7. Old English Phonology

Apart from the differences in consonants we may see that vowels і similar words are different too. Especially prominent are the instances of numerous diphthongs in Old English replacing simple vowels as in eahta jooc, meolc, heard (eight, yoke, milk, hard), or when vowels change their I quality in certain positions as in waster, stdn, fyllan (water, stone, fill). Some I sounds merge, some get doubled - all these are to be studied among Old English sound changes.

The system of vowels in Old English included seven long and eight short vowels (monophthongs) (aaeeiouya –ааёёу) and four short and four long diphthongs (ea eo ie io - ёа eo j). The length of the vowel was a phonemic quality. The words having long and short vowels differed in meaning: jod (god) - jod (good), west (west) - west (waste), for (preposition for) - for (past tense of the verb j fa ran - go). Comparing Old English sounds with the system of sound of other Germanic languages, one can see that in English it is more complicated and the origin of some sounds is blurred. Some of the sounds had counterparts in other Indo-European languages So, for instance, such sounds as i, и can be found in similar words in other Germanic and non-Germanic Indo-European languages: Old English niman (Ukr. знімати); Old English sunu (Lat. 'sums). But the majority of sounds deviated from the way they were pronounced in other languages. So, for instance, Indo-European short о and a merged into one sound a in Germanic; but this a had several ways of development: a - a haban - habban (have); but harda - heard (hard), arm - earm (arm), manna - man (man); long Gothic a changed and gave several other variants, but there appeared a new long a from Gothic ai. Various changes occurred in the Old English phonology. These can be called spontaneous, independent, and assimilative, influenced by the 'surrounding sounds.

What had changed spontaneously, or independently is the following: Gothic ai corresponds to long a\au to long ea\ lu to long eo in Old English ddud-deadi&z&d); aust- east (east); dlups-deop (deep). These changes occurred irrespective of whatever sounds surrounded the sounds in question.

Assimilative changes are the changes that occurred in the language in specific surroundings і the sound might change when it was preceded or followed by some other sound or sound cluster. Many of the sounds that appeared in the language as a result of these changes returned to their previous quality in. the next period, some did not, but we are concerned with these because the changes transformed the words formerly common in Germanic languages to their Anglo-Saxon variety.

There are two types of assimilation - regressive and progressive assimilation. If a sound influences the preceding sound, the assimilation is regressive, if it influences the following it sound - it is called progressive assimilation. Both types of assimilation are found in Old English. Most common, mutilating the general Germanic picture ofthe sounds are:

Breaking (fracture). This is the process of formation of a short diphthong from a simple short vowel when it is followed by a specific consonant cluster.

In the Northumbrian and Kentish dialects l л-cons does not lead to fracture of the sound as, which turns into a {aid, all).

Palatal mutation (i-umlaut) The essence of this change is that a back sound, a or o, changes its quality if there is a front sound in the next syllable. Especially frequent are the changes in the roots of the verbs influenced by the /-sound of the suffix of the infinitive -ian (the suffix lost its front sound in the same process, and in the Old English we have already the result of this change, not seeing the cause of it): a > ae; a > e wakjan — wasccan (to observe, to be awake); sandian — sendan (to send) namnian — nemnan (to name) talian — tsolan — tellan (to tell), salian - saelan - sellan ( to sell, originally to give) satian — sastan - settan (to set) a > аё larian - /аё ran (to learn, to teach); kalian - /іае lan (to heal) an — аёnij (any) о > oe > e ofstian - efstan (to hurry)

dohter - dehter (dative case of daughter) о > oe > ё wopian — wepan (to weep)

domian - danan (to deem, to judge) u > у fidlian - fyllan (to fill)

kunin j - су піп j (king) \x > у m Us - mys (mice)

Palatal mutation was found not only in monophthongs but in diphthongs, too. The modified system of diphthongs looks like the following: ea > ie

eald - ieldra (elder)

hleahian - hliehhan (to laugh) -

eo > ie

feor - fierra (further) J'eorij - jienjra (younger) и- ^

ea > hear ran (hear) ¹

jeleafa - jellefan (believe) eo > Ге jetreowi - jetnewe (true)

In the Northumbrian and Mercian dialects long and short ea mutate into long and short e (eldra, jelefan).

Very often palatal mutation thus distanced a noun or an adjective and a verb derived from it, for the most frequent case of palatal mutation was under the influence of the verbal (infinitival) suffix -ian. We find the reflexes of Old English palatal mutation in such pairs in present-day English as sale- sell; tell - tale; doom - deem; full - fill - in Old English the verb had mutated vowel tasllan (from talian) whereas the noun had no such mutation - talu. As we will see later, plurals of some nouns had a mutated vowel in the stem, which was very much in accordance with the rule-miff- mys (mouse- mice), foot - feet. Later developments of sounds in these words blurred the initial identity of the roots.

Diphthongization after palatal consonants. Diphthongs may have resulted from another process in Old English - diphthongization after palatal consonants sk\ k' and j (in spelling sc, c, j): a > ea, skal — sceal shall, scacan — sceacan (shake) scamu — sceamu (shame) a > ea skaggxvon — sceawian (to show) e > ie jefan — jiefan (give), jetan — jietan (get) ж > ea (the as sound was actually derived from a) 3&f - jeaf (gave) jast - jeat (gate) ж > ea (the аё sound was actually derived from a), jar — joar (year) о > eo scort - sceort (short), yong - jeonj (young)

However, there are linguists who still doubt whether the і sound (that is the resulting sound, it was actually a diphthong) was pronounced. Some stick to the opinion that the letter і simply signified the palatal nature of the preceding sound. The words beginning with j, Ц and с (such may be found in (he texts) with non-palatalized vowel represent dialects other than West-Saxon (junj, Jefan) etc.

Back, or Velar Mutation.The formula of mutation here reminds very much that of И mutation, but the difference is that the syllable that influenced the preced vowel contained a back vowel - о or и (sometimes even a might serve^ background for back mutation). Not all the dialects had this mutation, and th process was not universal (in West Saxon literary language it occurred only before the sounds r, I, p, b, f, гіг): і > io hira - Mora (their); silufr - siolufr (silver) sifon - siofon (seven) liniu - liomu (limbs) e > eo heorot - heorot (hart), hefon - lieofon (heaven) efor - eofor (boar) a > ea saru - searu (armour).

Mutation before h. Sounds a and e that preceded h underwent several changes, mutating to diphthongs ea, ie and finally were reduced to i/y: - naht - nealit - niht - nieht - nyht (night). The second may be quite easily traced to breaking, but the origin of the other three is rather vague. Probably, the very nature of the h sound was the reason for further development of the sound.

The words with such mutation are not very numerous, still we cannot ignore them altogether. It is observed in the past tense of the verb majan (may) meahte - miehte - mihte - myhte and several other words.

Contraction. Somehow or other the consonant h proved to have interfered with the development of many sounds. When h was placed between two vowels the following changes occurred: a + h +vowel > ea slahan - slean (slay) e + h + vowel > eo selien - soon (see) і + h + vowel > eo tihan - teon (accuse) о + h + vowel > о fohan - fon (catch),hohan - Hon (hang).

The Old German had no contraction, and this consonant is present the corresponding words - in corresponding present-day German words consonant is still found in spelling, though later it was lost in pronunciation, too (in the words like sehen).

These were qualitative changes of vowels; the significant quantitative change that is still felt in present-day English is the lengthening of vowels before the clusters nd, ld_y mb - bindan, cild, climban (bind, child, climb). Further development of the sound system led to diphthongization of long vowels, and that explains the exception in the rules of reading the sounds in the closed syllables in the present-day English (the words like climb, find, bold, told, comb, bomb).

Still, if there was a consonant after this cluster the vowel was not lengthened: cildru (now children).

As far as other vowel changes, we can also mention gradation, or ablaut - grammatical interchange of vowels in different forms of the verb and in word-formation (чергування голосних у корені слова).

This was frequently found in making past tenses and participles of some verbs (they will be mentioned in studying Old English verbs).