Old English Language: History and Linguistic Features
The Norman Conquest and its Impact on England
Two chief candidates vied for the English throne: 1. Harold Godwinson, a prominent earl, and 2. William, Duke of Normandy. Edward the Confessor named Harold as his heir. Edward died on January 5, 1066. On the same day, Harold was crowned King of England. Duke William amassed an invasion fleet. When King Harold was ready to fight in the South, news came from the North of an invasion by Harald Hardrada, King of Norway. Harold marched north with his own personal army and defeated the Norwegians at Stamford Bridge. William attacked in the South, near Hastings. Harold marched back with his tired troops. This led to The Battle of Hastings (1066). The Norman knights defeated the English. With the defeat of Harold, the Dark Ages came officially to an end, ushering in the Middle English Period.
Viking Influence on the English Language
- Racial and linguistic kinship
- Intermarriage
- 1,400 Norse place names in England
- Many words in common: man, can, wife, folk, house, will, can, come, hear, see, think, ride, etc.
- Viking words replaced some Saxon words: sister (ON systir)
- Norse place name endings: -by, -thwaite, -toft, -thorpe
Old English Alphabet: The Runes
Old English used the runic alphabet. Runes were used in Northern Europe. There are approximately 4,000 inscriptions dating back to the 3rd century AD. The origin of runes is unknown. The word “rune” means whisper, secret, mystery. Each letter has a name. The first six letters are “futhark”. Several runic alphabets existed (Old Norse, Old Swedish, Old High German, Old English, etc.).
Old English Dialects
The main Old English dialects were Northumbrian, Mercian, West-Saxon, and Kentish. Reasons for dialectal differences include the use of diphthongs instead of vowels in Wessex: giet vs. get. Another difference is the use of “o” instead of “a” before “m”, “n”, and “ng” in Mercian and Northumbrian: mon vs. man. Mercian and Northumbrian are grouped as Anglian speech. Scant records remain of the Anglian and Kentish dialects. Standard Modern English derives from Mercian (London). Old English is based on West Saxon English. Winchester was the capital of Wessex and a cultural center. Old English dictionaries are based on the Wessex dialect, with exceptions like eald (Wessex) vs. ald (Anglian) = old. The Classical Old English period is known as Aelfric’s period (approximately the year 1000). There are two periods of the West Saxon dialect: Early West Saxon, from Alfred’s time (9th century), and Late West Saxon, from Aelfric’s time (10th century), during the Benedictine reform.
Old English Phonology Changes
Umlaut, also known as vowel mutation or metaphony, is an anticipatory vowel assimilation occurring in the Germanic languages. For example, i-mutation: *manniz > men, *fōtiz > feet. Another example is “How do you do?” vs. “How are you doing?”. Ablaut, also known as vowel gradation or apophony, is the variation of a root for grammatical purposes, e.g., sing/sang/sung. These are strong verbs, e.g., gelimpan / gelamp / gelumpon. Weak verbs use a dental suffix (-ode, -ede, -de), e.g., clipian / clipode.
Nouns in Old English
In Old English, nouns, adjectives, and most pronouns were inflected, and verbs were conjugated. Nouns consisted of a stem with meaning and gender, and a case ending with number and function. Nouns could change case and number depending on syntax but never changed gender. Inflections were reduced through time by analogization and weakening of unstressed syllables. In Modern English, only the plural morpheme “-s” and some irregular plural forms survive: men, feet, oxen, mice, etc. Originally, there were ten noun classes in Old English. By the 9th century, this was reduced to three main classes. Noun inflections were divided (depending on the Indo-European root) into vocalic (strong) and consonantal (weak).
There are four cases:
- Nominative: subject
- Accusative: object
- Genitive: possessive
- Dative: indirect object, place, time, etc.
Modern survivals of case + number include the genitive plural ending ‘a-‘ becoming ‘-e’ in Middle English, e.g., mila becoming mile in “sixty-mile drive”. The dative plural ending -um is seen in words like whilom (< hwilum) and seldom.
Adjectives in Old English
There were two declensions: strong and weak. Strong adjectives were used if not preceded by a determiner (article, demonstrative), e.g., gōd man = good man. Weak adjectives were used if followed by a determiner, e.g., se gōda man = the/this good man. There were two grades of comparison: comparative, with the suffix -ra, e.g., heard > heardra (harder), and superlative, with the suffix -ost, e.g., heard > heardost (hardest). Irregular forms include gōd / betra / betst and micel / māra / mæst.
Adverbs in Old English
Adverbs were formed by adding the suffix -e to adjectives, e.g., wrað (angry) > wraðe (angrily). The suffix -lice became -ly, e.g., huxlice, soðlice.
Pronouns in Old English
Old English pronouns had seven different functions: demonstrative, personal, possessive, reflexive, relative, interrogative, and indefinite. The demonstrative pronouns were sē, sēo, þæt and þēs, þēos, þis. They also functioned as definite articles, e.g., þæt word = the word / this word.