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Fourth Lecture

Fourth Lecture. 1-Inflections in OE. 2-A brief history of Middle English 3-Linguistic Influences of the Conquest(Spelling in ME). Inflections in OE. A- The Noun: The inflection of the noun was much more elaborate than it is today:

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Fourth Lecture

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  1. Fourth Lecture 1-Inflections in OE. 2-A brief history of Middle English 3-Linguistic Influences of the Conquest(Spelling in ME)

  2. Inflections in OE A- The Noun: The inflection of the noun was much more elaborate than it is today: 1-Old English nouns were inflected for number(singular –plural), 2- and for four cases (nominative-accusative-genitive-dative) in the singular and the same cases in the plural.

  3. C- The Verb: 1- OE distinguished two simple tenses by inflection (present and past). 2- OE recognized the indicative, subjunctive, and imperative moods, and had the usual two numbers(singular-plural) and three persons(1st-2nd-3rd). 3- The verbs were divided into two major classes (weak/regular-strong/irregular).

  4. B- The adjective: OE adjectival inflections were complex. For example, the adjective agreed with the noun it modified in gender, case, number, and definitness. 1- OE adjectives were inflected for five cases(nominative-accusative-genitive-dative-instrumental); 2- they were also inflected for number(singular-plural), 3- and gender(feminine-masculine-neutral); 4- they were inflected for definiteness(weak-strong declensions). 5- and, finally, they were inflected to indicate comparative and superlative forms.

  5. D-The Personal Pronoun: The personal pronouns in OE were almost as complex as they are today (except for the dual forms & the 2nd person singular and plural forms) . 1- OE pronouns were inflected for number(singular-dual-plural), and gender(only for the 3rd person singular forms). 2- OE indicated cases(nominative, accusative/ dative, genitive). 3- OE also recognized three persons(1st-2nd-3rd)

  6. A brief history of Middle Eng.(1100-1500) 1- The Norman invasion &conquest of 1066 was a catastrophic event that brought new rulers and new cultural, social and linguistic influences to the British Isles. 2- The Norman establishment used French & Latin leaving English as the language of the illiterate & powerless majority. 3- The influence of French (and Latin, often by way of French) upon the lexicon continued throughout this period, the loss of some inflections and the reduction of others accelerated, and many changes took place within the phonological & grammatical systems of the language. 4- By the end of that time, the aristocracy had adopted English as their language and the use and importance of French gradually faded.

  7. ME Spelling During the ME period, many changes occurred because of the French influence such as those which happened to the spelling conventions. I) Consonants: A- Earlier conventions: Some of the innovations in ME spelling were actually a return to earlier conventions. 1- The diagraph th, which was reintroduced during this period, had been used in some of the earliest English texts, but was replaced in later OE writing by other symbols. 2-uu was also brought back to England by Norman scribes in a ligatured form as w.

  8. B- True innovations: Other new spellings were true innovations during this period such as: 1- The introduction of the letter V to indicate the prehistoric OE development of [f] to[v], 2- The use of Ch to indicate the initial sound of child (which in OE had been spelled simply with c), 3- The preference of wh for the phonetically more accurate hw used in OE times, 4- The replacement of OE cw with ME qu, and 5- The replacement of OE cg with ME gg in medial and final positions.

  9. II) Vowels: 1- ME writing employed double letters to indicate vowel length(e.g. double O came to be used for the long low- back rounded vowel). 2- Final unstressed e following a single consonant also indicated vowel length(this corresponds to the “silent e” in modern English as in case, rule ..etc). 3- Double consonants, which indicated consonant length in earlier periods, began to indicate that a preceding vowel was short(e.g. dinner as contrasted with diner) 4- Short u was written oif m, n, u (v, w) were adjacent (e.g. son, come ….etc) 5- long u, and sometimes short u, was written as ou.

  10. Next week reading: Chapter 6 (pp143-162) of The Origins and development of the English Language

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