The Thesaurus of Old English Essay Sample

1. General features
The lasting vocabulary of Old English ( OE ) is comparatively little. The Thesaurus of Old English ( TOE ) . with which you will be working. contains about 34. 000 different word signifiers. whereas a modern desk lexicon might incorporate 80. 000. Some of these words have more than one significance. i. e. they are polysemantic: Toe contains merely over 50. 000 significances wholly. An illustration of multiple significance or lexical ambiguity is OE electrocardiogram. pronounced in the same manner as its Modern English ( Mod. E. ) descendent ‘edge’ . In add-on to intending ‘edge’ . it besides means ‘blade’ . the portion of an object that has a crisp border. and ‘sword’ . an object distinguished by holding a crisp border or blade. This is an illustration of metonymy. the designation of an object by one of its properties. as when the Prime Minister is referred to as ‘No. 10’ . ‘Edge’ in Mod. E. besides has a metaphorical sense. where an abstract thought is conveyed by mentioning to something concrete. as in ‘her voice had an border to it’ . Much of the vocabulary of Mod. E. derives from OE. This applies peculiarly to our core vocabulary: common words in mundane usage for cardinal constructs.

Examples include the natural universe ( Earth. sea. air current. fire. H2O ; Sun. Moon. star ) ; people ( adult male. adult female. kid. male parent. female parent. brother. girl ) ; the organic structure ( manus. arm. cubitus. finger. pes. nose. oral cavity ) ; and other basic constructs such as nutrient. drink ; heaven. snake pit ; friend. neighbour ; love. good. evil ; hot. cold ; after. over. under. However. non all words which look alike needfully mention to the same thing – such deceptive words are frequently called false friends. An illustration brace is OE beor / Mod. E. beer. Although both refer to alcoholic drinks. the nature of the drink is rather different. The illustrations above are all typical of OE words in being one or two syllables in length. Where there are two syllables. the emphasis is on the first.

Initial emphasis is a characteristic characteristic of the Germanic languages as a group and remains the most common type of word construction in Mod. E. We have besides retained from OE many of the ways of doing new words. but at the same clip English has borrowed legion words from other linguistic communications. notably Gallic and Latin. Thousands of Gallic words were brought into English after the Norman Conquest of 1066. which ended the regulation of the Anglo-Saxon male monarchs and introduced considerable societal alteration. New words occur particularly in Fieldss where Norman influence was strongest. such as Law. Literature and Fashion. These loan words from other linguistic communications frequently exhibit different emphasis forms from the basic Germanic vocabulary. as with anatomy and cagoule from French. armada and murphy from Spanish. kamikaze from Nipponese. bete noire from Greek and flamingo from Portuguese. 2. Compounds

New words are frequently formed in Mod. E. by uniting two bing words to organize a compound. as in aircraft. hatchback. expressway and waterproof. Such words are more specific in their significances than the words they combine. This pattern is even more characteristic of OE. where a high proportion of the vocabulary. peculiarly the vocabulary of poesy. comprises compounds. For case. OE s? ‘sea’ combines with OE Mann ‘man’ to give a compound s?mann ‘sailor’ . The same first component combines with OE deor ‘animal’ to give s?deor ‘sea creature’ . It besides combines with OE rima ‘rim’ to give s?rima ‘coast’ . and with OE faru ‘journey’ to give s?faru ‘voyage’ . You can frequently work out what a word means by interrupting it down into its component parts. 2. 1 Kennings

Sometimes a small more idea is required to understand a compound. as with s?mearh. a combination of s? with mearh ‘horse’ ( the ascendant of Mod. E. female horse ) . Here the 2nd component refers non to a life animate being but to the Equus caballus as a manner of conveyance. so the compound as a whole translates as ‘ship’ . Compounds like s?mearh which are to be understood metaphorically instead than literally are common in OE poesy. and are known as ‘kennings’ . Other illustrations are nihthelm ‘darkness’ . a combination of niht ‘night’ with helm ‘helmet’ ; banhus ‘body’ . from ban ‘bone’ and hus ‘house’ ; and swanrad ‘sea’ . from swan ‘swan’ and rad ‘road’ . 3. Prefixs and postfixs

As in Mod. E. . new OE words could be formed from bing 1s with the add-on of prefixes or postfixs. Prefixs tend to impact significance. for case by change by reversaling or escalating the application of the original word ( e. g. excusable. inexcusable ; sound. unsound ) . Suffixs are used to alter one type of word into another: for case. to make a noun from a verb ( e. g. sing. vocalist ) . or an adverb from an adjectival ( e. g. sad. unhappily ) . Common OE prefixes include:

mis- defective ( d?d ‘deed’ . misd?d ‘misdeed’ ; faran ‘to go’ . misfaran ‘to go astray’ ) ofer- surplus ( ?t ‘eating’ . ofer?t ‘gluttony’ ; fyllan ‘to fill’ . oferfyllan ‘to fill to overflowing’ ) un- negative ( cu? ‘known’ . uncu? ‘unknown’ ; riht ‘right’ . unriht ‘wrong’ ) However. prefixes sometimes have small if any consequence. For case. giefan and forgiefan both average ‘to give’ . Many verbs can happen with or without the prefix ge- ; niman and geniman both average ‘to take’ . This is sometimes summarized in lexicons and grammars of OE as ( Ge ) niman. and the Ge is ignored when the words are alphabetized. Common suffixes. many of which are still used in Mod. E. . aid to place types of word. Common adjectival postfixs include:

-ful ( cearu ‘care. sorrow’ . cearful ‘sorrowful’ )
-ig ( blod ‘blood’ . blodig ‘bloody’ )
-isc ( cild ‘child’ . cildisc ‘childish’ )
-leas ( hlaford ‘lord’ . hlafordleas ‘lordless’ )
-lic ( wundor ‘wonder. miracle’ . wundorlic ‘wonderful. miraculous’ ) Many adverbs terminal in:
-e ( heard ‘hard. fierce’ . hearde ‘fiercely’ )
-lice ( hr?dlic ‘quick’ . hr?dlice ‘quickly’ )
Abstract nouns frequently end in:
-dom ( wis ‘wise’ . wisdom ‘wisdom’ )
-had ( cild ‘child’ . cildhad ‘childhood’ )
-nes ( beorht ‘bright’ . beorhtnes ‘brightness’ )
-scipe ( freond ‘friend’ . freondscipe ‘friendship’ ) Other common Mod. E. postfixs. such as those in words like devotedness. fortitude ; generous. generousness ; societal. sociable. sociableness. were adopted subsequently from Gallic or Latin. 4. Metathesis

The heterotaxy of sounds within a word is known as ‘metathesis’ . and it affects a little but typical group of Mod. E. words derived from OE. Examples include beorht ‘bright’ . brid ‘young bird’ . g?rs ‘grass’ . ?erscold ‘threshold’ . ?ritig ‘thirty’ . ?urh ‘through’ and w?ps ‘wasp’ . 5. Survival

Many of the lasting OE words occur really seldom. or merely in specialized contexts. These are marked in TOE by four superior flags. g. o. p. Q. – g indicates words which occur merely as interlingual renditions of foreign words. normally Latin. Such interlingual renditions are sometimes written in a manuscript and sometimes occur in bilingual wordlists or glossaries. – o indicates words which occur really seldom. frequently merely one time. – p indicates words which occur merely in poesy.

– Q indicates words about whose really existence we are dubious. possibly because they occur in a manuscript which is hard to read or has been altered in some manner. Searchs can be made in TOE on the g. O and P flags. If a big figure of words in a field have g or o flags. so either it is a field with a batch of specialised vocabulary or one that was non much written approximately. A batch of P flags. as in subdivisions such as Warfare or Emotions. indicate that the topic normally occurs in poesy. Poetry was an of import literary signifier in Anglo-saxon civilization. Its construction was based on half lines linked by alliterating sounds. which is one ground why it was advantageous for poets to hold groups of equivalent word get downing with different letters. Some of the editorial treatments of hard words in TOE are recorded in the View Comments subdivision at the pes of the screen. Where we reconstruct an Old English word that has ne’er really been found. it is preceded by an asterisk * . There are no such words in the database. but they may happen in treatments.