|
|
||
Latin
|
Greek
|
Sanskrit
|
English
|
pater
|
pater
|
pitar
|
father
|
pedam
|
poda
|
padam
|
foot
|
decem
|
deka
|
dasam
|
ten
|
est esti asti is
These sets of words seem to have diverged
from a common source, a common ancestor, a pre-historic original. This common
ancestor we call the proto Indo-European from which were descended most of the
languages of Europe, Northern India and Persia. This is only a hypothesis, but
it is had been a useful starting point. As it goes, the 'Indo-European' spoken
about 3500 - 3000 B.C. by a loosely linked group of communities living on the
plains around the Black Sea. These people split up into several groups and
moved in different directions in search of greener pastures and better
conditions of living. They spread both East and West and grew heterogeneous
with hardly any chance of meeting and mingling again. The common tongue which
each group carried with it was modified by mixing with non-Indo-European
languages, and got progressively differentiated from the speech of other
groups, acquiring individual characteristics in tune with the changing needs
and environments. This process went on, and by about 2000 B.C. there were eight
clearly recognizable sets of languages, all descendants of the proto
Indo-European. On the basis of their geographical dispersion, they fall into
two broad classes, the Eastern and the Western. The former comprises
Indo-Iranian
Armenian Albanian Balto-Slavic
The language sets of the latter are Hellenic Italic
Primitive
Germanic Celtic
An the Indo-European, the numeral 100
was denoted by the term kmiom. While the languages of the Western group
have retained the original /k/ sound {kentun), Sanskrit has changed it
to an sh / sound. For this reason the Western languages are called Centum
(Kentum) languages and the Eastern Satem languages)
The languages of the Indo-European are
distinguished from the rest by two characteristics: (1) They lend themselves to
description in terms of what were called 'Parts of Speech' by the Greeks (noun,
pronoun, adjective, verb, preposition, conjunction, adverb, interjection), and
(2) they all share a corpus of fundamental words such as those denoting family
relationships, elementary domestic materials and familiar animals.
What follows is a diagrammatic
representation of the genealogy of the Indo-European family of languages, with
brief descriptive notes on each member.
|
Indian: The Indian branch, Vedic
Sanskrit, dates to about 1500 B.C. This language is found in the four vedas and
other prose writings of the age. By the fourth century B.C., it developed into
Classical Sanskrit in which were wrfcten the Mahabarata and the Ramayana
and a large body of drama, poetry and philosophical works. From the
colloquial dialects-of this tongue called Prakrits, there evolved Pali, and the
modern languages of India-Bengali, Mahrati, Punjabi, etc.-and Sinhalese.
Iranian: This branch comprises Avestan
and Old Persian. Modern Persian, Afghan, Beluchi, Kurdish, etc., were descended
from Old Persian.
2. Armenian
Having been spoken in a small area south
of the Caucusus mountains and the eastern end of the Black Sea, it is known to
us from about the fifth century A.D. through a translation of the Bible.
3. Hellenic
The common Greek. The earliest
literature in this language, the two epics of Homer, goes back to the ninth or
the tenth century B.C.
4. Albanian
A small branch found on the eastern
coast of the Adriatic, it dates back to the 15th century.
32
5. Italic
The ancestor of Latin. The principal
descendants J Latin, known as Romanic or Romance languages, arl French,
Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Rumanian.
6. Balto
Slavic
The East European set. It comprises
Bulgariarl Serbian, Czech, Russian and Polish.
7. Celtic
The Celtic tongues - Walsh, Irish
Gaelic, Scots Gaelid Gallic and Manx- once spread across the greater part o|
Western Europe, have now shrunk to the remote corners of France and the British
isles.
8. Primitive
Germanic (or Teutonic)
The immediate ancestor of English. The
languages ol this set expand into three groups: East Germanic, North Germanic
and West Germanic. The principal East Germanil branch is Gothic, preserved now
in a translation of parts <J the Bible made by Bishop Ulfilas. North
Germanic (alsl called Scandinaviam or Old Norse) includes Swedisll Danish,
Norwegian and Icelandic; Norwegian ceased to bj a literary language in the 14th
century. West Germanic spll into High German, Low German and Anglo-Friesian.
Higl German has developed into Modern German. Thd descendant of Low German is
Dutch. Old Friesian and Old English constitute the Anglo-Friesian subgroup.
With the decline of power of the Frisians, once a great sea-faring people,
their language has now been reduced to the positior of a dialect in Friesland.
The history of the English language
33
I begins with
the settling of the North Germanic tribes, Angles, I Saxons and Jutes, in
Britain.\
I b.
The Distinguishing Traits of the Germanic Family of Languages
The Germanic languages are marked by
certain I characteristics which distinguish them from other Indo-I European
groups. They are:
I
1. The Great Consontant Shift, I
2. The Verbal System, and I 3. The Teutonic Accent.
1. The Great Consonant Shift (or Grimm's
Law)
It is also called the First Sound Shifting in order to I
distinguish it from another sound shifting which occurred later in Old High
German.
Erasmus Rask, a Danish scholar, noticed
a regular and systematic shifting of certain Indo-European consonants to
certain other consonants in the Germanic languages. Following up his
suggestion, the German philologist, Jacob Grimm, in the year 1822, formulated
an explanation which systematically accounted for the correspondences between
these consonants in the Indo-European tongues such as Sanskrit, Greek and
Latin, and those in the Germanic languages. The formulation has come to be
known as Grimm's Law.
This sound-shift, the most distinctive
feature of the Germanic languages, might have occurred before the
34
primitive Germanic split into East, West and North, and al
a result of the migration of non-Germanic tribes intJ Germany. All these
changes, obviously, might have takel place gradually over a period of time. The
principal sounJ changes are:
I.
Indo-European
aspirated voiced stops (bh, dh, ghl
become voiced stops (b, d, g) in the Germanil
languages.
become voiced stops (b, d, g) in the Germanil
languages.
II.
Indo-European
voiced stops (b, d, g) become shifteJ
to corresponding voiceless ones (p, t, k) in thJ
Germanic languages.
to corresponding voiceless ones (p, t, k) in thJ
Germanic languages.
III.
Indo-European
voiceless (p, t, k) become changed;
to the corresponding voiceless fricative sounds (f, 61
h) in Germanic.
to the corresponding voiceless fricative sounds (f, 61
h) in Germanic.
Verner's Law
However, it was found that Grimm's Law did
not account for all the
correspondences between the other Indo-European and the Germanic consonants.
There were certain apparent exceptions to Grimm's Law. For example, between the
pair, Latin centum and English hundred, the shift from c to h is in consonance with Grimm's formulation, but the shift from t to
d was not, according to Grimm's Law. it shoulB have been from t to θ,
The same deficiency could be seen between the pair, Sanskrit stigh and
Old English stige Grimm himself was puzzled by the existence of such
pairs of words. Because sound laws do not admit of any exceptions, it was
realized that some combinative factor was at work by which the voiceless open
consonants became voiced.
35
Forty years later in 1875, Karl Verner,
a disciple of Grimm, succeeded in solving this puzzle. He discovered that the
variable Indo-European accent was responsible for the voicing of what should
have been voiceless open sounds. This discovery he formulated into a law which
came to be called Verner's Law. According to this law, when the Indo-European
accent was not on the vowel immediately preceding the consonant in question,
such voiceless open sounds became voiced in Germanic. This explains the
shifting of the Latin voiceless t (in Centum) to the voiced d (in hundred)
in English. Thus when the accent is on the syllable preceding the consonant
in question, Grimm's Law operates, and when the accent is on the following
syllable, it is in accordance with Verner's Law.
Verner, by formulating this law,
vindicated the claim of regularity for the sound changes and thereby
established that sound laws do not admit of exceptions.
2 (a). The Verbal System
Another distinctive feature ofthe
Germanic languages is their verbal system.
The Indo-European had an elaborate and
complex system of verb-conjugation, with a multitude of forms by which to
indicate the time or tense of the action. Thus one series of forms indicated
the progressive aspect of a verb; a second series indicated the perfective
aspect; a third series the momentaneous aspect; and so on. But the Germanic
verb has only two tenses, a present and a past, which are indicated by the
primary forms of the verb. The other tenses and time references are shown of
bringing in auxiliary verbs, compound tenses, etc. This tendency on the part of
the Germanic languages has resulted in an increasing use of
36
auxiliary verbs and a multiplying of compound tenses. While it has facilitated an astonishing flexibility
and subtlety of expression, there is, at
times, the scope for looseness of construction in the language.
2 (b). Vowel-Gradation or Ablaut
This is another striking phenomenon witnessed in the Teutonic
languages. Ablaut is the term used by Jacob Grimm, a pioneer in Teutonic
philology, to indicate a certain distancing of vowel sounds in a class of verbs
in the Germanic languages. Basing himself on the criterion of tense changes,
Grimm has divided the Germanic verbs into two classes, strong ve.bs and weak
verbs. Strong verbs are those which indicate their tense according to a regular
series of vowel-variation which is called Ablaut-series and which is now known
in English as vowel-gradation. This vowel
gradation or alternation of
vowels for grammatical purposes was a legacy of the Proto Indo-European,
and it could be seen in modern forms such as rise, rose, risen; write,
wrote, written; and drive, drove, driven. The change of tense
in these verbs is shown by changes of
vowels in a series, with the consonantal framework in each form remaining the
same. Only primary verbs, that too those which denote simple actions, not those
derived from the forms of other words, have originally lent themselves to be classes
as strong verbs.
Weak verbs, a distinctive contribution
of the primitive Germanic, according to Grimm, are those which show their tense
not by vowel gradation but by adding a suffix (d or t) to their end, as in love,
loved, loved ox walk; walked, walked. These verbs do not change their
root-vowel in conjugation, and they are secondary or derived in the sense that
they
37
denote
actions derived from other words (for example, to love derived from the
noun love).
Vowel-gradation remained a well-marked phenomenon
in Old English, serving as a principal means of expressing distinctions of
time} Even though it has gradually become a relic of the past, in modern
English^we have now some of the best examples of the Ablaut-series; (i, a, u)
as could be seen in sing, sang, sung; drink, drank, drunk; ring, rang, rung;
swim, swam, swum; begin, began, begun and so on. Again, it is possible to
see several of the modern verbs as having been originally rooted in the (i, a,
u) conjugational behaviour. Examples are rin (ran, run); swil {swell), swal,
swul, etc.
Notwithstanding, the distinction between
strong and weak verbs no longer holds good, and in several cases it has become
blurred. We hold, for good reasons, that the Modern English verbs buy and
dig were strong verbs but historically they are weak. Again, today, the
strong verbs present a decayed order, and there has been a gradual but steady
tendency to get the strong verbs merge into the ranks of the weak verbs which
vastly outnumber the former. With all this said, the strong verb conjugation is
one of the sources of the richness, complexity and variety of the Germanic
languages of which English is a member.
3. The Teutonic Accent
It is another Teutonic characteristic of
far-reaching historical significance. In the parent Indo-European, the accent
was free and variable; it could be on different syllables of the same word
depending upon context and meaning. But the Germanic languages developed a
tendency to fix the stress of a word on its root syllable or as
38
near to its beginning as possible. The result of this
tendency was that the syllables at the end of the word tended to be weakened
and blurred in utterance and ultimately lost. This led to the gradual reduction
and loss of inflections in the Germanic languages, which is a marked
characteristics of the English language./That today English is an analytical
language with a minimum of inflectional ending (plural, gender, past tense,
possessive, derivative nouns, verbs, etc.) is largely due to the Teutonic
accent.
We could profitably conclude this section with the words of
Barber (1964: 116)
These, th >n are some of the main
developments in Proto-Germanic : simplification of the inflexional system of
Proto Indo-European; the introduction of the weak declension of the adjective;
the introduction of the weak verbs; the great consonant change known as Grimm's
Law, and the smaller change known as Verner's Law; the change from
predominantly pitch to predominatly stress accent; the fixing of the accent on
the first syllable of the word; and of course a host of lesser changes, both in
grammar and in pronunciation.
43
3. LANDMARKS IN THE HISTORY OF
ENGLISH & PHILOLOGY AND
LITERATURE
ABSTRACT
1. (A. The
Three Phases in the History of English : Old English (A.D. 450 - 1150) Middle
English (1150 - 1500) Modern English (1500 - Present day)
B. The
Characteristics of Old English
The
invasion of Britain by Angles. Saxons and Jutes
Anglo-Saxon (Old English)
The
dialects of Old English (Northumbrian, Mercian, West Saxon and Kentish)
The
dominant position of West Saxon and its becoming the literary standard
The Characteristics of Old English
C. The
Characteristics of Middle English
The
Conquest of England by William, the Duke of Normandy
The influence of French on English
44
English becoming heterogeneous
The
dialects of Middle English (Northern, East Midland, West Midland, and Southern)
East
Midland dialect becoming the standard -the factors contributing to it.
The grammatical changes D. The Characteristics of Modern English
The Renaissance
and the Reformation
Their
impact on the language
The Standard English. II. Philology and Literature
The
historical relationship between the two
I. A. The Three Phases in the History of
English
As far as the English language is
concerned. It has an unbroken history of about fifteen hundred years, extending
from the fifth century to the present. Historians of this 4anguage distinguish
three main stages in its growth and development. The first stage is the Old
English (or the Anglo-Saxon) period, spanning over nearly seven hundred years
from A.D. 450 to A.D. 1150. The second is called the Middle English period
extending from 1150 to 1500. And the third phase from 1500 onwards is called
the Modern English period. These dates are based on A. C. Baugh's A History
of Che English Language (1959 : 59). C.L. Wrenn goes in for slightly
different points of time basing himself on certain
45
other
landmarks in the history of the English language. His dates are :
Old English - the close of the
seventh
century to
1100
Middle
English - 1100 to 1450 Modern English -
1450 to the present
These dates do not mean that the English
language underwent a total change and attained a new form from a particular
date. We must not, for example, assume that English from A.D. 1150 or 1500 was
strikingly different from what it was a few years earlier. These points of
division only indicate certain historically significant causal factors that
have contributed to a particular linguistic change and development. Thus, the
beginning of the history of English could be traced to the invasion of Britain
by the Germanic tribes - Angles, Saxons and Jutes - about the year A.D. 449.
(Or, we could fix it at A.D. 600 when the Angles and Saxons had succeeded in
entrenching themselves and implanting their language in Britain). Again, the
justification for 1150 as the beginning of the Middle English period stems from
the consolidation of the Morman French king William the Conqueror in England
and the beginning of the change of the basic character of English due to the
overbearing impact of Norman French. And by A.D. 1500, the impact of the
Renaissance was profoundly felt on the English soil, affecting both the
language and the general intellectual climate.
The Old English period is described as the
period of full inflecctions; the Middle English period as the period of
levelled inflections; and the Modem English period as the period of lost
inflections/We shall in the following pages, briefly substantiate these
characterizations.
46 B. The Characteristics of Old English
About A.D. 449, Britain witnessed an event of far-I reaching
historical significance, when the Germanic (also known as Teutonic) tribes -
Angles, Saxons and Jutes -§ invaded the country in large numbers. The original
inhabitants of the country who spoke a form of the Celtic tongue, unable to
withstand the superior might of the invaders, gradually withdrew themselves
into the hills ofl Wales, Cornwall and Scotland. These three powerful races of
invaders came to entrench themselves in different parts of the country and
there arose a number of small kingdoms; and there existed several dialects, the
important among them! being Northumbrian. Mercian, West Saxon and Kentish. But!
only one of them, the language of the Saxons of the West! Saxon kingdom, came
to be recognized as the literary! standard for the whole country, thanks to the
unification ofl Britain under the West-Saxon kings. Nearly all of Old English!
literature is in this dialect, with even the literatures in other I dialects
having been recopied into this tongue. Naturally, it has become the basis of
Old English grammars and! dictionaries. However, it is an Anglian (Mercian)
dialect,! not the West-Saxon, which is the direct ancestor of modern! literary
English.
(The characteristics of Old English in
brief are :
1.
It
was a homogeneous, Anglo-Saxon language, almosl
pure with only a small amount of Latin influence!
followed by some from Scandinavian, on thel
vocabulary of the written language.
pure with only a small amount of Latin influence!
followed by some from Scandinavian, on thel
vocabulary of the written language.
2.
Gnlike
Modern English, Old English was largely
phonetic in its spelling. That is, there was a ot.e-to-
one correspondence between the spelling of a word!
phonetic in its spelling. That is, there was a ot.e-to-
one correspondence between the spelling of a word!
47
and its pronunciation. In Old English we do not come across
what are now called silent sounds (as in words like come, stone, calm, etc.)
3.
The
Anglo-Saxon vocabulary comprised about 20,000
words as against over half a million words in Modern
English. Nevertheless, the great English writers, down
the centuries have demonstrated a marked tendency
to adapt words from this corpus rather than go in for
borrowed words.
words as against over half a million words in Modern
English. Nevertheless, the great English writers, down
the centuries have demonstrated a marked tendency
to adapt words from this corpus rather than go in for
borrowed words.
4.
A
unique feature of the Old English vocabulary was
its capacity for derivation and word-formation, its
tendency to use its own materials and resources rather
than go in for borrowing from foreign languages.
its capacity for derivation and word-formation, its
tendency to use its own materials and resources rather
than go in for borrowing from foreign languages.
5.
Old
English had an arbitrarily fixed gender system: In
it, while nouns designating males are generally
masculine, and females feminine, those indicating
neuter objects are not always neuter.
it, while nouns designating males are generally
masculine, and females feminine, those indicating
neuter objects are not always neuter.
Examples :
Stone -
masculine moon - masculine
sun - feminine
Old English was characterized by an elaborate system of
inflections - the nouns had four case endings for singular and four for plural;
the adjectives declined (have case endings) for five cases and two numbers; The
personal pronoun had distinct forms for genders, Persons, cases and numbers;
the verb had three moods (indicative, subjunctive and imperative), two numbers
and three persons.
These
traits contributed to Old English beirB characterized as a language of full
inflections.
C. The Characteristics of Middle English
The Middle English period extends from A.D. 1150 to A.D.
1500. As we have referred to earlier in this lesson, the year 1150 marks a
significant landmark in the history of the English language, as much as the
political and social history of England. William the Duke of Normandy who
invaded England in 1066 had his political dominance consolidated on the English
soil by this date. Most of the important positions in the Court and the Church
passed into the hands of the Normans, and French became an almost exclusive
medium of the court, administration, church and thel aristocracy, with English
remaining the language of thfl masses. In course of time, however, there was
seerB increasing interaction and adjustment between the FrenclB and the native
Anglo-Saxons; there were intermarriages* and eventually these two peoples
amalgamated into one. I
Again, even though the Scandinavian
invasions ofl England occurred during the Old English period, their impact I on
the written language was felt only during the MiddleB English period.
These two events - the Norman Conquest
and thel Scandinavian invasions brought about sweeping changes I in the
languages of the Anglo-Saxons as well as theirl social structure. We shall, for
our purpose here, deal with I the changes that characterized the language.
These changes I are extensive, momentous, fundamental and far-reaching I in the
history of the English language. They, in I outline, are :
49
1. The Middle English period witnessed a
variety of dialects, more divergent and more numerous than those of the
Anglo-Saxon. The principal ones are Northern, East Midland, West Midland, and
Southern.
As was the case with the West Saxon
during the Old English period, the East Midland dialect came to attain to the
position of a kind of 'standard' during the Middle English period. Several
factors contributed to this : First, it was spoken in and around London, the
heart of English social, political, commercial, legal and ecclesiastical life.
Secondly, there were the two universities, Oxford and Cambridge, in this
region. Thirdly, London's very heterogeneous population, drawn from all over
the country, developed a kind of mixed dialect of the educated and commercial
classes. Fourthly, the East Midland District was the largest and the most populous
of the major dialect areas. Fifthly, it was employed by Chaucer and a number of
prominent writers of the day. And finally, by the close of the Middle English
period Caxton printed his earliest books in this dialect, setting thereby a
seal upon it as [he English language.
2- The Middle English grammar was marked
by a great reduction in the inflectional system of Old English, resulting in an
increased use of prepositions and periphrases. This weakening and loss of
inflections was largely due to (i) the Teutonic tendency of fixing the accent
on the first or the root syllable, the unstressed syllables at the end of the
word becoming weakened and
50
lost, (ii) in the areas of mixed population, the!
inflections were a source of confusion, since the! Scandinavian and English had
similar roots butl different endings and (iii) the French scribes who I were
not versed in the numerous inflectional! forms of the Anglo-Saxon speech copied
the! manuscripts phonetically according to the! French conventions.
3.
This
period also witnessed depletion of the ranks I
of strong verbs and a steadily growing body of
weak verbs.
of strong verbs and a steadily growing body of
weak verbs.
4.
In
the language of this period is seen a transition I
from the largely unmixed vocabulary of the
preceding era to the fully heterogenous one of
the succeeding Modern English period.
from the largely unmixed vocabulary of the
preceding era to the fully heterogenous one of
the succeeding Modern English period.
5.
The
Norman French conventions greatly j
informed and modified Old English spelling and j
pronunciation.
informed and modified Old English spelling and j
pronunciation.
6.
The
English literature was exposed to the I
continental movements and trends of literary
expression, due largely to its contact with
French.
continental movements and trends of literary
expression, due largely to its contact with
French.
D. Modern English
Modern English runs from about 1500 to the present j day.
We can, for the sake of convenience, divide this period ' into Early Modern
English (1500-1700), and Later Modern English (1700 - to the present). The
Early Modern English period was characterized by the following :
51
i There had been a conscious interest in
and attempts at cultivating English, and improving it in various ways -
particularly enlarging its vocabulary and regulating its spelling.
2.
This
period witnessed the defeat of Latin and the final
establishment of English as the sole literary medium
in England.
establishment of English as the sole literary medium
in England.
3.
Notwithstanding,
the Renaissance (the intellectual
awakening of Europe) marked a rediscovery of the
classics, a revival of classical scholarship, and the
consequent borrowing of Latin terms in a very large
number.
awakening of Europe) marked a rediscovery of the
classics, a revival of classical scholarship, and the
consequent borrowing of Latin terms in a very large
number.
4.
We
attain in this period to something in the nature of
a standard, something that is recognizably modern in
the language. In the writings of Shakespeare and his
contemporaries, we find the existence of a standard
literary language free from dialectal variations.
a standard, something that is recognizably modern in
the language. In the writings of Shakespeare and his
contemporaries, we find the existence of a standard
literary language free from dialectal variations.
5.
A
series of changes in pronunciation particularly the
Great Vowel Shift [i: -» al; e: —> i: ; o: -> ou ; o: -> u: ;
etc.], brought the pronunciation closer to a language
as we hear now.
Great Vowel Shift [i: -» al; e: —> i: ; o: -> ou ; o: -> u: ;
etc.], brought the pronunciation closer to a language
as we hear now.
&• The advent of printing and the efforts of the spelling
reformers changed written English to a form that offers little difficulty to
the modern reader.
' ■ By the end of the seventeenth century,
the modern grammatical system came to be adopted. From being a complex, highly
inflected language, English became a language of lost inflections with few
traces of the old inflectional system.
52
8.
Fixation
of word-order followed the loss of inflections, I
and there witnessed increased use of prepositions and |
periphrases.
and there witnessed increased use of prepositions and |
periphrases.
9.
The
Protestant Reformation, and the various English
translations of the Bible as well as the contribution of j
Shakespeare immensely enriched the vocabularly of j
English.
translations of the Bible as well as the contribution of j
Shakespeare immensely enriched the vocabularly of j
English.
10.
Dr
Johnson's Dictionary almost 'fixed' the English
spelling for posterity by reducing the chaotic spelling
system to something like an order. Besides, we owe
to him the notion of 'good English', for it was he who
distinguished between 'reputable' and 'low' words.
spelling for posterity by reducing the chaotic spelling
system to something like an order. Besides, we owe
to him the notion of 'good English', for it was he who
distinguished between 'reputable' and 'low' words.
11.
The
public schools since the time of Arnold of Rugby
dominating the education of the English gentry, the
"everyday speech in the families of Southern English,
whose menfolk have been educated at the great public
schools", came to be accepted as Standard English.
dominating the education of the English gentry, the
"everyday speech in the families of Southern English,
whose menfolk have been educated at the great public
schools", came to be accepted as Standard English.
12.
The
eighteenth century, in tune with the prevailing
environment of classicism, tried to reduce the
language to rule and set up a standard of correct usage.
Consequently, the grammarians and the
lexicographers took upon themselves the task of
systematizing the facts of English grammar and
drawing up rules by which questions of correct usage
could be decided.
environment of classicism, tried to reduce the
language to rule and set up a standard of correct usage.
Consequently, the grammarians and the
lexicographers took upon themselves the task of
systematizing the facts of English grammar and
drawing up rules by which questions of correct usage
could be decided.
13.
In
the nineteenth century, marked as it had been by
Empire-building and great commercial development,
the vocabulary of English was considerably enlarged
through foreign contacts and through borrowings of
learned and technical terms from the classical tongues.
Empire-building and great commercial development,
the vocabulary of English was considerably enlarged
through foreign contacts and through borrowings of
learned and technical terms from the classical tongues.
53
14 And today, in spite of there being
varieties of English as ued in the United States, Canada, Australia, etc.,
"In formal writing, the essential structure of the language is practically
the same throughout the English-speaking world; the differences in vocabulary
are perceptible but not enormous; and the differences in spelling negligible.
There is, therefore, a standard literary language which is very much the same
throughout the English speaking community..."
II
Philology and
Literature
Etymologically, the term 'philology'
denoted 'love of logos', and logos implied thought and language. Naturally
then, philology had been concerned with the study of literature in its totality
: the thematic materials of a work of art and its structural elements including
the linguistic matters. For, as seen by the classical and medieval writers, the
understanding of a text comprised an understanding of its language as well as
its 'content'. And today, perhaps due to the increasing tendency towards
specialization, the meaning of 'philology' has been narrowed down to cover only
the more technical study of language as distinct from literature. Mow, it is an
'old-fashioned' technical word designating "the study of the nature and
especially development of words or language".
Obviously, this distinction between
'language and
literature' is misleading and harmful as
much as artificial.
hese two disciplines are not only complementary to each
other, but they work in inseparable
unity in the study of a
text. The aesthetic satisfaction of a
text hinges primarily on
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our knowledge of the meaning of its author's language. Especially
when it comes to the study of older literature such as the works of Shakespeare
and Milton, an understanding of the history of the language, and of the
meanings words and idioms have had at different periods is essential. Take for
example Olivia's referring to Malvolio as a fellow:
Let this fellow be looked to
In Elizabethan English to refer to anyone
as 'fellow' was to place him on a level with oneself. In the eighteenth century
we find this word undergoing a sad declension, as seen in Pope's line :
Worth makes the man and want of it the
fellow.
Again, Shakespeare uses the word Bethlehem
as an alternative for madman, but this meaning is now obsolete and has
given place to that of noise and confusion. Or, take the following lines from
Chaucer's Prologue :
If a
presl be foul, on whom we trusle, No wonder is a lewed man to ruste
Here lewed (lewd) primarily means
'unlearned' or 'ignorant'. Its gradual depreciation over the years is too
well-known. There are innumerable words and idiomatic expressions of this kind
whose meanings, as seen in the writings of different periods, cannot be
properly understood without the help of the historical study of language. It is
also that our pleasure of studying poetry is enhanced when we come to see the
varied nuances of words, and acquire a feeling for the imaginative qualities in
the use of words. The study of the meanings of words called Semantics and
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Semasiology
must therefore be of particular importance to he student of literature.
It is clear then that
compartmentalization of philology and literature would take us to distortion of
meaning of a tford in the given text, misreading of the contextual relevance
and finally taking a false view of the great masters of English literature such
as Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden and many others.
Philology also reminds the student that
language is by its nature fluid, never static, a living organism which can be
fully appreciated in relation to thought and feeling as well as form.
Questions
I.
Answer the
following in about 500 words :
Describe the characteristic features of Old English,
Middle English and Modern English.
or
Substantiate the characterization of Old English as a
language of full inflections, Middle English as a language of levelled
inflections and Modern English as a language of lost inflections.
Answer: Sections B, C and D, leaving out the features not
directly relevant.
"• Answer the following in about 200 words
each :
1- Discuss
the characteristics of Old English/Middle Engiish/Modern English.
2 comments:
hi sir, i never knew you had a blog!! or i would have been a frequent visitor :)
hi sir, i never knew you had a blog!! or i would have been a frequent visitor :)
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