in
g
.
esc
.
y ‘a pair of shoes’, and associativity, as in
g
.
efera. It should be noted
that this prefix is never stressed, even in nominal contexts.
It is not always possible to give a clear indication of meaning to some
of the prefixes. Thus
a-, a verbal prefix found in verbs such as
acalan
‘become frozen’, is clearly an intensifier of
calan ‘become cold’, but
afysan
and
fysan can both mean ‘drive away’. Another similar case is
be-, as in
bebe¯odan ‘offer’, but again there are other examples with perfective or
intensifying effect, such as
belucan ‘lock up’. Other prefixes can have
more than one distinct meaning. An excellent example of this is
in-. One
meaning is quite transparent from a present-day perspective, since it is
the same as that for ‘in’ today, hence
inga¯n ‘go in’ and
inneweard ‘inward’.
But it also has an intensifying meaning, as in
infro¯d ‘very wise’.
One point which becomes quickly apparent is that very many of the
Old English prefixes have been lost from the language since that time.
Sometimes the loss is total, as in the case of
g
.
e-; sometimes a few exam-
ples may remain, but often their prefixal status is not obvious, as in,
for example
arise from OE
arı¯san. Other cases still are misleading; for
example the OE prefix
in- should not be confused with the Latinate
prefix
in- as in
incomplete. In later English there was considerable borrow-
ing of prefixes from the Romance languages.
There was in Old English even more suffixation than prefixation. One
general issue is whether a given suffix remained synchronically active in
Old English or was rather a relic of a system which was active only in the
Germanic period or even earlier. Thus it is far from clear that a derived
form such as
leng
´
‘length’ (from
leng +
´
) represents a relic or a still
active derivational process; the same is perhaps true of present-day
length, although there are further complications with that form which are
outside the present work.
Some of the Old English suffixes remain in frequent use today. Thus
we find
græ¯dig
. ‘greed’ with the suffix
-ig.. This suffix is in competition with
the suffix
-lic
. found in, for example,
de¯oplic. ‘deeply’. So both
cræftig. and
cræftlic ‘strong’ therefore occur. In addition, alternative suffixes may have
become prevalent later, hence
c
.
ildlic and
cildisc ‘childish’ both occur, but
the latter wins out (but note
child-like).
There are also other distinguishing features amongst suffixes. Gram-
matically, as with prefixes, we can isolate nominal suffixes, such as
-scipe,
which forms nouns from nouns, for example
fre¯ondsc
.
ipe ‘friendship’,
adjectival suffixes such as in
græ¯dig
. above, and others which change the
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