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COPYRIGHT 2006 Adam Mickiewicz University
ABSTRACT
In the paper I attempt to present the semantic evolution of the suffix -ship(e) from Early to Late Middle English. The major development in Late Middle English was the replacement of the dominant EME sense 'a quality' in a fairly large number of derivatives by one of the originally minor senses, i.e. 'a status, rank, an office'. The original EME sense 'a condition, state of being', however, was commonly preserved in Late Middle English. The suffix was highly productive in the period not only in new coinages of native origin but also in Scandinavian and French hybrids. It appeared in all the dialects.
1. Introduction
The aim of the paper is to present the Late Middle English development of one of the EME suffixes which I investigated in my doctoral dissertation, i.e. -ship(e), mostly for the reason that it displayed a vividly changing semantic profile between Old and Early Middle English. Thus, I will be basically interested in the further semantic development of -ship(e) although its productivity and dialect distribution will not be left out of consideration. I will use the same methodology which I devised for and applied in my dissertation. Here, the time span ranges from 1350 to 1500. The selection of the year 1350 as a starting point of Late Middle English is not random. Scholars such as McIntosh et al. (1986) in A linguistic atlas of Late Mediaeval English treated 1350 as a borderline marking the beginning of the investigated period. Moreover, the discussed date can be found as a closing border of the Early Middle English period in Kristensson (1965-2002). For problems concerning boundaries in the chronological division of English see Fisiak (1994).
The main tool which I used for my analysis is the Middle English dictionary online, which is an extensive electronic database comprising all preserved ME texts. It is supplemented by several complete texts which facilitate a broader contextual analysis. Occasionally, I also refer to the diachronic part of the Helsinki Corpus. As for the results of the study concerning earlier periods, i.e. Old and Early Middle English, I will rely on Ciszek (2005 and in press). The investigation of the productivity of -ship(e) will be based on the type value count (see Dalton-Puffer--Cowie 2000). Hence, the suffix in question is considered productive once it appears in new coinages in the period under discussion.
2. Previous studies
So far, the only study of LME word-formation can be found in the work Morphemic structure of Chaucer's English (1965) by Fisiak. As indicated in the title, the author, however, concentrates on the complete works of Chaucer, who is the major representative of Late Middle English. -Ship(e) is described by Fisiak as a productive, non-combinative suffix forming abstract nouns from other nouns, which is illustrated with a few instances together with their meaning, e.g., felaw(e)shipe 'fellowship' and shendshipe 'harm'. Other scholars such as Martin (1906), Dorskiy (1960), Fisiak ([1968] 2004), Marchand (1969) and Dalton-Puffer (1996) treat the suffix briefly and provide its...
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