From OE to modern times the English vocabulary has changed greatly. The changes were as follows: 1) losses of words; 2) losses of the meanings; 3) replacements; 4) additions.

Losses were due to the external history events: with the changing conditions of life & the obsolence of many medieval concepts & customs.

● Daneƺeld (the tax paid to the Scandinavians);

● werƺeld (a fine paid by the murderer to the family of the murdered man);

● The specific OE poetic vocabulary went out use together with the genre of OE poetry.

Even if the words survived some their meaning became obsolete.

● ƺift (OE) = price of the wife

sellan (OE) = give, sell

talu = number, series, story

From 80 to 85% of OE words were replaced by other words of the same or similar meaning. It was the result of the co-existence & rivalry of synonyms.

● OE clipian > ME callen > NE call

niman > taken > take

ea river

bord table

Sometimes the replacement occured only in the meaning.

● OE dream = joy

OE cniht = boy, servant > ME knight

clerec = clergyman > ME clerk = student > NE secretary in the office.

Additions embraced a great number of vocabulary changes.

New words were created to name new things, ideas, qualities, customs.

● ME citee (town with a cathedral)

duke, duchesse, prynce (new ranks) NE potato, nylon

The development of new meanings in the existing words extended the vocabulary & led to the growth of ‘polysemy & homonymy.

● OE cræft (science, skill, strength) > ME, NE (group of skilled workers giuld vessel).

The souces of new words can be divided into internal & external.

Internal ways included word – formation & semantic changes creating new words & their meanings.

External forces influenced English far more than other languages. While the OE vocabulary was almost Germanic, the Md E vocabulary had only 1/3 Germanic words; the other two thirds came from foreign souces, mainly Romance. But the native element in English is significant because when loan words were assimilated by the languages they could produce new words through word-formation or develop new meanings on British soil. These new items were specifically English words not borrowings.

● French: “passer” > Eng. root “pass” ⇨ new words: pass by, pass away, pass through phraseological units: pass the ball, pass a remark.

The linguistic situation in ME was favourable for strong foreing influence: first Scandinavian then French. Later English freely borrowed from classical & modern sources.

Scandinavian influence on the vocabulary (ME)

Today a lot of place names in the northen & eastern areas has the Scandinavian componens.

● thorp (village); toft (piece of land); byr (O. Sc. village), ness (cape), beck (rivulet) (ручей)

● Troutbeck, Grimsby, Inverness, Brimtoft.

In the beginning Scandinavian loan-words were dialectically limited but due to the mixture they penetrated into other parts of the language space, into London English & the national language. The total number of Scandinavian borrowings in English is estimated about 900 words & about 700 words belong to Standard English. Semantic sphere of the most number of loan – words pertain to everyday life, some of them deal with military & legal matters reflecting the relations of the people during the Danish raids.

● OE cnif > knight

laƺu law

utlaƺu outlaw

feolaƺa fellow

husbonda (хозяин дома) husband

Close contacts between these two languages can be proved by the fact of borrowing some form-words which are rarely borrowed from a foreign language.

● OE hie > they

hē > he

hēo > she

It’s difficult to distinguish Scandinavian loans from the native English words. The only criteria can be some phonetic features. (1) The Scandinavian cluster sound [sk] was palatalized in to [ƒ] in ME but didn’t change in loan – words.

● sky, skill, skull, skirt

(2) Other critia are the sounds [k] [g] before front vavels, which in native words became [tƒ], [dƺ] but not in all cases.

● kid (O. Sc.) chin (OE) < cin

French borrowings

They were brought to England by the Norman conquest. There appeared so called Anglo-Norman language which died out two hundred years later having influenced upon English greatly.

Firstly French words were restricted to some spheres of English the speech of the aristocracy & educated people. Finally French loan-words spread throughout the languages space & became an integral of the English vocabulary being used not only in oral communication but also in translation of French books.

Semantic spheres of the French borrowings are as follows:

(1) the govenment and administration

● assembly, authority, court, chacellor, people, power, etc.

(2) the feudal system

● baron, noble, countess, prinse, duke, etc.

(3) military terms

● aid, army, navy, company, soldier, etc.

(4) law and jurisdiction

● accuse, court, crime, damage, money, marriage, etc.

(5) church & religion

● abbey, altar, grace, pray, vice, etc.

(6) house & architecture

● arch, castle, palace, cellar, pillar, column, etc.

(7) entertainment

● cards, dance, chase, pleasure, sport, etc.

(8) forms of address

● sir, madam, mister, mistress, etc.

(9) manes of meals & dishes

● dinner, supper

The names of meals are aften French but the names of animal are English.

● beff, veal, mutton, pork, bakon (French)

ox, cow, calf, sheep, swine (English)

(10) town trades

● butcher, carpenter, draper, grour, painter, etc.

There were a lot of words that can’t be reffered to a definite semantic sphere.

● advice, honest, satisfy, remember, sure, travel, etc.

The influence of French wasn’t limited to the borrowing of words & roots but affixes as well.

Assimilation of French loan-words was more difficult than of Scandinavian ones because French belonged to a different linguistic group. They contained many new sounds such as nasalized vowels, [y] & soft palatalized consonants. As a rule the words were adapted to the norms of English pronunciation [y] > [u]

● O Fr. vertu ME vertu NE virtue

[l’] [n’] ⇨ [l], [n]

● faillir [l’] – O Fr. > fall [l]

The nasalized vowels lost their nasal character

● O Fr. Chambre > ME chaumbre > NE chamber

The stress in loan – words was shifted according to the English rules due to the rhythmic or recessive tendency.

The most important aspect of assimilation was the participation of borrowed words and their components in word formation.

● L ME verrai – ly NE very

un – fruit – ful NE unfruitfull

gentil – man > gentleman

Borrowings from contemporary languages in NE

In the late 15^th & in the 17^th century the influx of French words continued & reached new peaks. French remained the international language of diplomacy for several hundred years. French borrowings of this period mainly pertain to diplomatic relations, social life, art & fashions.

● attache, communique, dossier, ball, cafe, hotel, picnic, restarant, genre, balley, essay & so on.

Most of them have not been completely assimilated & have retained their spelling or position of the stress to the present day.

In addition to the three main source – Greek, Latin & French in the NE period there appeared a lot of borrowings from other languages. The main contributors to the vocabulary were Italian, Dutch, Spanish, German, Portuguese & Russian. A number of words were borrowed from Persian, Chinese, Hungarian, Turkish, Malayan, Polynesian, the native languages of India & America.

Italian (14^th century) (mainly through French): studio, million, pedestal, gallery, alarm, cartridge, piano, violin, balcony, design.

Spanisch (16^th – 17 th century): cargo, embargo, barricade, banana, potato, tomato, tobacco, etc,

Dutch (15^th – 16^th century): pack, scour, stripe, cruise, deck, dock, skipper, freight, etc.

German (18^th – 19^th century): cobalt, zink, nickel, dynamics, kindergarten, plunder, poodle, etc.

Russian element (16^th – 19^th century): beluga, copeck, collective, farm, wall newspaper, sputnik, cosmonaut, Five-Year-Plan.

Borrowings from classical languages

The Latin language was used in OE & ME in religions spheres, documents & in texts of scientific & phylosophical character. It was partly replaced by official Anglo-Norman. The most Latin borrowings of ME reffered to the translations of religions texts, e.g. the Bible. A new wave of borrowings from Latin & Greek appeared in the age of Renaissance.

Many classical words were borrowed into ENE through French. Many new ideas encountered in classical works retained the Latin terms. So all classical borrowings can be divided into (1) genuine Latin & Greek words & (2) those which were based on Latin & Greek roots.

A lot of borrowings from these classical languages appeared in the works of Thomas More (16^th century), Shakespeare’s works, John Wyclif’s translations, scientific works of that time.

One of the effect of the classical borrowings was the further increase of the number of synonyms.

● English French Latin

reckin count compute

kingly royal regal

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