Table Of ContentOld Northumbrian Verbal Morphosyntax
and the (Northern) Subject Rule
NOWELE Supplement Series (NSS)
NOWELE Supplement Series is a book series associated with the journal NOWELE:
North-Western European Language Evolution. The supplement series is devoted not only
to the study of the history and prehistory of a locally determined group of languages,
but also to the study of purely theoretical questions concerning historical language
development. The series contains publications dealing with all aspects of the (pre-)
histories of – and with intra- and extra-linguistic factors contributing to change and
variation within – Icelandic, Faroese, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Frisian, Dutch,
German, English, Gothic and the Early Runic language. The series will publish
monographs and edited volumes.
For an overview of all books published in this series, please see
http://benjamins.com/catalog/nss
Editors
Erik W. Hansen Hans Frede Nielsen
University of University of Southern Denmark
Southern Denmark
Advisory Editors
John Ole Askedal Hans Fix Sara M. Pons-Sanz
University of Oslo Universität Greifswald University of Westminster,
London
Michael Barnes Kurt Gustav Goblirsch
University College London University of South Carolina Jürg R. Schwyter
Rolf H. Bremmer, Jr. Alexandra Holsting University of Lausanne
Leiden University University of Southern Denmark
Volkert F. Faltings Henrik Galberg Jacobsen
Universität Flensburg University of Southern Denmark
Volume 25
Old Northumbrian Verbal Morphosyntax and the (Northern) Subject Rule
by Marcelle Cole
Old Northumbrian
Verbal Morphosyntax and the
(Northern) Subject Rule
Marcelle Cole
Leiden University
John Benjamins Publishing Company
Amsterdam / Philadelphia
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
8
the American National Standard for Information Sciences – Permanence
of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cole, Marcelle.
Old Northumbrian verbal morphosyntax and the (Northern) subject rule.
p. cm. (NOWELE Supplement Series, issn 0900-8675 ; v. 25)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. English language--Old English, ca. 450-1100--Dialects--England--Northumbria
(Kingdom) 2. English language--England--Northumbria (Region)--Syntax.
3. English language--Social aspects--England--Northumberland.
4. Northumbria (England : Region)--Languages. 5. Northumberland (England)--
Languages. 6. Northumbria (Kingdom) I. Title.
PE1999.N67.C65 2014
429’.56--dc23 2014011871
isbn 978 90 272 4071 2 (Hb ; alk. paper)
isbn 978 90 272 6991 1 (Eb)
© 2014 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any
other means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. · P.O. Box 36224 · 1020 me Amsterdam · The Netherlands
John Benjamins North America · P.O. Box 27519 · Philadelphia pa 19118-0519 · usa
For my parents
Table of contents
Acknowledgements xi
List of figures xiii
List of tables xv
Abbreviations xvii
chapter 1
Introduction 1
chapter 2
Old Northumbrian 7
2.1 Old Northumbrian textual sources 7
2.2 The authorship of the Lindisfarne glosses 8
2.2.1 Palaeographical evidence 11
2.2.2 Linguistic evidence 12
2.3 The language of the Lindisfarne glosses 15
2.4 The sociolinguistic situation 19
2.5 Present tense markings in Old Northumbrian 22
2.6 Accounting for the origin of the -s ending 26
2.6.1 Phonological and phonetic factors 27
2.6.2 Analogical levelling 30
2.6.3 Scandinavian influence 32
2.7 Summary 33
chapter 3
A diachronic overview of the (Northern) Subject Rule 35
3.1 The Subject Rule in the North of England and Scotland 35
3.1.1 Northern Middle English and Middle Scots 35
3.1.2 Northern Early Modern English to Present-Day English 43
3.2 The Subject Rule outside the North 48
3.2.1 Early Modern London English 48
3.2.2 Southwestern varieties of English 54
3.2.3 Irish English 61
viii Old Northumbrian Verbal Morphosyntax and the (Northern) Subject Rule
3.3 The Subject Rule beyond the British Isles 62
3.3.1 North American varieties 63
3.3.2 African American Vernacular English 66
3.4 The Subject Rule and the verb be 68
3.4.1 Processes of was/were-levelling in Present-Day English 72
3.4.2 Levelling and subject effects in other Germanic languages 80
3.5 Summary 85
chapter 4
A variationist study of -s/-ð present-tense markings
in Late Old Northumbrian 87
4.1 Data and methodology 87
4.1.1 Methodological preliminaries 87
4.1.2 Data collection and coding 88
4.1.3 Explanatory variables 93
4.1.4 Methods 95
4.2 Grammatical person, subject type, number, person
and adjacency effects 99
4.2.1 Overview of Old English subject types 101
A. Personal pronouns 101
B. Demonstrative pronouns 102
C. Indefinite pronouns 102
D. NP + relative clause 102
E. Null subjects 103
4.2.2 Grammatical person effects 104
4.2.3 Subject type, person and number effects 108
4.2.4 The distribution of subject effects in Lindisfarne
and its implications 112
4.2.5 Adjacency and word order effects 116
4.2.6 Summary 122
4.3 Phonological conditioning factors 122
4.3.1 Following phonological environment 123
4.3.2 Inflectional vowel weakening and syncope 123
4.3.3 Preceding phonological environment 124
4.3.3.1 Palatalisation and assibilation in Old English 125
4.3.3.2 Stem ending 129
4.3.4 Results for phonological environment 130
4.3.5 Summary 133
Table of contents ix
4.4 Priming effects 134
4.4.1 Morphosyntactic priming 134
4.4.1.1 Results and analysis 135
4.4.2 Priming effect of Latin verbal inflection 136
4.4.2.1 Results and analysis 137
4.4.3 Summary 138
4.5 Lexical conditioning and lexical frequency effects 139
4.5.1 Measuring token frequency 142
4.5.2 Results 145
4.5.2.1 Word specific effects 145
4.5.2.2 Frequency effects 150
4.5.3 Summary 154
4.6 Discussion 155
chapter 5
Reduced verbal morphology in late Old Northumbrian 159
5.1 Reduced inflection in Old English dialects 159
5.2 Reduced present tense inflection in the Lindisfarne gloss 163
5.2.1 Present-indicative interrogative forms 163
5.2.2 Imperative forms 165
5.2.3 Present indicative forms 169
5.2.4 Summary 173
5.3 The historical source of present-indicative -e/-Ø 174
5.3.1 Subjunctive verbal morphology 174
5.3.1.1 Conditional clauses 176
5.3.1.2 Purpose clauses 177
5.3.1.3 Temporal clauses 178
5.3.1.4 Summary 179
5.3.2 Preterite-present verbal morphology 180
5.3.3 Preterite verbal morphology 183
5.4 Summary 192
chapter 6
Explaining subject and adjacency effects 195
6.1 Internal change 195
6.1.1 Benskin (2011) 196
6.1.2 Börjars & Chapman (1998) 199
6.1.3 De Haas (2011) 202
6.1.4 Pietsch (2005) 203
6.1.5 Discussion 205
