Assignment 2 The history of the verb ‘to be’. What it wӕs and what it ys! The verb ‘to be’ is the most commonly used verb in the English Language.Its general meaning is to ‘come into existence, to happen or to occur’ (O.E.D. 2012), and it has many properties: A highly irregular or anomalous verb that carries overt inflections according to person, number and tense – this form of inflection is known as suppletion. It can be used as a lexical or auxiliary verb. Used as an intensive verb, requiring a single complement, ‘to be’ is known as the ‘copula’. The verb is also used in existential sentences, where ‘there’ and ‘it’ are used as dummy subject to express a notion of existence. (Quirk & Greenbaum, 1979:418). The verb has different forms that share semantic meaning but with little phonological similarity. The verb has a very interesting history, dating back thousands of years. This essay will analyse the historical origins of the various verb forms, and will cover all the important aspects of development from pre-Germanic to Middle English; with examples of verb forms in contemporary texts, and comparison of distinguishing features with P.D.E. regional variations. According to Lass (1992:139), be is ‘a collection of semantically related paradigms of various historical origins’; these origins can be traced back to derivatives of Proto-Indo-European, the parent language of most major languages thought to have been in use before 3000B.C. This language was then subsequently split into smaller groups of languages including Indo-European (from which Germanic languages are derived), Indo-Iranian (includes Sanskrit), Greek and Latin.(Crystal, 2010:306). The similarity of common origin is demonstrated below: Old English Gothic Latin Greek Sanskrit eom (am) im sum eimi asmi art (art) is es ei asi is (is) ist est esti asti sindon (are) sijum sumus esmen smas sindon (are) sijup estis este stha sindon (are) sind sunt eisi santi Historical forms of verb ‘to be’ (Baugh and Cable, 2002:20). One of the many changes that took place from Indo-European to Germanic was the loss of distinction of tense and aspect, with the exception of present and preterit (past) tenses. All other forms, such as existed in Latin, Greek and Sanskrit are realised in Germanic languages by the use of verb phrases. The link between these languages was proposed by the philologist Sir William Jones in 1787. By identifying Sanskrit’s full system of declensions and conjugations, Jones was able to compare groups of cognates between the old languages (ibid). Another change was the sound shift of consonants in Indo-European that were gradually modified under the principle of Grimm’s Law (Pyles and Algeo,1992:87), named after a philologist who identified a system of consonantal differences between Germanic and other Indo-European languages. A further shift, which more directly affected the verb ‘to be’, was known as Verner’s Law, which will be discussed later in the essay. Thus, Old English is left with three stems of this major verb: s-stem group (am, art, is) corresponds to Latin sum, es, est. b-stem group corresponding with Latin fio ‘make’, and Sanskrit bhu ‘dwell’ past stem (wesan – originally this was a class V strong verb) ‘was and were’ corresponding with Sanskrit vasati ‘he dwells’ (Lass,op.cit: 139) These are shown paradigmatically as follows: Present s-stem b-stem indicative subjunctive indicative subjunctive imperative Sing.1 eam sie beo beo Sing.2 eart sie bist beo beo Sing.3 is sie bi beo Plural sindon/sint/(e)aron* sien beo beon beo *This stem form was of Scandinavian origin, aron was the O.E. form in the North of England, the West Saxon plural was syndon (similar to German sind).The Scandinavian form spread during Middle English, eventually being realised as are in P.D.E. Past indicative subjunctive Sing.1 waes waer-e Sing.2 waer-e waer-e Sing.3 waes waer-e Plural waer-on waer-on (ibid:140) The alternation in the past (preterit) forms of /s/ and /r/ stem final consonant was due to the occurrence known as Verner’s Law. This was a Germanic sound change which took place between 2000BC and 500BC, in which voiceless fricatives became voiced after unstressed syllables in voiced environments (Trudgill, 2008:343). Stress in the past plural forms was on the second syllable, as in wesan and its derivative, the Sanskrit vasati. So, under the principles of Verner’s Law the sound change was formed whereby /s/~/z/. (Hock and Joseph, 1996:121). A further sound change, that affected North and West Germanic languages, was the shift of /z/~/r/. This was known as rhotacism, and appeared in all Germanic languages except Gothic (Pyles and Algeo, 1992:91); this in turn led to the s ~ r alternation that was still retained in O.E., although within the verb paradigm the r-forms were in the majority. This alternation still persists in P.D.E. with r-forms still predominant, however many regional dialects of English favour the s-forms: most notably the non-standard colonial Englishes of Ireland, Scots and far North of England (Trudgill, op.cit:346). The period from about 1100 to 1500 was known as Middle English. This was a period of great dialectal variation. The O.E. written standard of West Saxon fell into disuse, and Latin and French now performed important functions in the language of the land. In spite of this, English remained the main spoken language for the majority of the population. There was much more written material in Middle English (M.E), and this material reflected the impact of historical changes, dialect variation and contact with Scandinavian as well as French and Latin. In addition, there were changes to verb forms in M.E., although these changes affected strong and weak verb forms primarily. Anomalous verbs, like ‘to be’ survived from O.E. but were dismantled and spread over regional varieties. These forms are shown below: North West-Midland East-Midland South Kentish Pres.Ind. Sg.1 am, be am am am, aem, em em Sg.2 ert, es, bes art art art, best Sg.3 es, bes is,ys,beop, bup is, ys is, beop, bep byep Pl. ar(e), er(e), es, bes arn ar(e)n,beop beyn,ben,ben (sinden) beop,bep, bup byep Subj. Sg. be be be (si) beo, bo (sie) by Pl. be ben ben beon,bon (sien) Imp. Sg.2 be be be beo, bo Pl.2 bes bep bep beop Infinitive be ben ben, be beon,bon,bo bi, bie(n) Participle beande(e) being Pret.ind. Sg.1 was, wes was was was wes Sg.2 was, wes wore were, wast weore Sg.3 was, wes was was was Pl. wer,war(e), wes woren were(n) weore, wӕre Sub. Sg war(e) wore were were Pl. war(e) woren were(n) were Past. Part. ben ben (y-)be(n) i-be Forms of the verb ‘to be(n)’ in Middle English. Adapted from Mosse (1952:84) In comparison to the O.E. forms discussed earlier, the verb underwent relatively minor changes: The s-stem remained fairly generalised in the present indicative; however, there was some alternation with the Scandinavian are(n) and the native be(n) forms in the present plural, with the are(n) form more prevalent in the North and Midlands, however be(n) plural is ‘much more commoner throughout the period than the Northern are(n) (Lass,1992:141). The second person singular form art was still in use across all regions with the exception of Kentish. The b-stem remained for present subjunctive. The present participle shows regional variation between the Northern beand(e)and the East Midland being, the latter now retained in P.D.E. Sie-forms are now diminishing, particularly in the North and Midlands, although some forms are retained in regional dialects of East Midlands and the South. The /s/~/r/ alternation of the wes-form still persisted, with the predominance of r-forms throughout the paradigm, however the loss of the subjunctive in M.E. reduced the use of this form, together with the development of a form for 2nd person singular,wast, prior to the loss of 2nd person singular completely (Trudgill,2008:344). An interesting grammatical feature in the North of England is es and bes in 2nd and 3rd person singular and plural forms. These non-standard verbal agreements probably correspond with what is now known in P.D.E. as the Northern Subject Rule,which itself developed in the Middle English period (Pietsch, 2005: 12; Bailey et al, 1989: 290). Under this rule, which developed with lexical verbs then spread to the verb ‘to be’, verbal agreement varied according to whether a pronoun subject or full noun phrase subject was being used. Pietsch recorded this phenomenon as ‘the forms of BE after pronouns are used just as in Standard English, while in all environments where –s is licensed with other verbs, analogical is and was can be found too’ (op.cit) It seems that this pattern was beginning to appear in the Northern dialects of Middle English. In P.D.E. the pattern is somewhat different, in that some varieties of English do not show concord with pronoun and verb. An example – I is from North Yorkshire, he were from South-West Yorkshire. (op.cit.). Literary work from the Middle English period show some of the regional differences in respective texts. The following example is an extract from the Cursor Mundi, a Christian allegory retelling the story of Creation to Doomsday. Originally written in the North of England at the end of the 13th century, it was translated in the South of England several years later. The verb ‘to be’ is highlighted within the text. Northern Text Southern Text ‘Suilk in herth es fundun nan, 77 ‘Sucheopere in erpe is founden none, 77 For scho es modur and maiden, For she is modir & mayden alone, Modur and maiden neuer pe lesse, Modir & mayden neuer pe les, Forpi of hir tok Crist his flesse, perfore of hir toke ihesu flesshe, Qua truly loues pis lemman, Who pat loupe trewely pis lemmon, Pis es pe loue bes neuer gan.’ 82 He shal haue loue pat neuer is woon’. 82 (adapted from Freeborn, 1998: 152) From this incongruous mix of local dialects, toward the end of the 14th century a written language emerged that went on to become the standard in both speech and writing, although an established standard was not recognised for a few more centuries. This was the East Midland dialect, and in particular the dialect of its constituent, London. There were a number of reasons for this: it occupied a central position between extreme differences in regional dialects in the North and South, and London was also the centre of economy and parliamentary affairs. Until 1362, French had been spoken in Parliament and the law courts, and was the language taught in schools. After this date, English emerged as the language of the nation. Even within the London dialect, however, there were still significant differences. The dialect of the educated was used by Chaucer in his prose; he was a court poet, and so his language reflected the speech of the court (Baugh and Cable, 2002:193). In his works, however, he often used a mix of East Midland, Southern and Kentish varieties: ‘And peyned hir to counterfete chere Of court, and been estatlich of manere, And to ben holden digne of reverence. But for to speken of hir conscience’ (Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, c.1387 lines 40-43, quoted in Baugh and Cable, op.cit:419) The Midland –n infinitive is found in been and ben, whereas counterfete does not have this ending – a characteristic of Southern dialects. Chaucer was also able to exploit dialectal differences in his portrayal of characters, as in The Reeve’s Tale. The students speak in a Northern dialect, in contrast to the Miller’s Southern form. Northern Southern ‘I is as ille a millere as ar ye’ ‘For jalous folk ben perilous everemo’ (l.127) (l.41) (Adapted from Crystal, 2004: 166). In 1476, an important development in the language was made possible by the introduction of Caxton’s Printing Press. This greatly expedited the forming of a written standard in England. Caxton however, was inconsistent with spelling and grammatical features, but eventually chose to use the London dialect as a basis for his translations and spellings. This resulted in a recognisable difference between what was now becoming the ‘standard’, and what were regarded as ‘regional dialects’. The advent of printing was not the only process to fundamentally alter the quality and design of the language. Pronunciation was altered through a phenomenon known as the ‘Great Vowel Shift’. Under this shift, or series of shifts, that occurred sometime in the 15th century, all six long vowels were either raised or became diphthongs. This mainly affected English in the Midlands and South of England (Crystal, 1988:79), and marked a significant transition into Present Day English. The verb ‘to be’ was still relatively unsettled, even during the period known as Early Modern English from 1500. Shakespeare used several different forms of the verbs in his plays: the most noticeable was the use of the 2nd person singular present tense form art, and past tense forms wast and wert. Eventually these forms were lost from the verb paradigm, although some relic regional dialects may still use them in P.D.E. In spite of this, the verb has remained more or less unchanged since its formation of different forms from various roots. Through various linguistic and historical processes, new forms have been added, and old forms eradicated. It was, and still is, as Pyles and Algeo (1992: 126) maintain, ‘a badly mixed up-verb’! BIBLIOGRAPHY Bailey, G., Maynor, N. & Cukor-Avila, P. (1989) ‘Variation in subject-verb concord in Early Modern English’ Language Variation and Change.1 (3) pp.285-300. Baugh, A. & Cable, C. (2002) A History of The English Language. 5th ed. Oxon: Routledge. Beal, J. (2004) ‘English Dialects in the North of England: Morphology and syntax’ In: Kortmann, B. & Schneider, E. (eds.) A Handbook of Varieties of English II: Morphology and syntax. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. pp.114-141. Crystal, D. 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