Chapter III linguistic features of Germanic languages

Preliminary Remarks (§ 50)

§ 50. All the Germanic languages of the past and present have com­mon linguistic features; some of these features are shared by other groups in the IE family, others are specifically Germanic.

The Germanic group acquired their specific distinctive features after the separation of the ancient Germanic tribes from other IE tribes and prior to their further expansion and disintegration, that is during the period of the PG parent-language. These PG features inherited by the descendant languages, represent the common features of the Ger­manic group. Other common features developed later, in the course of the individual histories of separate Germanic languages, as a result of similar tendencies arising from PG causes. On the other hand, many Germanic features have been disguised, transformed and even lost in later history.

PHONETICS (§ 51-61)

Word Stress (§ 51-52)

§ 51. The peculiar Germanic system of word accentuation is one of the most important distinguishing features of the group; it arose in PG, was fully or partly retained in separate languages and served as one of the major causes for many linguistic changes.

It is known that in ancient IE, prior to the separation of Germanic, there existed two ways of word accentuation: musical pitch and force stress. The position of the stress was free and movable, which means that it could fall on any syllable of the word — a root-morpheme, an affix or an ending — and could be shifted both in form-building and word-building (cf. R дóмом, домá, домовничать, дóма).

Both these properties of the word accent were changed in PG. Force or expiratory stress (also called dynamic and breath stress) became the only type of stress used. In Early PG word stress was still as movable as in ancient IE but in Late PG its position in the word was stabilised. The stress was now fixed on the first syllable, which was usually the root of the word and sometimes the prefix; the other syllables — suffixes and endings — were unstressed. The stress could no longer move either in form-building or word-building.

These features of word accent were inherited by the Germanic lan­guages, and despite later alterations are observable today. In Mod E there is a sharp contrast between accented and unaccented syllables due to the force of the stress. The main accent commonly falls on the root-morpheme, and is never shifted in building grammatical forms. The following English and German words illustrate its fixed position in grammatical forms and derived words:

English: be'come, be'coming, over'come; 'lover, 'loving, be'loved;

German: 'Liebe, 'lieben 'lieble, ge'liebt, 'lieberhaft, 'Liebling.

(Cf. these native words with words of foreign origin which move the stress in derivation, though never in form-building: ex'hibit v, exhibition n).

§ 52. The heavy fixed word stress inherited from PG has played an important role in the development of the Germanic languages, and especially in phonetic and morphological changes. Due to the difference in the force of articulation the stressed and unstressed syllables under­went widely different changes: accented syllables were pronounced with great distinctness and precision, while unaccented became less distinct and were phonetically weakened. The differences between the sounds in stressed position were preserved and emphasised, whereas the con­trasts between the unaccented sounds were weakened and lost. Since the stress was fixed on the root, the weakening and loss of sounds mainly affected the suffixes and grammatical endings. Many endings merged with the suffixes, were weakened and dropped. Cf., e.g., the reconstructed PG word ‘fish’, with its descendants in Old Germanic languages:

PG *fiskaz, Gt fisks, O Icel fiskr, OE fisc.

(The asterisk * is placed before reconstructed hypothetical forms which have not been found in written records; the words may be pro­nounced exactly as they are written; spelling in Old Germanic languages was phonetic).

Vowels (§ 53-56)

§ 53. Throughout history, beginning with PG, vowels displayed a strong tendency to change. They underwent different kinds of altera­tions: qualitative and quantitative, dependent and independent. Qualitative changes affect the quality of the sound, e.g.: [o > a ] or [p > f]; quantitative changes make long sounds short or short sounds long, e.g.: [i > i:], [ll > l]; dependent changes (also positional or combinative)are re­stricted to certain positions or phonetic conditions, for instance, a sound may change under the influence of the neighbouring sounds or in a certain type of a syllable; independent changes — also spontaneous or regular — take place irrespective of phonetic conditions, i.e. they affect a certain sound in all positions.

From an early date the treatment of vowels was determined by the nature of word stress. In accented syllables the oppositions between vowels were carefully maintained and new distinctive features were introduced, so that the number of stressed vowels grew. In unaccented positions the original contrasts between vowels were weakened or lost; the distinction of short and long vowels was neutralised so that by the age of writing the long vowels in unstressed syllables had been shortened. As for originally short vowels, they tended to be reduced to a neutral sound, losing their qualitative distinctions and were often dropped in unstressed final syllables (see the example *fiskaz in § 52).

§ 54. Strict differentiation of long and short vowels is commonly regarded as an important characteristic of the Germanic group. The contrast of short and long vowels is supported by the different directions of their changes. While long vowels generally tended to become closer and to diphthongise, short vowels, on the contrary, often changed into more open sounds. These tendencies can be seen in the earliest vowel changes which distinguished the PG vowel system from its PIE source.

IE short [o] changed in Germanic into the more open vowel [a] and thus ceased to be distinguished from the original IE [a]; in other words inPG they merged into [o]. The merging of long vowels proceeded inthe opposite direction: IE long [a:] was narrowed to [o:] and merged with [o:]. The examples in Table 1 illustrate the resulting correspond­ences of vowels in parallels from Germanic and non-Germanic languages (more apparent in Old Germanic languages than inmodern words, for the sounds have been modified in later history).

Table 1

Independent Vowel Changes in Proto-Germanic

§ 55. In later PG and in separate Germanic languages the vowels displayed a tendency to positional assimilative changes: the pronunciation of a vowel was modified under the influence of the following or preceding consonant; sometimes a vowel was approximated more closely to the following vowel. The resulting sounds were phonetically conditioned allophones which could eventually coincide with another phoneme or develop into a new phoneme.

The earliest instances of progressive assimilation were common Germanic muta­tions; they occurred in Late PG before its disintegration or a short time after. In certain phonetic conditions, namely before the nasal [n] and before [i] or [j] in the next syllable the short [e], [j] and [u] remained orbecame close (i.e. appeared as [i] and [u]), while in the absence of these conditions the more open allophones were used; [e] and [o], respectively. Later, these phonetic conditions became irre­levant and the allophones were phonologised.

Table 2

Mutation of Vowels in Late PG

§ 56. After the changes, in Late PG, the vowel system contained the following sounds:

SHORT VOWELS i e a o u

LONG VOWELS i: e: a: o: u:[5]

It is believed that in addition to these monophthongs PG had a set of diphthongs made up of more open nuclei and closer glides: [ei], [ai]. [eu], [au] and also [iu]; nowadays, however, many scholars inter­pret them as sequences of two independent monophthongs.

Consonants. Proto-germanic consonant shift (§ 57-59)

§ 57. The specific peculiarities of consonants constitute the most re­markable distinctive feature of the Germanic linguistic group. Compa­rison with other languages within the IE family reveals regular cor­respondences between Germanic and non-Germanic consonants. Thus we regularly find [f] in Germanic where other IE languages have [p]; cf. e.g., E full,R полный,Fr plein;wherever Germanic has [p], cognate words in non-Germanic languages have [b] (cf. E pool, R болото). The consonants in Germanic look ‘shifted’ as compared with the consonants of non-Germanic languages. The alterations of the con­sonants took place in PG, and the resulting sounds were inherited by the languages of the Germanic group.

The changes of consonants in PG were first formulated in terms of a phonetic law by Jacob Grimm in the early 19th c. and are often called Grimm's Law. It is also known as the First or Proto-Germanic consonant shift (to be distinguished from the 2nd shift which took place in OHG in the 9th c.).

By the terms of Grimm's Law voiceless plosives developed in PG into voiceless fricatives (Act I); IE voiced plosives were shifted to voice­less plosives (Act II) and IE voiced aspirated plosives were reflected (See Note 1 to Table 3) either as voiced fricatives or as pure voiced plo­sives (Act III).

Table 3

Consonant. Shift in Proto-Germanic (Grimm's Law)

§ 58. Another important series of consonant changes in PG was discovered in the late 19th c. by a Danish scholar, Carl Verner. They are known as Verner's Law. Vemer's Law explains some correspondences of consonants which seemed to contradict Grimm's Law and were for a long time regarded as exceptions. According to Verner's Law all the early PG voiceless fricatives [f, θ, x] which arose under Grimm's Law, and also is) inherited from PIE, became voiced between vowels if the preceding vowel was unstressed; in the absence of these conditions they remained voiceless. The voicing occurred in early PG at the time when the stress was not yet fixed on the root-morpheme. The process of voicing can be shown as a step in a succession of consonant changes in prehistorical reconstructed forms; consider, e.g. the changes of the second consonant in the word father:

Verner's Law accounts for the appearance of voiced fricative or its later modifications [d] in place of the voiceless [θ] which ought to be expected under Grimm's Law. In late PG, the phonetic conditions that caused the voicing had disappeared: the stress had shifted to the first syllable.

Table 4

Voicing of Fricatives in Proto-Germanic (Verner's Law)

§ 59. As a result at voicing by Verner's Law there arose an interchange of consonants in the grammatical forms of the word, termed grammatical interchange. Part of the forms retained a voiceless fricative, while other forms — with a diffe­rent position of stress in Early PG — acquired a voiced fricative. Both consonants could undergo later changes in the OG languages, but the original difference be­tween them goes back to the time of movable word stress and PG voicing. The interchanges can be seen in the principal forms of some OG verbs, though even at that time most of the interchanges were levelled out by analogy.

Table 5

Grammatical Interchanges of Consonants caused by Verner's Law

Note that some Mod E words have retained traces of Verner's Law, e. g. seethe — sodden; death — dead; raise — rear; was — were.

Interpretation of the Proto-Germanic Consonant Shift (§ 60-61)

§ 60. The causes and mechanism of the PG consonant shift have been a matter of discussion ever since the shift was discovered.

When Jacob Grimm first formulated the law of the shift he ascribed it to the allegedly daring spirit of the Germanic tribes which manifested itself both in their great migrations and in radical linguistic innovations. His theory has long been rejected as naive and romantic.

Some philologists attributed the shift to the physiological peculiarities of the Teutons, namely the shape of their glottis: it differed from that of other IB tribes, and the pronunciation of consonants was modified. Other scholars maintained that the consonant shift was caused by a more energetic articulation of sounds brought about by the specifically Germanic force word stress. Another theory suggested that the articulation of consonants in Germanic was, on the contrary, marked by lack of energy and tension.

The theory of "linguistic substratum" which was popular with many 20th c. linguists, attributes the PG consonant changes — as well as other Germanic inno­vations — to the influence of the speech habits of pre-Germanic population in the areas of Germanic settlement. The language of those unknown tribes served as a sort ol substratum (‘under-layer’) for the would-be Germanic tongues; it intermixed with the language of the Teutons and left certain traces in PG. This hypothesis can be neither confirmed nor disproved, since we possess no intamation about the language of pre-IE inhabitants of Western Europe.

According to recent theories the PG consonant shift could be caused by the internal requirements of the language system: the need for more precise phonemic distinction reliable in all phonetic conditions. Before the shift (according to J. Kurylowicz) the opposition of voiced and voiceless plosives was neutralised (that is, lost) in some positions, namely before the sound [s]; therefore new distinctive features arose in place of or in addition to sonority. [p, t, k] changed into [f, 0, x] and began to be contrasted to [b, d, g] not only through sonority but also through the manner of articulation as fricatives to plosives. This change led to further changes: since [f, 0, x]were now opposed to [b, d, g] through their frica­tive character, sonority became irrelevant for phonemic distinction and [b, d, g ]were devoiced: they changed into [p, t, k], respectively. That is how the initial step stimulated further changes and the entire system was shifted. It is essential that throughout the shift the original pattern of the consonant system was preserved; three rows of noise consonants were distinguished, though instead of opposition through sonority consonants were opposed as fricatives to plosives. (For a critical review of various theories see «Сравнительная грамматика германских языков", M., 1962, кн. II, ч. I, гл. 1, 7.1 — 6.5.)

Another explanation based on the structural approach to language interprets the role of the language system from a different angle. Every subsystem in lan­guage tends to preserve a balanced, symmetrical arrangement: if the balance is bro­ken, it will soon be restored by means of new changes. After the replacement of [p, t, k] by [f, 0, k] the positions of the voiceless [p, t, k] in the consonant system were left vacant; to fill the vacuums and restore the equilibrium [b, d, g ]were devoiced into [p, t, k]. In their turn the vacant positions of [b, d, g] were filled again in the succeeding set of changes, when [bh, dh, gh] lost their aspirated character. This theory, showing the shift as a chain of successive steps, fails to account for the initial push.

§ 61. The chronology of the shift and the relative order of the changes includ­ed in Grimm's Law and Verner's Law, has also aroused much interest and specu­lation. It is believed that the consonant shift was realised as a series of successive steps; it began first on part of Germanic territories and gradually spread over the whole area. The change of [p, t, k] into fricatives is unanimously regarded as the earliest step — the first act of Grimm's Law; it was followed, or, perhaps, accom­panied by the voicing of fricatives (Verner's Law), Linguists of the 19th c. were inclined to refer the voicing of fricatives to a far later date than the first act of Grimm's Law, However, there are no grounds to think that the effect of word stress and intervocal position on sonority could have been much delayed. In all probability, the IE plosives split into voiced and voiceless sounds soon after they had acquired their fricative character or even during that process.

The order of the other two steps (or acts of Grimm's Law) varies in different descriptions of the shift.

GRAMMAR (§ 62-69)

Form-building Means (§ 62)

§ 62. Like other old IE languages both PG and the OG languages had a synthetic grammatical structure, which means that the relationships between the parts of the sentence were shown by the forms of the words rather than by their position or by auxiliary words. In later history all the Germanic languages developed analytical forms and ways of word connection.

In the early periods of history the grammatical forms were built in the synthetic way: by means of inflections, sound interchanges and suppletion.

The suppletive way of form-building was inherited from ancient IE, it was restricted to a few personal pronouns, adjectives and verbs.

Compare the following forms of pronouns in Germanic and non-Germanic languages:

The principal means of form-building were inflections. The inflec­tions found in OG written records correspond to the inflections used in non-Germanic languages, having descended from the same original IE prototypes. Most of them, however, were simpler and shorter, as they had been shortened and weakened in PG.

The wide use of sound interchanges has always been a characteristic feature of the Germanic group. This form-building (and word-building) device was inherited from IE and became very productive in Germanic. In various forms of the word and in words derived from one and the same root, the root-morpheme appeared as a set of variants. The consonants were relatively stable, the vowels were variable[7]. Table 6 shows the variability of the root *ber- in different grammatical forms and words.

Table 6

Variants of the Root *ber-

Vowel Gradation with Special Reference to Verbs (§ 63-65)

§ 63. Vowel interchanges found in Old and Modern Germanic lan­guages originated at different historical periods. The earliest set of vowel interchanges, which dates from PG and PIE, is called vowel grada­tion or ablaut. Ablaut is an independent vowel interchange unconnected with any phonetic conditions; different vowels appear in the same en­vironment, surrounded by the same sounds (all the words in Table 6 are examples of ablaut with the exception of the forms containing [i] and [y] which arose from positional changes.

Vowel gradation did not reflect any phonetic changes but was used as a special independent device to differentiate between words and gram­matical forms built from the same root.

Ablaut was inherited by Germanic from ancient IE. The principal gradation series used in the IE languages — [e ~ o] — can be shown in Russian examples: нести ~ ноша. This kind of ablaut is called qual­itative, as the vowels differ only in quality. Alternation of short and long vowels, and also alternation with a "zero" (i.e. lack of vowel) re­present quantitative ablaut:

The Germanic languages employed both types of ablaut — quali­tative and quantitative, — and their combinations. In accordance with vowel changes which distinguished Germanic from non-Germanic the gradation series were modified: IE [e ~ o] was changed to [e/i ~ a]; likewise, quantitative ablaut [a ~a:] was reflected in Germanic as a quantitative-qualitative series [a ~ o:] (for relevant vowel changes see § 53,54). Quantitative ablaut gave rise to a variety of gradation series in Germanic owing to different treatment of the zero-grade in various phonetic conditions.

§ 64. Of all its spheres of application in Germanic ablaut was most consistently used in building the principal forms of the verbs called strong. Each form was characterised by a certain grade; each set of principal forms of the verb employed a gradation series. Gradation vowels were combined with other sounds in different classes of verbs and thus yielded several new gradation series. The use of ablaut in the principal forms of ‘bear’ was shown in Table 6. The Gothic verbs in Table 6 give the closest possible approximation to PG gradation series, which were inherited by all the OG languages and were modified in ac­cordance with later phonetic changes (see OE strong verbs § 200-203)

Table 7

The expansion of English overseas proceeded together with the growth of the British Empire in the 19th c. and with the increased weight of the United States (after the War of Independence and the Civil War). English has spread to