Classes of the strong verbs

There were seven principal gradation series in Old English and there were seven classes of the strong verbs — from I to VII.

As we have already said, the seventh class of the strong verbs stands apart from the rest of the classes, because it was the only class formed by verbs which originally used reduplication of the root-vowel as their principal grammatical means; the sixth class of the strong verbs shows a peculiarity that is also typical only of one class within the system of the strong verbs — original quantitative gradation; the rest of the classes — from I to VII — are characterised by a certain similarity in their original grammatical means as all of them originally used the same type of qualitative ablaut, i.e. the interchange of a front vowel — back vowel — zero in the form of

i —a — ø.

The difference in the gradation series of each of the classes within the first five was mainly due to the splitting of that one gradation into variants under the influence of the vowel or the consonant of the stem that followed the vowel of gradation.

Thus in the first class of the strong verbs the vowel of gradation was followed by the vowel -i, in the second — by the vowel -u, in the third, fourth and fifth — by a sonorous consonant + another consonant, by one sonorous consonant or by a noise consonant, respectively.

The root of the verbs of the sixth class consisted only of consonants, and the purely quantitative vowel interchange of prehistoric times developed into a quantitative and qualitative one. The verbs of the seventh class show traces of the original reduplication (addition of an extra syllable including the initial consonant of the infinitive and having the vowels -e- or -eo- in the past singular and plural)¹.

The original structure of the verb is still quite clear in the Gothic language. In table 7-3 below the bold type vowel in the Gothic verb is the vowel of gradation. As is seen from the examples, in the third and second forms of the verb there was no vowel of gradation — the zero grade of gradation.

 

Table 7-2. Classes of the strong verbs

Stems	I stem Infinitive, Present tense, Imperative	II stem Past tense singular	IIIstem Past tense plural	IV stem Past Participle (Part. II)
Class
I II III IV V VI VII	rīsan (rise) cēosan (choose) bindan (bind) teran (tear) etan (eat) scacan (shake) hātan (-call)	rās cēas band tær æt scōc hēt	rison curon bundon tǣron ǣton scōcon hēton	risen coren bunden toren eten scacen hāten

 

Table 7-3. Old English and Gothic strong verbs

Class language	I	II	III	IV
Forms
I Old English Gothic	rīsan reisan	rās rais	Rison risum	risen risans
II Old English Gothic	cēosan kiusan	cēas kaus	curon kusum	coren kusans
III Old English Gothic	bindan bindan	band band	bundon bundum	bunden bundans

In the following table there is given the paradigm of some types of strong verbs.

 

Table 7-4. Conjugation of Old English strong verbs

Classes	Class I gradation vowel + i	Class III' gradation vowel + sonorant + any consonant	Class IV gradation vowel + sonorant
Forms
Infinitive
	wrītan (write)	bindan (bind)	niman (lake)
Present Ind.
Sing. 1	Wrīte	binde	nime
2	wrītest, wrītst	bindest, binst	nimst
3	wrīteϸ, wrīt	bindesϸ, bint	nim(e)ϸ
Plur.	wrītaϸ	bindaϸ	nimaϸ
Present Subj.
Sing.	Wrīte	binde	nime
Plur.	Wrīten	binden	nimen
Imperative
Sing.	Wrīt	bind	nim
Plur.	Wrītaf	bindaϸ	nimaϸ
Participle I
	wrītende	bindende	nimende
Past Ind.
Sing. I	Wrāt	band, bond	nam
2	write	bunde	name
3	wrāt	band, bond	nam
Plur.	writon	bundon	namon
Past Subj.
Sing.	write	bunde	name
Plur.	writen	bunden	namen
Participle 11
	(ӡe)writen	(ӡe)bunden	(ӡe)numen

 

 

Weak verbs

The Old English weak verbs are relatively younger than the strong verbs. They reflect a later stage in the development of Germanic languages.

They were an open class in Old English, as new verbs that entered the language generally formed their forms on analogy with the weak verbs.

Whereas the strong verbs used vowel-interchange as a means of differentiation among principal verb stems, the weak verbs used for that purpose suffixation, namely, suffixes -t or -d. For example:

c ē pan — cēpte — cēpt (keep)

The strong verbs, as we remember, were "root-stem" verbs, i.e. they did not have any stem-forming suffix following the root, but they added their grammatical endings to the root directly. The weak verbs, however, had a stem-forming suffix that followed the root and preceded the grammatical ending. By way of an example we may use a Gothic verb where that original stem-forming suffix is better preserved than in English.

InfinitivePast tensePast Participle

Singular

I class haus-j-an (hear) haus-i-d-a haus-i-ϸs

Classes of the weak verbs

In accordance with the character of the stem-suffix the weak verbs are subdivided into three classes.

If the English strong verbs had four principal forms, the English weak verbs had three principal forms.

We may draw the following table of the English weak verbs.

 

Table 7-5. Classes of the weak verbs

Classes	Stem suffix	Infinitive	Past tense Singular	Past Participle
I	i	dēman (deem) fyllan (fill)	dēmde fyllde	dēmed fylled
II1	oi	lufian (love) lōcian (look)	lufode lōcode	lufod lōcod

 

Class I - the stem-suffix - i

The class includes many verbs formed from other nouns, adjectives or verbs. All of them have a front root vowel — the result of the palatal mutation due to the - i - element of the stem-suffix.

e.g. deman ← dōm

fyllan ← ful

In the course of time this palatal stem-suffix was as a rule lost. It was preserved only in some participles in the form of - e -(after sonorous consonants):

dēman — dēmde — dēmed.

Class II - the stem-suffix - oi

The ō -element of the suffix is preserved in the past tense and in the Past Participle.

If the first class of the weak verbs reflected the palatal mutation of the root-vowel due to the i -element of the stem-suffix, the root vowel of the weak verbs belonging to the second class remained unchanged (because of the preceding ō).

luf-ōian → lufēian → lufēan → lufian

The following table shows the paradigm of weak verbs.

^{______________________________________}

¹ Of the third class there remained in Old English only three verbs — habban (have), libban (live), secӡan (see).

Table 7-6. Conjugation of Old English weak verbs

Classes	Class I stem suffix -i-	Class II stem suffix -oi-	Class III
Forms
Infinitive	cēpan (keep)	lōcian (look)	habban (have)
Present Ind. Sing. I 2 3 Plur.	Cēpe Cēpst Cēpp cēpap	lōcie lōcast lōcap lōciap	hæbbe hafast, hæfst hafap, hæfp habbap
Present Sub). Sing. Plur.	cēpe cēpen	lōcie lōcien	hæbbe hæbben
Imperative Sing. Plur.	Cēp cēpap	lōca lōciap	hafa habbap
Participle I	cēpende	lōciende	hæbbende
Past Ind. Sing. I 2 3 Plur.	cēpte cēptes(t) cēpte cēpton	lōcode lōcodes(t) lōcode lōcodon	hæfde hæfdest hæfde hæfdon
Past Subj. Sing. Plur.	cēpte cēpten	lōcode lōcoden	hæfden hæfden
Participle II	(Ʒe)cēped	(Ʒe)lōcod	(Ʒe)hæfd

 

Irregular verbs

Regularity means conformity with some unique principle or pattern. It does not require any exact material marker. That is why it is said that most verbs in Old English were regular I in theor conjugation they followed one of the patterns typical of this or that class of strong or weak verbs. However, there were also a few irregular verbs, conjugated in some specific way.

Irregular weak verbs

The majority of the weak verbs belonging to the 1^st and 2^nd classes were regular. The weak verbs of the 3^rd class are considered to be irregular, because the class consists of only three verbs, following their own individual patterns of form-building. However, among the 1^st class there were also some irregular verbs. This irregularity was inherent, but it was manifested in pre-historic times and in Old English differently. Here we may speak of such verbs as

tellan — talde — tald (to tell)

sellan — salde — said (to sell)

The sign of irregularity of the weak verbs in Old English was vowel interchange, a feature not typical of this group of verbs. The cause of it was the original absence of the stem-forming suffix -i- in Past Singular and Past Participle:

* talian — talde — tald

Under the influence of -i- only the form of the infinitive could change during the process of palatal mutation:

* talian > tellan;

the other two remaining unchanged, and as a result the verb acquired vowel interchange.

 

Irregular strong verbs

There was a group of strong verbs which in the pre-written period lost some of their forms and preserved the others, changing their lexical and grammatical meaning. Forms historically past changed so as to become present in meaning. These verbs are called preterite-present, for in the written period they build their present tense forms from the original past (preterite) ones. The new past tense forms of these verbs in Old English are built with the help of dental suffixation, like weak verbs. The majority of preterite-present verbs are defective verbs — they do not have all the forms of regular verbs, which lost their connection with the other forms and were dropped.

The group of Old English preterite-present verbs includes, among others, the following:

 

InfinitivePresentPresentPastParticiple II

SingularPluralSingular

āƷan āƷ āƷ on ā hte āƷ en

cunnan cann cunnon cuðe cunnen

sculan sceal sculon scolde —

ma Ʒ an mæƷ ma3on meahte —

— mōt mōton mōste —

 

The Old English forms of preterite-present verbs correspond to the following pre-written forms of the verb:

Pre-written Infinitive Past Past Participle II

Singular Plural

Written Infinitive Present Present Past Participle II

Singular Plural Singular

Preterite-present verbs were further to develop in a number o\' different ways.

 

The verb āƷan later developed into several words:

— the infinitive āƷan as a result of phonetic changes gave • the New English verb owe with the past tense/participle II form

owed built according to the pattern of weak verbs;

— the past participle āƷan gave the New English adjective own from which there was later formed the regular verb own — owned — owned;

— the past tense singular ā hte developed into the modern modal verb ought.

The verb cunnan lost its infinitive. The form can began to be used for the present, the past tense form acquired the dental suffix -d, in Middle English began to be spelled with -ou- instead of -u-, and later acquired the letter -1- on analogy with such verbs as should and would.

The verb ma Ʒ an also lost its infinitive and participle I, using the form of mæƷ for its present, and the former meahte gave us the present-day might.

The verb mōt has preserved but one form — must — which goes back to its past tense form mōste and is understood as a present tense form — it is an example of a second change of its meaning, when the new past form came to be understood as the present tense one.

The verb sculan, similar to other verbs of this group, lost its infinitive, using the form sceal for the present, and the former sceolde was to develop into should, both verbs nowadays being used as modal or auxiliary.

Suppletive verbs

Supplition, as we know, is one of the oldest means of form-building. All Indo-European languages, and English among them, have suppletive verbs — those building different forms from different roots. Each of them is a class in itself. Among such verbs we may mention the following:

 

bēon — wesan (be)

Ʒān — eode (go)

don —dyde (do)

The first verb of each of the pairs above is the root for the Present tense forms, the second — for the past.

A similar phenomenon is observed in German: sein — war — ich bin, Russian: 6trn> — ecTb, H/ry — uieji, Latin: sum — fui, French: aller —je vais —j'irai. In fact, the forms of the verb cortresponding to the present-day be are derived from three different roots: wes-, es- and be- (for a complete paradigm of the verbs beon/wesan and jan/eode see table 7-7 on the next page).

* * *

Summary

If we compare the system of conjugation with that of the system of declension we shall observe a number of instances of basic difference between them.

— The principal grammatical means used in the paradigm of declension was suffixation, in the paradigm of conjugation — vowel gradation.

— With reference to the structure of the noun we generally speak of three elements of word-structure: root + stem-suffix + grammatical ending. In the verb we very often have only two elements — the root and the grammatical ending.

— The system of declension manifested a tendency to simplification from the point of view of the number of. declensions and the number of grammatical categories, the system of conjugation preserved its principal groups and classes of verbs and also retained and developed its original grammatical categories.

 

Table 7-7. Conjugation of beon/wesan and 3an/eode

Infinitive	wesan/bēon	Ʒān/ēode
Present hid. Sing. 1 2 3 Plur.	eom beo eart bist is bip sint, sindon bēob	Ʒā Ʒæst Ʒæp Ʒap
Present Subj. Sing. Plur.	sy, sī bēo syn, sīn bēon	Ʒā Ʒān
Imperative Sing. Plur.	wæs bēo wæsap bēop	Ʒā Ʒāp
Participle I	wesende bēonde	Ʒānde, ƷānƷende
Past hid. Sing. 1 2 3 Plur.	Wæs wǣre wæs wǣron	ēode ēodest ēode ēodon
Past Subj. Sing. Plur.	Wǣre wǣren	ēode ēoden
Participle II

 

Some more facts...

Reduplication

The seventh class of Old English strong verbs is formed by the so-called reduplicating verbs, which, as the name implies, used repetition of their elements as a means of form-build ing, although due to later contracting we see but traces of it in Old English. These verbs are put in a class by themselves because of their unusual pattern of preterits and are significant as forming a connecting link between the Teutonic¹ and other Indo-European languages, such as Greek and Latin, which also had reduplication — one of the oldest word- and form-building means of any language, encountered even now in some Creole languages, for example:

now-now (immediately), fast-fast (very fast) - in South African English.

Reduplication was perfectly preserved only in Gothic, the oldest representative of Teutonic, where past tense was formed by repeating the root syllable, for example:

haitan (to call) — haihait tekan (to touch) — taitok.

In Anglo-Saxon examples of reduplication are far less distinctly preserved, some of the most evident of them being:

hatan (to call) — heht (Gothic 'haihait'), which shows reduplication by the repetition of 'h';

rcedan (to advise) — reord (Gothic 'rairoth'), which shows reduplication by the repetition of Y;

lacan (to skip) — leolc (Gothic 'lailaik'), which shows reduplication by the repetition of T. More commonly the repeated consonant is lost, and a diphthong is substituted for the root vowel, as in:

______________

Teutonic = Germanic

GothicOUt English

faifall feoll (fell)

haihald heold (held)

Reduplicating verbs differed in one other respect from the remaining strong verbs, since their four principal stems had but two different vowels, one for the present and participle and another — for the preterite singular and plural. However, due to later changes most of them have lost the pattern, preserving the vowel interchange to become 'irregular', such as beat, blow, fall, grow, hold, know, let, throw, or started to use dental suffixes for their past and participle, losing the vowel difference completely and thus becoming 'regular':

blend, claw, dread, fold, glow, leap, row, salt, swoop, wheeze, wield.

The only certain example of the pattern remaining in Modern English is hight (to call), which in Old English was heht, the past tense of hatan and in Gothic — haihait, as shown above.

after O.F. Emerson and J.C. Nesfield

UNIT 3 The History of MIDDLE ENGLISH LECTURE 1 Part I Outer history

When the English or Anglo-Saxons united their warring tribes and developed a somewhat centralised government. Their whole existence was imperilled by the incursions of Danes or Northmen, Vikings from Norway and Iceland, whose fame and the dread of whom went before them. They were related to the nations they came to harry and plunder but their spirit was different from that of the conquered Teutonic tribes. The rapturous fight with the elements in which the Northman lived and moved and had his being, gave hin a strain of ruthless cruelty unlike anything in the more peaceful Anglo-Saxon character. There was also a power of bold and daring actions, of reckless valour, of rapid conception and execution, which contrasted strongly with the slower and more placid temperament of the Anglo-Saxon, and to their strain modren Englishment probably owe the power of initiative, the love of adventure and the daring action which have made England the greatest colonising nation on the earth.

Plan   1. SCANDINAVIAN INVASION 2. NORMAN CONQUEST 3. NORMANS IN FRANCE 4. FORMATION OF THE ENGLISH NATIONAL LANGUAGE

Программа Основные события этнической истории Англии и Франции периода 9-11 веков., наложившие отпечаток на формирование этнокультурного типа англичанЮ специфику лингвистической ситуации и состояние среднеанглийского языка.Вариативность языка в среднеанглийский период (диалекты и литературный язык, их соотношение).Основные памятники среднеанглийского периода. Седнеанглийские диалекты. Возвышение Лондонского далекта. Этнокультурные доминанты в письменных памятниках этого периода. Значение произведений Дж.Чосера для исследования языка в этнокультурном историческом контекте.

Literature:

1. Reznik R.V., Sorokina T.S., Reznik I.V. A History of the English Language. М: Флинта: Наука, 2001.

2. B.A. Ilyish. The History of the English Language. М., 1968.

12. T.A. Rastorgueva. A History of English. М.,1983.

13. Б.А. Ильиш. История английского языка. М., 1968.

14. Иванова И.П., Чахоян Л.П., Беляева Т.М. История английского языка. Спб., 1999.

15. Хлебникова И.Б. Введение в германскую филологию и историю языка. Калинин, 1975.

16. Шапошникова И.В. История английского языка: Учебник. Новосибирск, 2008.

17. Гуревич А.Я. Походы викингов. www. natahaus.ru

18. Стриннгольм А.М. Походы викингов. http://ihtik.lib.ru

19. Смирницкий А.И. Лекции по истории английчкого языка (средний и новый период). Москва «Добросвет», 2000.

20. Нейман С.Ю. Английский язык. Омск.2005.

 

 

embrace – охватывать inroad – вторжение stubbon – решительный plunder – ограбить, разграбить treaty – договор robb – грабить provision – условие conversion – обращение в веру recommense – зд. возобновиться predatory – хищный succession – наследственная власть, престолонаследие compel – вынудить subsequent – последующий

ease – легкость mutual penetration – взаимопроникновение equal footing – «на равных», равноправно approximately – приблизительно intercourse – взаимопонимание merge – слиться experience – пережить uniform – однородный Wedmore battle – Уэдморская битва Danelaӡu=Danelaw – Область Датского права Ethelred – Этелред Canute – Канут

 

 

 

pious – набожный, религиозный archbishop - архиепископ livestock – слой население strive – стремиться capture – захватить parcel out – передать recessive – ухудшающийся immensly – черезвычайно, колоссально reinforce – укрепить overwhelm – заполонить impartially – справедливо, беспристрасно

buttressed – поддержать tenants-in-chief – арендатор, дворянин, нанятый на службу shire – графство Edward the Confessor – Эдуард Исповедник Senlac Field, Hastings – поле у местечка Сенлак при Гастингсе William the Conqueror – Вильгельм Завоеватель Centerburry – Кентеберри

 

 

 

len possession – владение по лену stand aloof – держаться высокомерно Dispise - презирать coexistence – сосуществование artificiallly – искусственно

ascendancy - превосходство remnants – останки, остатки medieval – средневековый

 

 

 

UNIT 3 The History of MIDDLE ENGLISH LECTURE 1 Part II Outer history

 

 

1. MIDDLE ENGLISH WRITTEN RECORDS 2. CHANGES IN GRAPHICS 3. DEVELOPMENT OF WORD-STOCK 4. BORROWINGS

Основные события этнической истории Англии и Франции периода 9-11 веков., наложившие отпечаток на формирование этнокультурного типа англичан, специфику лингвистической ситуации и состояние среднеанглийского языка. Вариативность языка в среднеанглийский период (диалекты и литературный язык, их соотношение).Основные памятники среднеанглийского периода. Седнеанглийские диалекты. Возвышение Лондонского далекта. Этнокультурные доминанты в письменных памятниках этого периода. Значение произведений Дж.Чосера для исследования языка в этнокультурном историческом контекте.

 

 

 

LECTURE 8.

CHANGES IN THE PHONETIC

SYSTEM IN MIDDLE ENGLISH

AND NEW ENGLISH

William the Conqueror listening to his messenger, fragment of a contemporary embroidery ("Bayeux tapestry", or "Queen Mathilde's tapestry", Musee de Bayeux).

List of principal questions:

1. Changes in the phonetic system in Middle English

1.1. Vowels in the unstressed position

1.2. Vowels under stress

1.2.1. Qualitative changes

1.2.2. Quantitative changes

1.3. Consonants

2. Changes in the phonetic system in New English

2.1. Vowels in the unstressed position

2.2. Vowels under stress

2.2.1. Qualitative changes

2.2.2. Quantitative changes

2.3. Consonants

3. Changes in alphabet and spelling in Middle and New English

 

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