169. Reinforcement through France

1. 169. Reinforcement through France • English borrowed many words from Latin and French

2. 170. Words from Roman Language • 16th century: Three classes of strange words: inkhorn terms, oversea language and Chaucerisms. • English vocab adopted more than 50 languages: • French • Italian • Spanish

3. English travel in France and consumption of books in such word as alloy, baluster, comrade, detail, entrance…etc. • English travel in Italy observed Italian architecture and brought back Italian manners and styles of dress and Italian words. • Italian words: algebra,balcony, cameo,design…etc. • Italian words adapted to French: batallion, bankrupt, carat, gala…. etc. • from Spanish and Portuguese: alligator, apricot, armada, banana, brocade…. etc.

4. 171. The Method of Introducing New Words • Influenced the work of churchmen and scholars • Effort of individual writers and their associates

5. 172. Enrichment from Native Sources • English vocab was drawn from sources outside English. • Foreign words have implied a disparagement of English resourcesthat was resented in some quarters. • Poetical innovation: old words revived such as astound, blameful, displeasant, enroot…etc. • Adaptation of and derivative of old words: baneful, briny, changeful, drear…etc.

6. 173. Method of Interpreting the New Words • New words were presented in various ways: • Explanations were added parenthetically • Equivalent word or expression was combined the new and old in a self-interpreting pair.

7. 176. The Movement Illustrated in Shakespeare • Shakespeare had the largest vocabulary of any English writer. • Shakespeare’s words: agile, antipathy, catastrophe, consonancy, critical, dire, emphasis…etc. • He use new words illustrates an important point in connection with them.

8. 177. Shakespeare’s Pronunciations • Much more like ours: [e] for [i] in some words • Er, irand ur have same pronunciation (e.g., herd, birth, hurt) • Two different sound: • Close sound which spelled with ee or ie (deep, field) • Open sound was written ea (sea, clean)

9. Words containing a ME Ộ regularly develop into [u:] (room, food, roof and root) • Vowel was shortened and unrounded to the sound in blood and flood • In 1700, the length was shortened without being unrounded (e.g., good, stood, book and foot) • Fluctuations in pronunciation of words containing Middle English vowel.

10. 178. Changes shown through corpus Linguistic • Flourishing of sociolinguistics and availability of electronic databases, converged to give a fuller picture of English language.

11. 179. Grammatical Features • English grammar in the 16th and early 17th century is marked more by survival of certain forms and usage. • Reduced in inflection of OE • Few parts of speech was retained some of their original inflections.

12. 180. The Noun • The inflections retained in the noun were plural and possessive singular. • S-plural become so generalized except: • sheep and swine – unchanged plurals • mice and feet –mutated vowel

13. In ME –esof genitive was written and pronounced –is, -ys. • The ending identical to the pronoun his (lost h when unstressed) • So, pronunciations stonis and ston his (his)are the same

14. 181. The Adjective • Adjectives lost all its ending; no distinctions of gender, number and case • Two method used to form comparative and superlative: • ending –erand –est • the adverb more and most • Shakespearian comparison (honester and violentest) replaced by analytical forms

15. 182. The Pronoun • 16th century: establishment of personal pronoun. • Involved three changes: • Disuse of thou, thy and thee • Substitution of you for yeas nominative case • Introduction of itsas possessive of it

16. Disuse of thou, thy and thee • Early period of English: • thou = singular • ye = plural • 13th century: • thou, thy and thee= singular [addressing children or persons of inferior rank] • ye, your and you= plural [addressing superior] • Later, ye, your and you become the usual pronoun of direct addressing irrespective of rank or intimacy. • Shakespeare’s time: y-form displaced the th-form among both men and women.

17. ii. Substitution of you for ye as nominative case • ye = nominative • you = objective • 14th century: • you used as nominative, and ye appear for objective case • Finally, ye disappeared

18. iii. Introduction of its as possessive of it • Formation of new possessive neuter its. • his remain the proper form of possessive • Noun (stone’s , horse’s) suggest the analogical form of it’s for possessive of it.

19. The use of who as a relative • Uses of who are the sources of new construction: • as indefinite pronoun • as interrogative in indirect questions

20. 183. The verb • Verb used to distinguish part of speech from its form in later times. • Common interrogative form without an auxiliary • Scarcity of progressive forms • Impersonal use of verb • Difference in inflection • Ending of third person singular of present indicative

21. Difference in inflection • In South and Southeastern part of England: The formation of the standard speech was –eth. • Chaucer: telleth, giveth, saith, doth • North the formation of –es • 16th century –eth spread into north and become majority form • -eswas preferred by women than by men • -eswas resurfaced in London and ending word had undergone contraction.

22. 184. Usage and idioms • Defy explanations or logical classification. • Placing of the negative before verb:

23. 185.General characteristic of the period • Conscious interest in the English language • Effect of the Great Vowel Shift • Words had not distributed themselves into rigid grammatical categories • Many features of language were unsettled: alternative forms in grammar, experiments with new words and variations in pronunciation and spelling.