Lecture 1 Introduction


Weak Verbs and their Development



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Weak Verbs and their Development

  1. The division of weak verbs into classes was based on the original stem-building suffix of a verb that was already hard to distinguish even in OE:




Class 1

Infinitive

Past

Participle 2

Basis for Subdivision

OE

styrian

styrede

stured

stem-suffix -j
most verbs – with front root-vowel
derived from nouns, adjectives

ME

stiren

stirede

stired

NE

stir

stirred

stirred




Class 2

Infinitive

Past

Participle 2

Basis for Subdivision

OE

lōcian

lōcode

lōcod

stem-suffix –oja
most numerous class
most verbs – with back root-vowel

ME

looken

lookede

looked

NE

look

looked

looked




Class 3

Infinitive

Past

Participle 2

Basis for Subdivision

OE

libban

lifde

lifd

3 verbs only:
habban (to have), libban (to live), secζan (to say)

ME

livien

livde

lived

NE

This class merged with class 1 in ME




  1. Weak verbs were not as complex as strong ones and had a greater regularity and simplicity. That’s why they were productive, i.e. all borrowed verbs used weak model of form-building (suffix -t/-d) (e.g. Scand. to skate, Fr. to charm, Lat. to decorate, etc.) and, as it has already been mentioned above, many originally strong verbs turned into weak (e.g. to bake, to laugh, to help, to lie, etc.). The opposite process of turning of weak verbs into strong was very rare and was mainly based on phonetic similarity between some strong and weak verbs, i.e. was a result of mere confusion that later was accepted as a norm due to its persistent and regular character (e.g. to wear was originally weak and became strong because of the mistaken analogy with to swear, to ring (mistaken analogy with to sing), to hide (mistaken analogy with to ride)).



Non-Finite Forms
Participle 1
The formation of the Participle 1 was as follows:



OE

ME

NE

berende

bering

bearing

In OE Participle 1 was considered Present Participle, had only the form of the Active Voice, possessed the categories of Number, Gender, Case. It was used predicatively and attributively (agreed with the noun in Number, Gender, Case).


In ME it lost its nominal and adjectival features together with the categories of Number, Gender, Case and became unchangeable.
Participle 2
As it has been mentioned in the table above, in OE Participle 2 was formed:

    • in strong verbs – with the help of the suffix –en (+ sometimes root-vowel interchange) + often marked by prefix ζe-:

e.g. OE bindan (Infinitive) – ζebunden (Participle 2) (to bind)
In ME prefix ζe- was weakened to prefix i-/y- (e.g. ME y-runne (run, Part.2 from “to run”) and in NE it disappeared at all.

    • in weak verbs – with the help of the suffix -t/-d:

e.g. OE cēpan (Infinitive) – cēped (Participle 2) (to keep)

Participle 2, unlike Participle 1, had two meanings of the category of Voice:





OE

NE

Active Voice

Passive Voice

ζegān

ζeboren

gone, born

somebody was gone, i.e. he did it himself = he was the subject/active doer of the action

somebody was born, i.e. somebody gave birth to him = he was the object/passive recipient of the action

No Voice distinctions observed



Thus in OE Participle 2 was considered Past Participle, had the forms of the Active and Passive Voice, possessed the categories of Number, Gender, Case. It was used predicatively and attributively (agreed with the noun in Number, Gender, Case).
In ME it lost the category of Voice and the categories of Number, Gender, Case and became unchangeable.


Infinitive
In OE the Infinitive resembled the Noun and had the category of Case (only two Cases – Nominative (Nom) and Dative (Dat)):
e.g. OE Nom writan (uninflected)Dat to wrītanne (inflected, indicated direction or purpose).

In ME the Infinitive lost the Dative Case (the inflected form) and only one form was left:


e.g. ME (to) writen.

Particle to remained in NE as a formal sign of the infinitive with no meaning of direction or purpose:


e.g. NE (to) write.
Though sometimes the traces of these meanings are still visible:
e.g. He came to feed the horses (purpose).


Gerund
The Gerund appeared only in the 12th c. Actually it presented a mixture of the OE Verbal Noun (with suffix -unζ/-inζ) and Participle 1 and its characteristics were:

    • It took direct object (verbal feature) (e.g. buying a book);

    • It could be preceded by an article or a possessive pronoun (noun feature) (e.g. the cleaning of my room, your coming late).



Preterite-Present Verbs
OE
The preterite-present verbs had the following characteristics:

    • Their Present-Tense forms resembled Past-Tense forms (Germ. “Präteritum” = past tense, that’s why they were called so);

    • Some of these verbs did not have a full paradigm and were called “defective”;

    • These verbs expressed attitude and were followed by the Infinitive without “to” (NB! Most of these verbs are present-day modal verbs);

    • Out of 12 preterite-present verbs only 6 survived in ModE:

āζ (ought), cunnan (can), dear (dare), sculan (shall), maζan (may), mōt (must).
E.g.:

Numb.

Pers.

Present

Past

(formed like Past Tense of strong verbs)

(formed like Past Tense of weak verbs)

cunnan

sculan

cunnan

sculan

Sg

1st

cann

sceal

cuðe

sceolde

2nd

canst

scealt

cuðest

sceoldest

3rd

cann

sceal

cuðe

sceolde

Pl

-

cunnon

sculon

cuðon

sceoldon



ME
The following changes happened to the preterite-present verbs:

    • They lost their Verbals (non-finite forms) (e.g. OE cunnen – Part 2 of cunnan);

    • They lost the Number and Mood distinctions (e.g. OE cann (Indicative) – cunne (Subjunctive); OE cann (Sg) – cunnon (Pl)).



NE
The paradigm of the preterite-present verbs (that had already become modal verbs) was reduced to one or two forms (e.g. must (just one form), can, could (just two forms), etc.).


Anomalous Verbs
They were irregular verbs that combined the features of the weak and strong verbs. There were 4 of them – willan (will), bēon (to be), ζān (to go), dōn (to do).


Willan:

    • had the meaning of volition;

    • resembled the preterite-present verbs in meaning (attitude) and in function (was followed by the Infinitive without “to”);

    • eventually became a modal verb and also together with sculan developed into an auxiliary for the formation of the Future-Tense forms.



Dōn
This verb combined the features of the weak and strong verbs:



Infinitive

Past

Participle 2

strong verb feature (root-sound interchange) + weak verb feature (dental suffix -d)

strong verb feature (suffix -n and prefix ζe-)

dōn

dyde

ζen



ζan
This verb was suppletive and also combined the features of the weak and strong verbs:




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