)
Cf Proto-Indo-European *me- (to measure)
Via Latin and French: (TO) MEASURE
Via Greek: METER, DIAMETER, METRONOME,
GEOMETRY, etc

meaht, alternative form miht (cf below
ælmihtig - ALMIGHTY)
meotodes meahte – the Creator’s might
(object, i.e. (We must praise) the Creator’s
might)
(meotodes – Genitive, meahte –
Accusative).

Old English, just as Present-Day German,
had four cases:
Nominative (roughly “what/who?” – “mis/kes?”
Genitive (roughly “of what/whose?” – “mille/kelle?”)
Dative (roughly “to what/to whom?” –”millele/kellele?”)
Accusative (roughly “what/whom?” – “mida/keda”?
(plus earlier Instrumental, which merged with Dative).
(NB! In all languages every case usually has multiple
meanings, cf Estonian Elative
Elative (from Latin efferre "to bring or carry out") - a
locative case with the basic meaning "out of“. Yet Elative
has also, e.g., the meaning of “about” (rääkima millestki,
mõtlema millestki, unistama millestki)).

Present-day German Macht – power, might
How did miht turn into MIGHT /mait/?
Spelling changed in the Middle English
period (Norman French scribes used gh to
denote Ich-Laut and Ach-Laut).

Pronunciation changed twice:
First, Ich-Laut and Ach-Laut were dropped from English
(Elisabeth I already used what was then considered by
grammarians the “wrong” forms, i.e. those without Ich-Laut
and Ach-Laut). The preceding vowel was lengthened
(/mi:t/).
Second, long /i:/ turned into /ai/ - the Great Vowel Shift.
The first change had to be already almost completed when
the second change hit the word (remember, the Great
Vowel Shift did not affect short vowels!).
Since long /i:/ was considered “wrong” in Elisabethan
times, the change must have been happening then. The
Great Vowel Shift must at least have been still active at that
time, otherwise /i:/ would not have turned into /ai/.

How do we know Elisabeth dropped the ich-
Laut? Because she spelt “rhyme” as
“rhyghme”.
Hypercorrection: in writing, she inserted “h”
into all words which she actually pronounced
without the ich-Laut. However, “rhyme” was a
recent Greek loan that had never had an ich-Laut
in it, was pronounced with a long /i:/ right from the
beginning and spelt, following Greek, as “rhyme”.

mod – mood, spirit, courage, mind (a general word for all
aspects of the inner world; cf Estonian meel as in
“meelekoht” (place of the mind!), meelde jätma (memory),
meelega (on purpose), hea meel (mood), meele järele
olema, meeldima (like), etc.).For the Estonian meel when
it occurs alone (i.e. not in a compound or phrase) only the
meaning “sense” has remained (narrowing of meaning).
mod has undergone a similar narrowing of meaning,
as more specificity was needed. Thus, it has survived in
present-day MOOD.
In Present-Day German Mut – courage, again only
one meaning left.

ond = and (see Pronunciation – Part II)
mod-gethanc – mind’s thought, i.e. intention,
conception.
weorc – work, WORK
wuldor – glory (has not survived)
fæder – father, FATHER (German Vater)
weorc (Accusative) wuldor-fæder (Genitive) –
work of the glorious father (object)

Thus, “we must praise” four things: heofon-
rices weard (i.e. God), meotodes meahte
(the Creator’s might), his mod-gethanc (his
intention), and weorc wuldor-fæder (work
of the glorious father).

swa he wundra gewhæs – how he of (=for)
wonder’s each (= of every wonder)
ece – eternal (cf German ewig, Estonian
iga(-vik, -vene))
drihten – lord, Lord (Swedish drottning –
queen)

or onstealde – the beginning established
or – beginning, origin (origin is a Latin loan,
ultimately goes back to the same Pr-IE root),
cf German Ur- in Uralt (very old, going back
to the beginnings), Ursprung (cause, the
original cause), Estonian ürg(ne) (Germanic
loan).

onstealde – praeterite from astellan – to
establish (Present-Day German aufstellen –
set up, establish, as in Rekord aufstellen).

ærest – first of all, earliest
ær – before (cf archaic ERE LONG – before
long- very common in Shakespeare), ærest
– most before, first (cf Modern English
ERSTWHILE – “kunagine”, as in, e.g., “his
erstwhile friend)
Cf German erst – first (adjective and adverb).
ær-lice – early, EARLY (for lice see Part IV –
Beowulf)

ærest and fyrst were close in meaning – one
more temporal, the other more spatial.
NB! Notice that BEFORE has both a temporal and
a spatial meaning, also Russian перед, cf
Estonian ees and enne, ette, esimene.
Temporal meanings are metaphors from
spatial meanings. (Space – concrete - is the
source domain and time – abstract – the target
domain in the scheme of the respective
generative/conceptual metaphor).

sceop – created. Praeterite from scyppan – to
make,create, cf below scyppend – Maker,Creator
(i.e. God). TO SHAPE – the meaning has
narrowed (shaping is a form of creating!),
since new words for creating were borrowed
(TO CREATE – Latinised French)
Present-Day German schaffen still means
“to create”.

eorth – earth (EARTH), eorthan – Genitive
(of the earth).
bearn – child (Scottish BAIRN – child),
bearnum – Dative Plural – to the children.
eorthan bearnum heofon to hrofe – to the
children of the earth heaven (sky) for a roof.
hrof – roof; ROOF. Cf Russian кров – shelter
(остаться без крова – to remain without a roof
over one’s head, krovlja - lid), Estonian
roovilatid (old loan).

halig – holy, HOLY
Long /a:/ turned into long /o:/ at the
beginning of the Middle English period. The
change happened in Southern England
only.
During the Great Vowel Shift long /o:/ turned
into /ou/. In Scottish English still forms such
as hame for home.

Proto-Indo-European *kailo-
“whole, uninjured, of good omen” I
Proto-Germanic *hailaz
Old English hal – HALE (sound in health, vigorous, robust (HALE AND HEARTY), WHOLE
Old English halsum – WHOLESOME (e.g. WHOLESOME FOOD)
Old Norse heill (healthy) – HAIL (as a greeting), TO HAIL (to greet, also: to hail a taxi, also fig. to praise highly, to acclaim, as in “critics hailed her new book”), WASSAIL; German “Heil!” not used any more (“Heil Hitler! and the associated shame (just as with Reich)

Proto-Indo-European *kailo-
“whole, uninjured, of good omen” II
Germanic *hailitho > Old English hælth – HEALTH
Germanic *hailjan > Old English hælan – TO HEAL
Germanic *hailagaz > Old English halig – HOLY
Germanic *hailigon > Old English halgian to
consecrate, to bless,
halga – sacred, a saint, Middle English halwe (see
Prologue to the Canterbury Tales: ferne halwes – distant
shrines – metonymic from the meaning “saint”
TO HALLOW (as in “Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowedbe thy name”), HALLOW meaning “saint” (the
latter is a French loan (ALL HALLOWS’ DAY,
HALLOWEEN).

Proto-Indo-European *kailo-
“whole, uninjured, of good omen” III
The metonymic link between “being in one piece”
and “being healthy” is fairly universal (cf. the two
meanings of the Estonian word “terve” – a Finno-
Ugric, i.e. a non-Indo-European word! – or Russian
“целый” (whole) and “целить” – to heal (NB!
modern medicine uses “treat” and “cure” – the
latter when the result is positive, “heal” is generally
used in alternative medicine as is “целить”, cf also
Healer and Целитель as names for Jesus).

Proto-Indo-European *kailo-
“whole, uninjured, of good omen” IV
The use of a word denoting “health” in greetings
and other ritual formulas ( as in HAIL!) is also fairly
universal (cf. Estonian “terviseks” and
“tere”<“terve”, Russian “здраздвуй(те)” <
“здоровье”; ancient Romans used “Vale!” – “be
healthy!” – as a parting formula).
The meaning of sacredness as in halig >
HOLY is related to magic/religion linked with
healing and being healthy (cf. Healer above).

halig scyppend – holy creator (cf.
scyppan above).
tha – then
middan-geard – middle yard, earth
(MIDDLE, YARD).

Germanic people thought of the world roughly as
three-layered: Upper World (gods), Middle World
(humans), Netherworld (ghosts, hell, the dead).
Human Middle World was thought of
metaphorically as an enclosed yard (cf.
Finno-Ugric idea of the world as a tent – “koda”),
with the fence protecting people against ghosts.
(For enclosed yard cf. later folde)

Germanic Cosmography
As you notice, the system is a
little more complicated than
described above (Midgard is only
part of the second layer), but
the basics are the
same.
(Those interested, see http://images.google.ee/imgres?imgurl=http://www.dickinson.edu/~eddyb/mythology/Triscentric.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.dickinson.edu/~eddyb/mythology/Cosmography1.html&h=335&w=310&sz=35&hl=et&start=33&tbnid=mjqDH6w2a3fdZM:&tbnh=119&tbnw=110&prev=/images%3Fq%3DGermanic%2Bworld%26start%3D20%26ndsp%3D20%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Det%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN
NB! The text there is not obligatory for the exam, just interesting)

A simplified version of Germanic Cosmography (the world tree Yggdrasil still clearly visible)

Monn-cynn – mankind (cynn> KIN as in
NEXT OF KIN, KITH AND KIN)
Monn-cynnes weard – mankind’s guardian
æfter – AFTER
teode – made (cf German tun, NB! Estonian
“tegema” is believed to be a Finno-Ugric
root)

fir – man (NB! One more word for “man” in
addition to the ones in the passage from
“Beowulf”). An early Latin loan, Latin vir –
man, Latin virtuus – virtue was originally
“manliness”!
Cf later loans VIRTUE (originally from French, the
Middle English form was vertue, re-Latinised
during the Renaissance period when Latin was
considered more prestigeous and French seen as
a “corrupt” form of Latin), VIRTUOSO (via Italian).

folde – enclosure (FOLD – as in “fold for
sheep”), cf. middangeard above.
firum foldan – for the men the earth
(enclosure)
frea ælmihtig – almighty Lord.
Cf Present-Day German Frau, the
corresponding loan in Estonian proua)

In the short text there are 7 synonyms (one used twice) for
God (while, true to the Commandment that God’s
name should not be abused, the direct word is never used,
kennings are used instead):
heofon-rices weard, meotod, wuldor-fæder, ece
drihten, halig scyppend, monn-cynnes weard,
ece drihten, frea ælmihtig.
The feeling is created that the poet turns to God all the
time, invokes God.

In the following simplified tranlslation all the
synonyms for God have been replaced by “God”,
just to show you how frequent the invocation of
God is in the poem. At the exam, though, you will
have to translate the kennings word for word (e.g.
ece drihten – eternal Lord), as well as give the
exact translations of, say, middan-geard and
folde (alongside their general meaning of “earth”).

Now (we) must praise God,
God’s might/power, and his mind’s thought,
work of God, how he for wonders each,
God, the beginning established.
He first created for the earth’s children
heaven for a roof, God.
Then the earth, God,
God, afterwards made,
for the men the earth, God.