Lecture 6

DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH GRAMMAR

Verbal Parts
Outline:
I. Indo-European verb-system
II.. OE Verb: 1) grammatical categories: a) Person & Number; b) Mood; c) Tense; d) Aspect; e) Voice; 2) morphological classification of OE Verbs: a) strong verbs; b) weak verbs; c) preterite-present; d) irregular;
III. Verb in Middle and Early New English: 1) strong verbs 2) weak verbs 3) other classes 4) development of analytical constructions 5) categories
IV. Adverb. Degrees of comparison.

I. Indo-European verb-system. The verb in IE is one of the oldest parts of speech. Therefore the development of the verb in any IE languages can be understood only if the old IE verb-system and its peculiarities are taken into account. The IE verb-stem had the following structure: consonant-vowel-consonant. The sounding of the vowel in the root was dependent on the conditions of the stress falling upon it. This vowel-variation, termed Ablaut, was primarily a phonetic process in IE. In Germanic languages it was widely employed as a grammatical means. The root-vowel could either change its quality (qualitative Ablaut), or its quantity/length (quantitative Ablaut).

Indo-European Ablaut: possible changes of sounding Qualitative gradation: Quantitative gradation: o – fully stressed vowel (full grade) ō – prolonged grade e – weakly stressed vowel (reduced grade) o – full grade zero – unstressed vowel (zero grade) zero – (zero grade)

IE gradation was first widely used in the category of aspect which represented actions as completed/non-completed, repeated, etc. In IE there existed many aspect forms: the durative, the perfective, and the momentary aspects. Each of these were characterized by a certain grade of the root-vowel. So, in IE there were the following vowel grades for different aspect forms:

Qualitative gradation quantitative gradation Durative e (reduced grade) o (full grade) Perfective o (full grade) ō (prolonged grade) Momentary zero (zero grade) ō (prolonged grade)

In the course of time both sounding and the grammatical meaning of these forms changed: 1) the changes in sounding took place in accordance with the Germanic Vowel Shift: IE e > Germ. e/i, IE o > Germ. a. Thus, in Germanic languages Ablaut was the following:

Germanic Ablaut Qualitative gradation: Quantitative gradation: a – fully stressed vowel (full grade) ō – prolonged grade e/i – weakly stressed vowel (reduced grade) a – full grade zero – unstressed vowel (zero grade) zero – (zero grade)

2) grammatically, the aspects changed into tenses, that is the categories expressing the time of the action in its relation to the time of the utterance. Though the IE tonic (musical) stress, which caused gradation, was replaced in Germanic by expiratory one, the primary verbs with Ablaut as a grammatical means survived in English (drink-drank-drunk). The most prominent feature of the Germanic verb-system is a special type of the past with the dental suffix – d/t. Verbs that formed their past by adding this suffix, came to be termed weak verbs. In subsequent centuries weak verbs in the Germanic languages have been on the constant increase (with the newly appeared and borrowed verbs), while the number of the so-called strong verbs gradually diminished.

II.. OE Verb:
Grammatical categories: OE Verb was characterized by many specific features. Though it had few grammatical categories its paradigm had a very complicated structure: verbs fell into numerous morphological classes and used a lot of means of form-building. All these forms were synthetic with some analytical elements to appear. The non-finite forms had a little in common with finite verbs, but much – with nominal parts. 1) OE verbs distinguished the following grammatical categories: person, number, mood, tense, aspect and voice. a) The verb-predicate agreed with the subject in number and person: sing./pl. and 1, 2, 3 persons accordingly. The homonymy of forms didn’t affect number distinctions, they were not neutralized. Unlike number, person distinctions were neutralized in many positions. Person was shown only in the Present, Indicative Mood, sing. form. But in the Past, singular, Indicative Mood the forms of the 1 and 2 persons coincided. In the plural and in the Subjunctive Mood person was not distinguished. b) The category of mood included 3 members: Indicative, Imperative and Subjunctive. There was not a clear distinction between moods, for there existed several homonymous forms (e.g. Subj. sing. and Indic. 1st, sing.). The Indicative was used to state an action as a real fact. The Imperative expressed order or request (to the 2nd pers.), sometimes – wish. The Subjunctive expressed an action which is supposed, both in the main and subordinate clauses. It was a very general meaning of unreality or supposition. In addition to its use in conditional or volitional clauses, Subj. was also common in clauses of time, result and in indirect speech. c) The category of tense in OE consisted of 2 categorial forms: Present and Past, and was expressed by synthetic means. The forms of the Pres. were used to indicate both present and future actions. The meaning of futurity could be expressed by verbs of perfective meaning, or phrases with modal meaning. The Past was used to indicate various events in the past (including ModE Past.Cont., Past Perf., Pres.Perf.). d) As for the category of aspect, it is disputable problem: if there was aspect in OE? How was it expressed? There is a view that aspect was expressed by the opposition of verbs with/without prefix –ze (with perfective or non-perfective meaning accordingly). But it didn’t always work. Recent researches show that –ze can not be regarded as a marker of aspect. It could make the verb perfective, but also could change its lexical meaning (e.g. OE sittan “sit” – zesittan “occupy”, beran “carry” – –zeberan “bear a child”). Also the verbs without –ze could express a perfective meaning. So, prefix –ze might be regarded as a derivational prefix with some shades of aspective meaning. Aspect in OE also could be expressed through verb-phrases with “habban, bēon, weorðan” and Participle II. e) The category of voice also existed in OE in the form of synthetic Mediopassive (which existed in Proto-Germanic and was well developed in Gothic). But the most frequent expression of Passive was the combination of Participle II of transitive verbs plus the verbs “bēon” and” weorðan”.

2) Morphological classification of OE Verbs: The majority of OE verbs fell into 2 great divisions: strong and weak. Also there were verbs which fell into minor groups: preterite-present (combined the features of both strong and weak verbs), and irregular (anomalous). The main difference between strong and weak verbs was the way of forming the Past and Participle II forms (strong imployed Ablaut, weak – suffix –d/t).

a) OE strong verbs (about 3 hundred) distinguished 4 main stems (Infinitive, Past Singular, Past Plural, Participle II), and were divided into 7 classes. Classes 1-6 used Ablaut to form Past and Part.II. Class 7 included reduplicated verbs (by repeating root-morpheme), and some other stem-vowels. In some verbs consonant interchange is found (according to Verner’s law). The rows of ablaut of OE verbs are the following: I class: ī – ā – i – i (wrītan – wrāt – writon - writen) II class: ēo – ēa – u – o (cēosan – cēas – curon – coren) III class: i – a/o – u – u /before nasal cons./ (drincan – dranc – druncon – drunken) /before “l+cons.” / e – ea – u – o (helpan – healp – hulpon – holpen) /before “r+cons.”, “h+cons”/ eo – ea – u – o (steorfan – stearf – sturfon – storfen) IV class: /before “l, r”/ e – æ – æ – o (stelan – stæl – stælon – stolen) V class: e – æ – æ – e (tredan – træd – trædon – treden) VI class: a – ō – ō – a (faran – fōr – fōron – faren) VII class: (hatan – het – heton – haten) As you see, all strong verbs have the same form-endings: -an for Infinitive, no ending in the Past sing., -on for the Past pl., -en for Part.II. Zero ending for Past sing. and -en for Part.II are specific only of strong verbs.

b) There were 3 classes of weak verbs in OE corresponding to 3 classes of such in Gothic. The 4th Gothic class is not found in other Germanic languages. The class of weak verbs was more numerous than that of strong verbs. All newly appeared and borrowed verbs became weak. This group of verbs formed their Past and Part.II by means of the dental suffix -d/t-. The 3 classes of weak verbs differed in the ending of the infinitive ( -an – 1 Class, -ian – 2 Class, -an – 3 Class) and the suffix (-i/j- – 1 Class, -ō/ōj- – 2 Class, PG -ai- – 3 Class). The 3rd Class is the mixture of PG 3rd and 4th Classes). The first class fell into 2 groups: regular and irregular. I class: Regular weak verbs – (Inf.) deman – (Past) demde – (Part.II) demed (-d becomes -t after a voiceless cons.) Irregular weak verbs – (Inf) sellan – (Past) sealed – (Part.II) seald II class: (Inf) macian – (Past) macode – (Part.II) macod III class: (Inf) habban – (Past) hæfde – (Part.II) hæfd

c) Preterite-present verbs belonged to so-called “minor” group. They have so strange a name, for originally the Pres. tense forms of these verbs were Past tense forms of strong verbs, but their Past tense forms derived from the Past tense forms of the weak verbs. In OE there were 12 such verbs. Six of them survived in ModE. They were united by common lexical meaning: the attitude of the speaker towards the reality, in ModE they are modal verbs (āg “ought”, cunnan “can”, sculan “shall”, magan “may”, mōt “must”). Infinitive and Participle II, if found, were formed from the Plural-Present-stem. According to ablaut, 5 main forms, like in Gothic, were distinguished: (Pres.Sg.) can – (Pres.Pl.) cunno – (Past Sg.) cuðe – (Part.II) cunnen – (Inf) cunnan In the paradigm of conjunction OE preterite-present verbs had no inflexion in the 3rd person Singular. It explains the fact why Modern modal verbs don’t have ending –s in the 3rd person Singular..

d) There were a few OE verbs with irregular forms, which derived from different roots, i.e. they are suppletive (e.g., OE tō gān “to go”, tō dōn “to do”, tō willan “will”, and tō bēon “to be”). The last one is ancient and goes back to Indo-European domain (Compare; Ukr.: є – бути). In OE the verb tō bēon had 2 forms of the Infinitive used in parallel – bēon/wesan. That is why there is a twofold system of Present Tense and 2 forms of Participle I. There was no Participle II of this verb in OE. Present Singular Plural Infinitive 1st pers. – eom (beo) wesan (beon) 2nd pers. – eart (bist) sind (beoþ, sint) Participle II 3rd pers. – is (biþ) –––––– Past Participle I Singular Plural (2nd pers.) wesende (beonde) 1st pers. – wæs 2nd pers – wære wæron 3rd pers - wæs

III. Verb in Middle and Early New English. In ME the inflectional system of the verb was very complicated because of phonetic changes, the tendency towards the leveling of different forms, and because of a high degree of diversity in the evolution of the same phenomenon in different dialects. In the course of ME the verb-inflection underwent further modifications due to the operation of some phonetic changes, such as the dropping of [ə] and [n] when final, and also due to analogy. In the 15th century Tense was marked by: - [ed] (hop-ed-e) - [d] (her-d-e) - [t] (kis-t-e) - [þ] (cū-þ-e).

OE ME OE ME sprecan wrīteth (South) spræcon sp(r)ēken (>e, ModE speak) wrīteþ (Pres., sing., 3rd p.) sprecen wrītes (North) - dominant wrīteth (South) wrītaþ (Pres., pl.) wrīten (Midlands) -dominant wrītes (North) OE ME Participle I

wrītande (North) wrītende wrītende (Midlands) -inge (descended from the verbal substantive) wrītinde (South)

ME verbs, like OE ones, were divided into strong, weak, irregular. 1) Strong verbs. The chief changes in the forms of strong verbs took place in passing from OE to ME. They were caused by the general tendency towards the gradual loss of inflexions, and partly by the process of analogy. Thus, for example, the inflexions of the OE infinitive –an and of the Past Plural –on were reduced to –en. a) the prefix –ze was first reduced to –i, and then lost. b) the consonant interchange in the root was also lost (ceosan – coren). c) the monophthongization of the OE diphthongs caused phonetic changes in the gradation of the 2nd, 3rd, and partly of the 7th classes. d) the 4 principal forms of strong verbs began to be reduced to 3. This process probably started in the 6th and the 7th classes where the Past Singular and Past Plural forms had identical stem-vowels already in OE. Besides, in ME the Past Plural begins to be leveled according to the Past Singular (in the 4th and 5th classes). Also, the graded vowel of the Participle II passes over to the Past Plural (in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd classes). Inf. Past, sg. Past, pl. Part.II I class wrīten – wrōt – wrīten - wrīten II class chēsen – chēs – chōsen - chōsen III class drinken – drank - dronken - dronken IV class bēren – bar - bar – bōren V class gēten – gat – gat - gēten VI class shāken – shōk – shōken - shāken VII class fallen – fell – fellen - fallen

In ME some strong verbs tended to build their forms on the analogy with the weak ones (e.g. to sleep). The process of reducing the 4 main forms to 3, which began in ME, reached its climax in ENE. In the 15-16th centuries the distinctions of number in the Past Tense of strong verbs disappeared, and 3 main forms were fixed: Infinitive, Past, Participle II. A large number of former strong verbs (about 90) passed over onto the class of weak verbs (e.g. to help).

2) Weak verbs. In ME the differences between the 3 classes of weak verbs tended to disappear. This tendency, which started already in OE, became vivid through the following changes in the forms of weak verbs: a) in the 14th century the unvoicing of the dental suffix –d (into –t)from the verbs like kepte, melte spread over to verbs whose stems ended in -nd, -ld, -rd, -l, -m, -n, -v, etc. b) the stem-suffix -o- of the 2nd class was reduced to -e- (e.g. OE lufian-lufode-lufod > ME loven-lovede-loved). c) the infinitive of classes 1 and 2 lost the element -i- (e.g. OE macian > ME māken). d) the double consonants in such verbs as habban, seggan, libban, etc.were contracted; besides, -b- was replaced by -v- on the analogy with the forms in -v- (ME haven, seyen, liven).

I class – lost -i- in the infinitive OE styrian > ME stirren II class – lost -o- in the Past and Participle forms OE lufian > ME loven

In ME the number of weak verbs grew rapidly because most of the newly formed and borrowed verbs came to be conjugated according to the patterns of the weak class. In ENE the disappearance of unstressed –e in the 2nd class of Past Tense resulted in that, the difference between 1st and 2nd classes was lost. A number of weak verbs whose roots ended in –d/t formed a group where all 3 forms were identical, including also some strong verbs. A few weak verbs became strong (tō werian > to wear, tō scēawian – to show, tō hŷdan – to hide). So in ENE we have the verb-system rearranged completely. The major group was regular verbs (former weak), the smaller group – irregular (former strong). The group of irregular verbs in ModE includes also the defective verbs: can-could, shall-should, and the suppletive forms: be-was/were-been.

3) Other classes. In ME from 12 OE preterite-present verbs only the verb zeneah (to be enough) was lost. The rest are well preserved with some changes in meaning and phonetic structure. Later, in ENE, their number was reduced to 6, which formed the group of modal verbs (can, may, must, shall, ought, dare). The verb dare has developed another form of the past tense dared on the analogy of the regular verbs. By the way, in ModE it tends to become a regular verb. Anomalous. In ME the verb bēon remains suppletive, but it loses the parallel forms. The Participle II bēn filled the place of the missing form. The forms of Plural, Present Indicative sint/sindon were gradually replaced by aren. In Chaucer we still found the forms bē and are side by side. In ENE the form are becomes standard throughout the country. The verb gān also remains suppletive, but its past tense ēode was replaced by ME form went (which is the past tense stem of the verb wenden – розвертатися). The verb dōn underwent only phonetic changes. The verb willan developed into an auxiliary and was used as a means of building the Future. In ModE will, when used in the meaning of volition, retains its modal meaning.

4) Development of analytical constructions. During OE period the system of the verb started to acquire some analytical elements instead of synthetic ones. Such formations were of importance for the development of English into analytical language: a) habban+ Part.II expressed the result of the action; b) wesan / bēon+ Part.II, weorðan+ Part.II expressed the result of the action. Actually in OE both these phrases were used to express a passive action; c) Constructions like Ic sceal+Infinitive (I am obliged to), Ic will+Infinitive (I wish to) served to express the connotation of obligation and desire. A similar tendency for inflections to be replaced by more analytic devices is more intensively seen in ME. There appeared a complicated system of tenses which was built up by means of the primary auxiliaries (be, have, later do), and the modal auxiliaries (shall, will, should etc.). The future tense with shall and will is established in ME. Actually shall and will have never entirely lost the connotation of obligation and desire, but today their main function is to signalize prediction or futurity, which developed in ME period. The perfect tenses with habban / bēon, and the Passive forms with bēon / weorðan, which already existed in OE, came to be used more frequently in ME. In the Perfect have spread at the expense of be, but the latter was still common with verbs motion and state till ENE. The Continuous Tenses arose in ME with the help of be+Participle I (He is coming), but they are not common until ModE. By the end of ME, therefore, the perfect, passive, and continuous markers of the verb were all well established, though much less frequently used than today. And it was not until the 18th century that it became possible to use all combinations with them.

VI. OE Adverbs were of several types: a) primary (were not derived from any other part of speech) þær “there”, nū “now”; b) secondary (which were derived from nouns or adjectives) dēop “deep” – dēope “deeply”. OE adverbs used the same suffixes for degrees of comparison as adjectives: a) -r- for the comparative, -st- for the superlative. b) some adverbs in the comparative degree had mutated forms: ēaþe “easily” – īeþ. c) like adjectives, some adverbs had suppletive forms for degrees of comparison: micelle “much” – māre – mæst.