Words of native Origin and Borrowings
Native words A native word is a word which belongs to the original English stock as known from the earliest available manuscripts of the Old English period. Native words are further subdivided into the words of the Indo-European stock and those of the Common Germanic origin. Characteristic Features of the Native Vocabulary: 1. The words are monosyllabic: sun, wood, break. 2. They are polysemantic. 3. They are characterized by high frequency. 4. Native words are usually found in set-expressions. 5. Verbs with post-positions are usually native: to look for, to look after. 6. They are characterized by a wide range of lexical and grammatical valency. 7. If words begin with wh, wr, tw, dw, sw, sh. th; if at the end they have dge, tch,nd, ld; if the roots have ng, aw, ew, ee, oo they are native.