Purpose subject.

Purpose of this subject is a systematic study of the language, development from the earliest time to the present day. this subject is connected with lex-gy, grammar, phonetics, history of the country. if we regard the language in particular period of time it’s synchronic approach if compare in different periods it’s diachronic.

The source of inf. About Germanic Tribes.

It is based on testimonies of Greek and Roman writers. Pythias lived in the 4^th century before Christ. He sailed from his native town through the straits of Gibraltar, then along the West cost of Gaul? Along the channel, he even maybe reached the Baltic. Only a few fragments from Pythias work have been preserved by the Greek geographer Strabol and part of it by the Roman writer Pliney the Elder. Next comes the roman general, statesmen and writer J. Ceaser. In his book “Commentaries of the war in Gaul” Ceaser gives a several chapters to the Germans lived in tribes, from is notes it follows that the Teutons were Normans. Besides about the Germanic tribes there are some more testimonies by “Historia Cornelious Tacitus”.

Prehistoric Celtic Britain:

1^st race- Paleolithic(stone age)no clothes/weapons of stone/

2^nd- Neolithic(polished stone age)raised crops,weapons,animals,clothes.

3^rd- bronze age

4^th- Iberians. They have populated the Br. Isles in 3000 Bc.They were a small dark-haired race who were civilized enough for that period. They were peaceful: their culture was very high for that period.

5^th- Celts have reached the Br. Isles in 700 Bc. It was the time of so called “great migration”. The are believed to have come in 3 waves and two large groups. The Celts were very war-like people, very moveable, great wanderers and great conquerors – a very strong tribe. They lived under the tribal system in clans. They spoke the Celtic tribal tongues, which are believed to have been the remote ancestors of some tongues on the Br. Isles now, for example, of Welsh. At the very end of the first millenium BC Julius Caesar got greatly interested in the Br. Isles which were independent then. He arranged two main rades there: they took place in 54-55 and 56 BC. A real occupation by the Romans began under the emperor Claudius in 43 AD. About 25000 legionaries were landed there, well trained and well equipped. They conquered the best part, the most Furtile parts and Claudius declared the Br. Isles to be a Roman Province. So they drove the native population (the Celts) further to the West and to the North (to Wales and to Scotland), to the mountainous part. The word “England” goes back to the old combination of two words – Anglo landa. The word “Britain” goes back to the name of one of the Celtic tribes: the most powerful and the most numerous of the Celtic tribes were the Britains, the Scotts and the Pickts. “Scotland” – the land of the Scotts.

Ancient Germanic tribes and their classification. Pliney the Elder

1. Vindili (Gaults and Burundians; eastern part of Germanic territory)

2. Ingveoni (North-western part of g. territory, the shore of the Northern Sea including what is called now Nederland).

3. Istkveoni (the Western part of G/T on the river Ryhn, among them were francs)

4. Germioni ( the South part of G/T, now it’s the southern German)

5. Pekvini or Bastarni ( they lived closed to the place, which is now called Ruminia)

6. Gellivioni (Scandinavia)

Subdivision of the Germanic languages.

The English language belongs to the Germanic languages and the G/L is the brunch of the Indo-European language family. First it was one language, and then ethnic and linguistic disintegration within the G/L put an end to original unity and there appeared 3 subgroups of G/L.

1. East-Germanic subgroup ( Gothic, Vandalic, Burgundian); all of them are dead.

2. North-Germanic subgroup ( Old-Norse, Old-Scandinavian). Later it became Norwegian, Danish and Swedish. There was Islatic and Faroesa. The linguists say that Faroesa was the language of Vikings.

3. West-Germanic tribes lived in the Ouder in the Albe. And then they spread up the Ruhn. They occupied many territories and they had many dialects: Anglian, Fresion, Saeson, English, German, Dutch, Jutish.

In spite of this subdivisions G/L made a distinct group within the Indo-European linguistic group because the had many features in common.

The First Consonant Shift.

Correspondence between I/E and Germanic consonants may be grouped under 3 categories: 1) I/E voiceless stops: p, t, k correspond to Germanic voiceless fricatives f, đ, h 2) I/E voiced stops b, d, g correspond to the G voiceless stops p, t, k 3) I/E aspirated stops bh, dh, gh correspond to the G voiced stops without aspiration b, d, g.

An essential feature of GLs separating them from other IE languages is their consonantal system, which developed from the original IE system. These regular correspondences between the consonants of GLs and IELs were discovered and systemized by Расмус Раск and Jacob Grimm. Called Grimm’s Law, or the 1^stconsonant shift.

IE	Germ	Examples
/ p /	/ f /	Latplěnus –Engfull
/ t /	/ þ /	Grtres –Engthree
/ k /	/ h /	Latocto –Gothahtau
/ b /	/ p /	RU болото – Eng pool
/ d /	/ t /	Latduo –Gothtwan
/ g /	/ k /	RUиго –Engyoke
/ b^h /	/ b /	sanser bhratar – Eng brother
/ d^h /	/ d /	sanser madhu – OE medu
/ g^h /	/ g /	Lat hostiss - RU гость – DE gast

Instead of an expected voiceless stop in some word would appear a voiced stop. These was explained by Karl Verner.

Verner’s La w.

Not all correspondence stated in Grimm’s law are equal. In some cases in G/L we find consonants which do not fit into Grimm’s Low (pater - fadar). Explanation of this exception was offered by the Danish scholar Karl Verner. His low adds fallowing addition to the Grimm’s low. If an I/E voiceless stop was preceded by an unstressed vowel, the voiceless fricatives which developed from it an accordance with Grimm’s low, became voiced, and later this voiced fricative became a voiced stop

Unstressed vowel+voiceless stop  voiceless fricative  voiced fricative voiced stop /t/  /þ/  /ð/  /d/ In the Gr word patěr the voiceless stop /t/ was preceded by an unstressed root vowel. Under these conditions the voiceless fricative /þ/ which had developed from it in accordance with the 1^st consonant shift became a voiced fricative /ð/ and finally it developed into the voiced stop /d/, i.e. Lat patěr OE fæder /k/  /h/  /ɣ/ /g/ Besides that there is one more change under Verner’s low (s-z) In some cases s  r . In West-Germanic and N-G languages according to the linguistic phenomenon rhotasism (подчеркнутое произношение r) s  r.

Earliest Germanic Alphabet.

Through the history of their development GLs used 3 diff-nt alphabets, which partly succeeded each other in time.

1. Runic alphabet.

Letters – runes. It is supposed that the runic ABC is based on the Latin or some other Italic alphabet, close to Latin in writing. But the material and technique of writing used by Germanic tribes used in their early times caused considerable modifications of Latin in the Runic ABC.

It is supposes that the Runic ABC originated in the 2-3 AD on the banks of the Rhine or the Danuble were Germanic tribes could come into contact with Roman culture

Since the Runic ABC was used by diff-nt Germanic tribes (Goths, A-Saxons, Scandinavians) it was adapted to the needs of each of these languages. New letters were added into in, some of the original fell out

2. Ulphila

Ulphila’s Gothic ABC originated in the 4^th century. It is based on the Greek ABC but has some Latin and Runic letters. This is the ABC of Ulphila’s gothic translation of the Bible. But in modern editions of Goth text a Latin transcription of the Gothic ABC is used.

3. Latin alphabet

It began to be used when a new technique of writing was introduced. That is spreading of color, paint on a surface instead of cutting and engraving the letters.

Introduction of the Latin ABC was stimulated by the spread of Christianity, as Christian religious texts were written in Latin.

The Latin ABC was also modified to the peculiar needs of the separate GLs.

Gradation or ablaut in G/L.

Vowel gradations was inherited by GLs from ancient IE family of languages. There are distinguished 2 kinds of gradation: qualitative & quantative

4. Qualitative gradation. Different vowels appear alternatively in various forms of one and the same word.

In IE /e/ and /o/

In GL /i/ and /a/ // везу – воз, беру – сбор// Goth hilpan – halp (preterit sg)// OE bindan – bånd (preterit sg)