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COPYRIGHT 2004 Adam Mickiewicz University Press
ABSTRACT
The original Proto-Germanic consonantal alternations of voiceless and voiced fricatives, generated by the operation of Verner's Law, though slightly modified, were relatively well attested in Old English. They were most regularly preserved in the strong verb paradigm where they emerged as: [thorn] ~ d, h ~ g/w, h ~ ng, s ~ r, as in sni[thorn]an: sna[thorn]: snidon: sniden, ceosan: ceas: curon: coren, teon: teah: tugon: togen. The focus of the present paper is the process of gradual elimination of the effects of Vernerian voicing from the Old English strong verb system. While a wholesale process of elimination must be dated no earlier than the (Early) Middle English period, available data indicate clearly that the tendencies towards the decay of Vernerian alternations can be traced back to Old English. A close examination of the Old English textual evidence is intended to capture and reveal peculiarities and tendencies which charasterised this very early stage of elimination.
1. Introductory remarks
The original Proto-Germanic consonantal alternations of voiceless and voiced fricatives, induced by the operation of Verner's Law, had been considerably obliterated by the time of the earliest attestations of Old English, yet their modified reflexes were relatively well preserved and systematically displayed in the Old English strong verb paradigm. (1) The modifications, taking place on the way from Proto-Germanic to Old English, involved various phonological developments pertinent to different stages within this period. They included rhotacism, characteristic of the whole Northwest Germanic subbranch, the West Germanic voicing of the dental fricative *[theta] and its subsequent occlusion in clusters with a nasal and a liquid (l[theta] > ld, n[theta] > nd), as well as voicing of medial voiceless fricatives (f, [theta], s), and finally, loss of the voiceless velar fricative *[chi] in medial position. All of these processes occasioned the emergence of a new pattern of alternations in Old English with the following alternating pairs: [thorn] ~ d, h/o ~ g, h/o ~g/w, h/o ~ ng and s ~ r. The ensuing pattern, viewed against the original Germanic proto-alternants, is presented in Table 1.
The emergence of these alternations in the shape in which they surface in Old English entailed the following phonological developments:
a) [thorn], [eth] ~ d
The change *[eth] > d took place already in the West Germanic stage and was unconditioned; the fricative in the cluster *l[theta] was very early occluded (West Germanic) and the sequence appeared as ld in the very early stage, e.g., PGmc. *fal[thorn]an- (Go. fal[thorn]an) > OE faldan, fealdan 'fold', OE wilde 'wild' (Go. wil[thorn]eis). Probably the earliest shift, dated as early as the Proto-Germanic period, was the occlusion of *[eth] in the neighbourhood of a nasal *n[eth] > nd, a process which affected also other voiced fricatives ([beta], [gamma], [[gamma].sup.w]) in medial position after the corresponding nasal, e.g., OE findan vs. Go. fin[thorn]an, OE (Go., OS) bindan 'bind' vs. Skt. bandhanam 'a binding' ( [[eth]]. Finally, in word-final position the voiced fricative underwent devoicing.
b) h/[phi] ~ g
Although the reflex of the original Proto-Germanic voiced fricative *[gamma] was Old English , it was used to represent either a fricative [gamma], continuing the Proto-Germanic value (e.g, slogun, flogon, belagen, getogen) or a palatal fricative, occasionally made distinct in spelling and marked as (e.g., betigen, [thorn]igen, [thorn]wegen, forsleginum). The voiceless velar fricative /[chi]/ was lost in a few contexts, among others, in the intervocalic position, relevant hem, which yielded the alternation with zero (e.g., *flea[chi]an > flean 'flay'). (2) This velar alternation is present in all verba contracta where the infinitive no longer preserves the voiceless fricative, e.g., slean < */sla[chi]an/, [thorn]eon < */[theta]i[chi]an/, [thorn]wean < */[theta]wa[chi]an/.
c) h/[phi] ~ ng
The nasal (phonetically [[eta]]) preceding the voiceless spirant in the original alternation which surfaced as Proto-Germanic *n[chi] ~ *n[gamma] was lost probably still in Proto-Germanic stage and is no longer evident in Old English. The voiced velar fricative /[gamma]/, when following a nasal, was occluded already in Proto-Germanic, hence OE ng in place of PGmc. *n[gamma]. Traces of the original alternation are preserved in a few Old English contracted verbs, e.g., [thorn]eon (<*/[theta]i[chi]an/ < */[theta]i[eta][chi]an/) : [thorn]ungon : [thorn]ungen, befon : befengon : befangen/befengen.
d) h/[phi] ~ g/w
The voiceless labiovelar fricative *[chi]w lost its rounding in root final position at some point, probably as early as the Northwest Germanic stage, and appeared in Old English as h or was eventually dropped. The voiced labial alternant was reflected as labial approximant w or as unrounded velar fricative [gamma], depending on the following vowel: [gamma] before PGmc. u and w before i, which yielded two new alternating sequences: h ~ [gamma] and h ~ w respectively. The only (strong) verb in Old English which preserved traces of the labiovelar alternation is seon (< *se[[chi].sup.w]an) and its related prefixed verbs with the forms siwen, sigen (< se[[gamma].sup.w]-ana-). (3)
e) s, z ~ r
The Proto-Germanic alternation *s ~ *z was very early (NWGmc.) subject to rhotacism whereby *z became r medially (but was dropped in word-final position) and was preserved in Old English as the alternation of s ~ r. (4) Affected by voicing in medial position, OE s surfaced as [z] in voiced environment, which yielded, in a sense, a triple alternation between s/z and r.
f) *f ~ *b
The labial series *f ~ *b became very early obliterated and was no longer distinct in the Old English strong verb paradigm. Given the evidence provided by the other Germanic dialects (cf. OS (af)heffian : hof: ho[beta]un : giha[beta]an, OHG heffen, hevan : huob : huobum : (ir-)haban), the alternation is to be expected at least in hebban 'heave' (PGmc. *[chi]a[beta]io > OE hebbu, hebbe). Old English hebban, however, is preserved with the reversed distribution of alternants: the voiceless consonant generalised in the preterite and the voiced one in the present system, consequently without a trace of the original alternation: hebban : hof : hofon : hafen, hoefen. Further development of the sequence involved voicing of PGmc. *f (< PIE *'-p-) in voiced environment, yielding a voiced labial fricative [beta] which did not develop into a stop but remained a fricative and as such was soon to merge with PGmc. *[beta] in this position. At the same time PGmc. *[beta] (< PIE *bh or -p-') was subject to devoicing in word-final position and appeared as f. When the voiced labiovelar fricative [v], produced by medial voicing, merged with *[[beta]] (as [v]), a new phonemic contrast arose, namely /f/ vs. /v/.
To some extent, the opposition was preserved in the early Mercian material, in Epinal and Erfurt Glossaries (dated no later than 700) and Corpus Glossary (late 8th century) (5) where the voiceless and voiced variants were made distinct in spelling: was used to represent [v] (in voiced environment) and represented [[beta]], the former--a labiodental allophone of /f/, the latter--an allophone of /b/ which only later developed into a labiodental fricative [v], e.g., fifadae 'butterfly', geroefa(n) 'reeve', uulfes 'wolf' vs. bebr, later beofor 'beaver' ( fifele) 'handle', gebuli (geabuli) 'tribute', halbae 'halves', gibaen 'given'. Already at that time a tendency to use in all positions became steady. Levelling in favour of took place only sporadically, e.g., glo(o)b 'glove', raebsid 'reproved' (Hogg 1992: 283).
The differentiation between PGmc. *f ( WGmc. *-mf- : *-mb- > OE -Vf- : -mb- (fif vs. climban); and similarly, PGmc. *-f(i)j- > *-[beta](i)j- > WGmc. *-ffj- : *-bbj- > OE -ff- : -bb- where geminated ff derives from PGmc. *f (<*'-p-) and geminated bb from PGmc. *[beta] (< *bh) (Go. hafjan vs. OE hebban 'heave') (6) (Brunner 1942: 156, 160).
2. Verner's Law and the Old English strong verb paradigm
The distribution of the vestiges of the original Vernerian voiceless and voiced alternants in Old English strong verb paradigm entailed the presence of the old voiceless fricative in the infinitive and 1, 3sg. preterite ind. and the reflex of the voiced fricative in the rest of the preterite system, i.e. 2sg. preterite ind., preterite ind. plural, preterite subjunctive singular and plural, and past participle. Such pattern of distribution of Vernerian alternants emerged as a result of the accentual conditions characteristic of Proto-Germanic, whereby forms of the infinitive and preterite singular displayed root accentuation, whereas forms of the preterite plural, past participle and subjunctive preterite received suffixal accent. Noteworthy is the presence of the vestiges of Verner's Law in forms of the 2sg. preterite ind. which, apparently, alongside the root vowel of the preterite pl., adopted its consonantism. A similar situation obtains for subjunctive preterite which was formed by employing the stem of preterite plural. Hence, the voiced alternants induced by Verner's Law may be expected in both subjunctive pret. singular and plural. (7)
The infinitive of all strong verbs containing an originally (Proto-Germanic) voiceless fricative reflects the early Old English process of voicing of intervocalic fricative following a stressed vowel, whereby medial /f, [theta], s/ developed into [v, [eth], z] in voiced environment. The change did not affect the velar fricative /[chi]/ which by that time was no longer preserved in this position. The relevant examples are: li[thorn]an, sni[thorn]an, seo[thorn]an [[eth]], dreosan, hreosan [z], etc.
In terms of class division, grammatical change is present in all classes of Old English strong verbs, with the exception of class IV where none of the verbs contained stem-final fricative which could potentially undergo voicing by Verner's Law. It is worth noticing that the first three classes are characterised by remarkable regularity and discipline with respect to grammatical change. This marked consistency detected in these classes is attributed to accentual pattern which must have been stable at the time of the operation of Verner's Law (D'Alquen 1988: 90). In the remaining classes (i.e. V, VI and VII) grammatical change is not accent-dependent but tan be viewed as a result of "analogical transfer" from the other classes, hence is less regular and sporadic (Prokosch 1939: 64). Accordingly, forms such as waeron, cwaedon, slogon, fengon, etc. can be viewed as analogical rather than originally induced by the accentuation pattern. (8)
3. Elimination of the effects of Verner's Law
3.1. The nature of the process
The original consonantal alternations tended to be obliterated through the influence of analogical levelling--a process of morphological simplification, which worked towards introduction of one single root consonant in all forms within the strong verb paradigm. As a result of such generalisation, the allomorphy rendered by the operation of Verner's Law was being gradually removed. (9)
The interpretation of the data does, in fact, depend to a large extent on how the term is understood. In the present analysis it is used in line with the above definition to mean restoration of the original Proto-Germanic voiceless variant and consequent generalisation of this variant to all forms which displayed the effects of the operation of Verner's Law. The definition of elimination can be extended however to include some less regular cases to the effect that forms such as Anglian past participles in classes VI and VII (such as befoen, geseen) can be interpreted as instances where Vernerian alternations were lost. Such interpretation is justified on the assumption that the mere absence of the voiced alternant in these forms is enough to view it as a case of elimination. In the present analysis these cases will be treated separately and will not be counted as instances of elimination.
3.2. The database and data analysis
The data for the analysis of the material come from The dictionary of Old English electronic corpus (known as Toronto Corpus), a collection spanning the period between 600 and 1150, considered to be a complete record of surviving Old English, with the exception of a few manuscripts of individual texts. An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary by Bosworth and Toller (1898) served as the main source for identifying the principal parts of strong verbs liable to voicing by Verner's Law. Forms of the prefixed verbs were drawn from the Dictionary as well and, if not specified there, were systematically built on the pattern of the simplex verbs. In this way a list of 211 verbs which could potentially display Vernerian alternations was compiled. In the effect of search procedure, the list was narrowed down to 149 verbs since some of the prefixed verbs were not attested in the corpus in forms which could testify to the earlier operation of Verner's Law. (10) The etymological dictionary of Germanic strong verbs by Seebold (1970) (Vergleichendes und etymologisches Worterbuch der germanischen starken Verben) was consulted to verify the Proto-Germanic root forms which were susceptible to the operation of Verner's Law and could be reflected in Old English.
3.2.1. Strong verbs Class I
In verbs belonging to Class I the alternations induced by Verner's Law are well preserved and very regular. All alternating pairs are represented, including the sequence h/[phi] ~ ng, preserved in forms of wreon and [thorn]eon (wrungen, [thorn]ungen), modelled after S[V.sub.2]. In a number of Old English strong verbs elimination of the effects of Verner's Law took place very early, before the date of their earliest attestation. They form a separate group of verbs in the sense that they never showed the morphophonemic alternations induced by Verner's Law. All of these generalised the old voiceless fricative, extending it to all forms which would have otherwise displayed effects of voicing. They are scattered across various classes but are most numerous in Class I, including: mi[thorn]an, bemi[thorn]an 'conceal, avoid', risan 'rise', arisan 'arise',...
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