Middle English: the non-standard period

1. What were the specific roles of English and French in the Early ME society?

Context: 1066 Battle of Hastings → William the Conqueror

→ English Nobles replaced by Normans- the leaders= most influential sector of society,the higer classes

- Most of the Church leaders French as well

- but mass of the inhabitants of England= English-speaking peasants

French- language of upper class for more than 200 years

- Marked class more than national identity

- French used in writing conventions

- Bilingualism (French landowners in isolated areas, Engl. /Fr. intermarriages among lesser nobility)

→ French used on the top and English on the bottom of the social scale

--> Bilingualism (landowners in rural areas) --> large-scale borrowing from French --> less influence on word order and inflection, more on vocabulary


2. What were the major factors for re-emergence of English in the Early ME period?

  • 1234 - bishop protest at Winchester = dismissal of foreigners
    • dind't last long, soon returned but there were tensions
    • 1258 - Henry III - Provisions of Oxford
      • first proclamation since the Norman Conquest issued in French, Latin as well as English
      • meant to promote power-sharing between the barons and the king (recognition of parliament)
      • not accepted by the king = Barons' War (1258-1265)
  • Edward I
    • most office-holders English
    • changes in attitude towards English
      • knowledge of English = mark of an Englishman
      • English common language in all parts of the population (due to the merge of Norman French with the native population)
      • Of Arthur and of Merlin (before 1325) (translated): But every Englishman knows English./ Many a noble I have seen/ Who could not speak French.
  • consequences
    • decline of French - there were attempts to hold this decline
      • University of Oxford forced students to learn both English and French
      • Canterbury and Westminster novices forbidden to use English
      • French a foreign language
  • English as a written language, the use of English in courts and Parliament established in the middle of the 14th century
  • 15th century - English in private and public use; French still present in the Court and upper class

3.Explain the origin of the phonemic difference in voicing of English fricatives.

-Lexical borrowing from French --> the evolution of new phoneme;

-Contact with and borrowing of words with the phonotactic features of French led to contrasts between initial voiced and voiceless fricatives;

- The adoption of French loans with /v/ spelt ‹u ~ v› begins ca. 1200-50 and accelerates dramatically ca. 1300 (voice-valūe);

Examples:

- Initial-fricative-voicing is a process that occurs in the West Country where the fricatives /s/, /f/, /θ/, /ʃ/ and /h/ are voiced to [z], [v], [ð], [ʒ]l. Initial /v/ from French --> meaning distinctions between words with /f/ and those with /v/ (ModE fon-van;

- /z/ was phonemicised thanks to the frequent occurrence of medial /-s-/ contrasting with /-z-/in OF; the effect of learned borrowings with initial /z-/ was negligible. The degemination of ME[-ss-] probably played a secondary role.

- /ð/ was phonemicised slowly and its distribution remains defective even in ModE. The medialcontrast between. The /ð/ of pronouns and conjunctions was aprosodically conditioned allophone. /ð/ owes its phonemic status mostly to analogical restoration (bath -bathe)

-Function words (articles) --> only weakly stressed while lexical words carried stress;


4. Comment on the loss of /w/ and /h/ in the early ME period.

  • postconsonantal /w/ disappeared before backround vowels, e.g. it disappeared in combinations such as /sw-/, which lead to so (as opposed to swā) or sword /sɔːd/ ( as opposed to sweord).
  • the loss of /h/, also known as h dropping, appeared in consonant clusters such as /hr-/, /hn-/ and /hl/ and before consonants as in (right), but it has been mostly retained before vowels. Dropping pre-vocalic /h/ is seen as violating the norms of good English (typical in Cockney ´ous instead of house). ! Initial prevocalic /h/ was not pronounced (and thus was ommited from writing) in loan woards (houre x oure - PDE hour).

5. Explain the principal mechanisms of short vowel lengthening and long vowel shortening in Middle English.

- In late OE, some long vowels shortened in closed syllables: e.g. OE cēp-te -> ME kĕpte

-Around the thirteenth century, some short vowels lengthened in open syllables: e.g. OE nŏ-su -> ME nōse

Changes in the vowel system in the ME period:

  • V + /l, r, n, m/ + voiced consonant → vowel lengthening / diphthongization
    • cild “child” – original /i/ → /iː/ (later → /aı/)

- but did not occur if a third consonant followed cildru “children” - /i/

  • ē before double consonants → shortened
    • If they were in stressed closed syllables before a ‘consonant group’

e.g. groups that resulted from compounding: scēaphirde e.g. doubled consonants: næ:ddre, læ:dde

      • mētanmētte → “meet” – “met”
  • Open syllable lengthening - general lengthening of vowels in open syllables (especially in the South)
    • /a/ as in faren “fare” → /ɑː/ in open syllables
    • /ɛ/ as in spere “spear” → /ɛː/ in open syllables
    • /ɔ/ as in boren “borne” → /ɔː/ in open syllables

consequence – today phonologically short vowels - /ɪ, e, æ, ɒ, ʊ, ʌ/ do not occur in open syllables

  • More and more unstressed vowels – realized as schwa or lost in final position

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------late OE (Wessex)-------------------------------------early 14th century (East)

------------------front---rounded---back---diphthongs--------------front---back---diphthongs

high-------------i/iː------y/yː---------u/uː---------------------------------i/iː-----u/uː------iu--(ui)

high-mid-------e/eː------------------o/oː------eo/eːo------------------e/eː----o/oː------ɛu--ɔi

low-mid---------------------------------------------------------------------ɛː-------ɔː------------ɔu

low-------------æ/æː-----------------ɑ/ɑː-----æɑ/æːɑ-----------------æ/æː--------------ai--au

--> By the end of the ME period,

  • Closed syllables are associated with short vowels

tal-ly remains short cēp-te becomes short

  • Open syllables are associated with long vowels

ta-lu becomes long cē-pan remains long


6. Sum up the main changes to English orthography in the Early ME period and explain their origins.

  • the first orthographic system connected with West Saxon was still used but grew outdated
  • new conventions began to shift → French influence
  • even though there were general effects of the changes no standard emerged in the early ME
  • Changes:
    • Non-Latin letters in disuse o
      • <ʒ> → <g> and <i>
      • <p> and <ð> replaced by <th>
      • <ae> interchanged with <a> or <e>
    • <u; uu; w> are now used instead of Wynn <p>
    • <y> used as a consonant for <j>
    • <ʒ> fully retired
    • <k> began to be used especially where <c> + <e; i> would lead to misinterpreation as <s> instead of <k>
    • OE grapheme combinantion <hw> →<wh> → thanks to the influence which used <h> as a diacritic in combinations such as -th, -ch etc.
    • in North and East Anglia <qu; u> and east Midlands <w> were also used for <hw>
    • <c> and <sc> were replaced by French <ch> and <sch>
  • Changes in vowels:
    • more challenging because of the great variety of pronunciations
    • OE /y/ → <e> in Southeast BUT! in Soutwest rounding was reatained → the French<u; ui; uy> occured
    • high back rounded /uː/ was spelled as <ou> in French fashion
    • OE raising of /a/ led to the use of <o> or <oo>
  • Ormulum o
    • 12th century East Midlands work; poetry; it wasn't praised because of its quality (used 15 beats iambic pentameter and it didn't rhyme) provides evidence of Old Norse in ME; includes English-Danish couplets
    • the use of spelling indicates the author's pronunciation :
      • short and long vowels are differentiated here
      • short vowels - followed by double consonant-letters:follc
      • long vowels - followed by only one consonants letters:god
      • such differentiation also indicates that this OE concept was lost