GERMANIC ALPHABETS AND LITERARY MONUMENTS Lecture 4
Types of alphabets Non-phonologically based (written symbols represent meaning): - Pictographic: Egyptian, Messopotamian (3000 BC), Chinese (1500 BC) - Ideographic (c. 2500 -100 BC): Near East (Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Hittite, Egyptian) - Logographic (China, Japan) Phonologically based (written symbols represent sounds): Syllabaries: Greece (1300 BC) Roman: western Europe Cyrillic: East Slavic countries Devanagari: (Indian Sanskrit)
SUMERIAN IDEOGRAPHIC WRITING SYSTEM
EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHS
Types of Germanic alphabets Runic (Gothic ‘runa’, O. Icelandic ‘runar’, OE ‘run’ = secret, secret talk) Gothic IV c. created by Visigothic bishop Ulfilas, found only in the Gothic language Latin was introduced after conversion of a people to Christianity
TYPES OF RUNIC ALPHABETS Elder Futhark (around 150– 800), the Anglo-Saxon Futhork (400– 1100), The Younger Futhark (800– 1100): 1. the long-branch runes (Danish, also used in Norway and Sweden), 2. short-branch or Rök Runes Swedish. Norwegian, also used in Denmark), 3. the stavesyle or Hälsinge runes (staveless runes). The Younger Futhark developed further into the Marcomannic runes, the Medieval runes (1100– 1500), and the Dalecarlian runes (around 1500– 1800).
Elder Futharc (150 -800)
Facts about Futhark Type: C&V, Alphabetic Genealogy: Proto-Sinaitic Greek or Etruscan Shape : angular Location: Europe Time: c. 200 Direction: left to right used: on cliffs; large walls; grave stones; religious, magic inscriptions; as inscriptions related to trade and politics; rude messages, personal letters; art and craft messages
Runic inscriptions Famous runic inscription the Gallehus Horn (c. 400 AD) Transliterated: ek hlewagastir holtijar horna tawido Translated roughly I, Hlewagastir Holtson, horn made c. 160 AD Vimose Comb found at Vimose in Funen Island, Denmark Harja = "army" or "wartroop”
Anglo-Saxon Futhork
Long-Branch Runes
Marcommanic Runes
Dalecarliean Runes
Lord’s prayer in Gothic writing style
Old Germanic Written Monuments GOTHIC the translation of Bible, several manuscripts, e. g. Silver Codex (Codex Argentus) and Carolingian Codex (Codex Carolinus). OLD SCANDINAVIAN are represented by heroic and mythological songs Elder Edda (XIII c. ), scaldic poetry (IX -XIII c. ). Old English - in prose (different genres: historical chronicles, teological didactic prose, historic prose, philosophical. Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, Pope Gregory I’s Cura Pastoralis , the story of Ohtere and Wulfstan in the monk Orosius’ ‘World history’ Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, 731. Northumbrian dialect Saints’ lives (homiles) Aelfric (end X- beg. XIc. ). Poetic literary monuments Beowulf. (West Saxon Dialect)
Alliteration and Kennings Alliteration Kenning is a descriptive metaphor, poetic means to add expressiveness: sæ-mearh морський кінь (корабель) hron-rād дорога китів (море) swanrād дорога лебедів (море) beadoleoma бойовий промінь(меч) hilde-leoma битви вогонь (меч), recedes mūþ будинка рот (двері).
Present day distribution of Germanic languages 17
PG > Common Germanic West Germanic East Germanic North Germanic 18
West Germanic Languages 19 Irminonic Istvaeonic Ingvaeonic
Irminonic group of West Germanic languages (Elbe Germanic) Primitive Upper German OHGerman, Lombardic Middle High German Early. New High German varieties Standard German 20
Istvaeonic group of West Germanic languages (Weser-Rhine Germanic) Primitive Frankish O Central German Middle Central German Early New Central German varieties Old Low Franconian (Old Dutch) Early Limburgish Middle Dutch Late Modern Dutch varieties Afrikaans 21
Ingvaeonic group of West Germanic languages (North Sea Germanic) Primitive Saxon (Southeast Ingvaeonic) OSaxon Middle Low German varieties Anglo -Frisian (Northwest Ingvaeonic) Primitive Frisian Old Frisian Middle Frisian varieties Primitive Anglic OE (Anglo-Saxon) Early Middle English > Late Middle. English Modern English, English varieties Early Scots Middle Scots, Scots varieties 22
North Germanic languages Proto-Norse: Runic Old West Norse: Old Icelandic > Late Old Icelandic > Icelandic Old Norwegian: - Old Faroese > Faroese - Old Norn > Norn extinct - Middle Norwegian > Norwegian 2) Runic Old East Norse: Early Old Danish > Late Old Danish > Danish - Old Swedish > Late Old Swedish > Swedish and Dalecarlian dialects 3) Runic Old Gutnish > Early Old Gutnish > Late Old Gutnish extinct 23
East Germanic languages Gothic > Crimean Gothic extinct Vandalic extinct Burgundian extinct Gerulic extinct Hepidic extinct Rugian extinct 24
Common innovations in Northwest Germanic languages "a-Umlaut”: /u/ > /o/ in initial syllables before /a/ in the following syllable "Labial umlaut”" in unstressed medial syllables: /a/ > /u/ and /ō/ > /ū/ before /m/, or /u/ in the following syllable /ē 1/ > /ā/ (vs. Gothic /ē/) in initial syllables The raising of final /ō/ > /u/ (Gothic lowers it to /a/) The monophthongisation of /ai/ and /au/ > /ǣ/, /ō/ in non-initial syllables 25
Common innovations in Northwest Germanic languages (II) The development of an intensified demonstrative ending in /s/ (reflected in English "this" compared to "the") The use of /ē 2/ in the preterite of Class VII strong verbs in North and West Germanic (Gothic uses reduplication: Goth. haihait; ON, OE hēt, preterite of the Gmc verb *haitan "to be called”) 26
Northwest Germanic common innovations with areal changes Rhotacism PG /z/ > /r/ e. g. Gothic dius; ON dȳr, OHG tior, OE dēor, "wild animal"); this is not present in Proto-Norse i-umlaut Goth satjan OE settan 27
Innovations common to the West Germanic languages Loss of final /z/ (except in short monosyllables). Change of voiced dental fricative /ð/ to stop /d/. Change of voiceless dental fricative /þ/ to stop /d/ after /l/ (except when /þ/ is word-final) West Germanic gemination of consonants, Simplification /ngw/ > /ng/. i-umlaut /e-u-i/ > /i-u-i/. Loss of /j/ before /i/ and /w/ before /u/ in endings. Change of /b/ or /g/ to /w/ before nasal consonant. Changes to the 2 nd pers. sg past-tense: replacement of past-sg stem vowel with the past-pl stem vowel, and substitution of the ending -t with -i. Short forms (*stān, stēn, *gān, gēn) of the verbs for "stand" and "go“ (Crimean Gothic also has gēn). The development of a gerund 28
Ingvaeonic innovations Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law, with loss of /n/ before voiceless friactives: e. g. *munþ, *gans > O E mūþ, gōs > "mouth, goose", but German mund, gans. Loss of the Germanic reflexive pronoun. Reduction of the three Germanic verbal pl forms into one ending in -þ. Development of Class III weak verbs into a relic class verbs (*sagjan "to say", *hugjan "to think", *habjan "to have", *libjan "to live”). Split of the Class II weak verb ending *-ō- into *-ō-/-ōja Development of a plural ending *-ōs in a-stem nouns. Possibly, the monophthongization of Germanic *ai to ē/ā. 29
Old Germanic Languages. Periods of development 1) Early Germanic – gradual separation and establishing of Common Gmc from PIE. Features: retains features characteristic for PIE (two types of stress / movable and fixed/, two tense-aspect verb stems) 2) Late Germanic – stabilisation of CGmc and its further division into Germanic languages. Features: fixed stress falling on the first root syllable 30
The Gothic language is an extinct Germanic language spoken by the Goths. is known primarily from the Codex Argenteus, a Vith century copy of a IVth-century Bible translation, and is the only East Germanic language with a sizable text corpus. As a Germanic language, Gothic is a part of the IE language family. It is the earliest Germanic language that is attested in any sizable texts, but lacks any modern descendants. The oldest documents in Gothic date back to the 4 th century. 31
The Gothic language The language was in decline by the mid-6 th century. The language survived as a domestic language in the Iberian peninsula (modern Spain and Portugal) as late as the 8 th century, and in the lower Danube area and in isolated mountain regions in Crimea (early 9 th century). The existence of such early attested corpora makes it a language of considerable interest in comparative linguistics. 32
Gothic vowels (monophthongs & diphthonhs) 33
The Gothic sounds Consonants devoiced at the ends of words. fricative consonants derived by the processes known as Grimm's law and Verner's law. Gothic is unusual among Germanic languages in having a /z/ phoneme which has not become /r/ through rhotacism. The doubling of written consonants between vowels suggests that Gothic made distinctions between long and short, or geminated consonants: atta [at: a] "dad", kunnan [kun: an] "to know” 34
Gothic Prosody a stress accent rather than the pitch accent of PIE. as in other Germanic languages, the free moving IE accent was fixed on the first syllable of simple words. Accents do not shift when words are inflected. In most compound words, the location of the stress depends on its placement in the second part: 35
Gothic Morphology Gothic preserves many archaic IE features. Gothic had nominative, accusative, genitive and dative cases, as well as vestiges of a vocative case (sometimes identical to the nominative and sometimes to the accusative). The three genders of Indo-European were all present adjectives were inflected according to one of two grammatical numbers: sg and pl. Nouns divided into numerous declensions according to the form of the stem: a, ō, i, u, an, ōn, ein, r, etc. Adjectives have two variants, indefinite and definite (sometimes indeterminate and determinate), with definite adjectives normally used in combination with the definite determiners while indefinite adjectives are used in other circumstances. 36
Gothic pronouns Gothic inherited the full set of IE pronouns: personal pronouns (including reflexive pronouns for each of the three grammatical persons), possessive pronouns, both simple and compound demonstratives, relative pronouns, interrogatives and indefinite pronouns. Each follows a particular pattern of inflexion (partially mirroring the noun declension), much like other IE languages. One particularly noteworthy characteristic is the preservation of the dual number, the plural was only used for quantities greater than two. 37
The Gothic Verb follows the type of IE conjugation called "thematic" because they insert a vowel derived from the reconstructed PIE phonemes *e or *o between roots and inflexional suffixes. The "athematic"conjugation, where suffixes are added directly to roots, exists only in unproductive vestigial forms in Gothic, just as it does in Greek and Latin. Gothic verbs are divided into strong and weak. Weak verbs are characterised by preterite formed by appending the suffixes –da / -ta, parallel to past participles formed with -þ / -t. Strong verbs form preterites by ablaut, or by reduplication (prefixing the root with the first consonant in the root plus aí), but without adding a suffix in either case. 38
Gothic strong verbs Verbal inflexions have two grammatical voices: the active and the medial; three numbers: singular, dual (except in the third person), and plural; two tenses: present and preterite (derived from a former perfect); three grammatical moods: indicative, subjunctive (from an old optative form) and imperative; three kinds of nominal forms: a present infinitive, a present participle, and a past passive. 39
Gothic Syntax The word order is fairly free The natural word order of Gothic is assumed to have been like that of the other old Germanic languages 40
Gothic is known to be significantly closer to PG than any other Germanic language, except for that of the early Norse runic inscriptions. This has made it invaluable in the reconstruction of PG. Gothic tends to serve as the primary foundation for reconstructing PG 41
Features of Gothic (to sum it up) Lack of Germanic umlaut Lack of rhotacism preserved many features that have mostly been lost in other early Germanic languages: Dual inflections on verbs A morphological passive voice for verbs Reduplication in the past tense of Class VII strong verbs Clitic conjunctions that appear in second position of a sentence in accordance with Wackernagel's Law, splitting verbs from preverbs 42
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