14. Oe noun s-m.

Number – Singular (Sg) and Plural (Pl).

Gender – Masculine (M), Feminine (F), Neuter (N).

Case – Nominative (Nom) (agent), Genitive (Gen) (attribute), Dative (Dat) (instrument, indirect/prepositional object), Accusative (Acc) (recipient, direct/prepositionless object). In OE there were 25 declensions of nouns. All nouns were grouped into declensions according to: stem-suffix; Gender.

Strong Vocalic Stems		Weak Consonantal Stems
Stem-suffix	Gender	Stem-suffix	Gender
a-stem	M, N	n-stem	M, N, F
o-stem	F	r, s, nd-stems	M, N, F
i-stem	M, N, F	root-stem	M, F
u-stem	M, F

a-stem – the most numerous declension (M, N): Traces of a-stem in Mod E: -es (M, Sg, Gen)  ‘s (student’s book) – Possessive Case; -as (M, Pl, Nom)  -(e)s (watches, books) – plural ending for the majority of nouns; - (N, Pl, Nom)  zero ending (deer, sheep) – homogeneous Sg and Pl. Traces of n-stem: -an (M, Pl, Nom)  -en (oxen, children, brethren) – irregular plural ending. Root-stem – never had stem-suffix, words consisted of just a root: irregular Plural (men, geese, mice).

15. The simplification of noun declension.

In ME the declensions disappeared due to the reduction of endings. As far as the Case endings were reduced to one or two, there remained no distinction between the Case forms of different declensions and there was no necessity any more to distinguish these declensions. The Case system was contracted in ME due to the reduction of endings. As far as the Case endings were reduced to one or two, there remained no distinction between the Case forms and there was no necessity any more to distinguish 4 Cases. The number of prepositions started to grow to help to replace the former Case forms. As far as there was no distinctions between the Cases, the distinction between the Subject and the Object of a sentence was lost  fixed word order appeared. The quantity of the Number endings was also reduced as far as the declensions disappeared. The markers of the Plural became more uniform (-s, -en, root-sound interchange). The preference of the consonantal endings can be explained by the fact that the vowels were more apt to change and reduction then the consonants that in general proved to be more stable.The Gender in OE was not supported semantically. It was only a classifying feature for the declensions and as far as the declensions disappeared there was no necessity to preserve the Gender. It disappeared by the 11^th – 12^th c. Gen-Pos/C;

N-Dat-Akk-Obj C

16. The development of Personal pronouns.

Personal Pronouns possessed (and still do) a very vivid Indo-European feature – suppletivity (i.e. they build their forms with the help of different roots). Categories: Person – 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd; Number –Sg, Pl + Dual (1^st, 2^nd pers. (we both, you both) when only two persons were meant);Gender – Masculine, Feminine, Neuter – only in 3^rd person!; Case –Nom, Gen, Dat, Acc. Later the following changes happened to the personal pronouns. Gender is still preserved (he, she, it) in ModE but is often denied by scholars because it is expressed lexically and practically has nothing to do with grammar. Cases:In ME the Genitive Case turned into a new class of pronouns – Possessive Pronouns (ModE I – mine; you – yours, he – his, she – her); The Dative and the Accusative Cases fell together and formed the Objective Case. Thus in ME there were only two cases left in the personal pronouns – Nominative and Objective (ModE I (Nom) – me (Obj); he – him, she – her, etc.). Number. Dual forms disappeared in ME. In NE the category of Number disappeared in the 2^nd person of the personal pronouns.

Pers.	OE	ME	Comments	NE
2nd	þu  sg	thou	Fell out of use due to the French etiquette (it forbade impolite “thou” form, so it was replaced with the polite “ēow” form).	ēow (Pl, Dat)(you)
	ζē pl	ye 	Coincided phonetically with wē  was dropped

As far as in the Early ME many forms in the 3^rd person coincided phonetically and often caused confusion, the language developed new ways of expr. Pl-they, fem. – she.