2.6.4. Root-Stems

Nouns with root-stems differed in their morphological structure from all other types: they had never had any stem-building suffix, so the endings were added to the root. Nouns of this type represent the oldest layer of words, going back to the period when there was no division of nouns into stems. Root-stems included nouns of all three genders. In the dative case singular and in the nominative and accusative plural there are traces of mutation.

man(n) (man), fōt (foot), bōc (book), ʒōs (goose)

	Masculine gender				Feminine gender
case	Sg	Pl	Sg	Pl	Sg	Pl	Sg	Pl
Nom.	man(n)	men(n)	fōt	fēt	bōc	bēc	ʒōs	ʒēs
Gen.	man(n)es	manna	fōtes	fōta	bōce	bōca	ʒōse	ʒōsa
Dat.	men(n)	mannum	fēt	fōtum	bēc	bōcum	ʒēs	ʒōsum
Acc.	man(n)	men(n)	fōt	fēt	bōc	bēc	ʒōs	ʒēs

Note. The original form of the dative singular and nominative and accusative plural must have contained the sound [i] that caused mutation: dat.sg. fēt < Gc* fōti; nom., acc. pl. fēt < Gc *fōtis. Cf. R мышь – мыши.

When the endings were later lost the only difference between the singular and the plural was the root vowel, and this difference has continued in ModE irregular plural forms, e.g.

OE tōþ – tēþ tooth – teeth

OE ʒōs - ʒēs goose – geese

OE man(n) – men(n) man – men

OE mūs – mӯs mouse – mice

OE lūs – lӯs louse – lice

A few nouns that belonged to that stem, such as bōc-bēc (book-books), hnute –hnyte (nut-nuts) conformed to the general pattern of forming the plural by suffixing (e) s: books, nuts.

2.6.5. Pronouns

There were several classes of pronouns in OE: personal, demonstrative, interrogative and indefinite. Relative, possessive and reflexive pronouns were in the process of developing and were not always separated from the four main classes.

2.6.5.1. Personal Pronouns

OE personal pronouns had three persons. It is expedient to treat the pronouns of the 1-st and 2-nd persons separately because of their peculiarities: (1) they were the only words in OE which distinguished 3 numbers; singular, dual and plural, (2) unlike the pronouns of the 3-rd person they had no gender distinctions, (3) they had more suppletive forms than other pronouns.

Originally personal pronouns, like nouns, distinguished between four cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative but soon they began to lose some of their case distinctions: the forms of the dative case of the pronouns of the 1-st and the 2-nd persons were often used instead of the accusative case and finally the two cases fused.

	1-st person			2-nd person
Case	Sg number	Pl number	Dual number	Sg number	Pl number	Dual number
Nom.	ic (I)	wē (we)	wit (we two)	þū (thou)	ʒē (ye)	ʒit (you two)
Gen.	mīn (mine)	ūre (our)	uncer	þīn (thine)	ēower (your)	incer
Dat.	mē (me)	ūs (us)	unc	þē (thee)	ēow (you)	inc
Acc.	mē (me)	ūs (us)	unc	þē (thee)	ēow (you)	inc

Except for the loss of the dual number, these pronouns have been preserved in ModE (with the regular sound changes), though the forms thou, thine, thee, and ye are archaic.

The personal pronouns of the 3-rd person are demonstrative by origin. Though the initial h of English he is thought to have been an innovation of the Anglo-Frisian group (Cf. G er, R он) it is interesting to correlate he and here that and there.

The personal pronouns of the 3-rd person had three genders: masculine, feminine and neuter and one form for all the genders in the plural.

	Sg number			Pl number
Case	Masculine gender	Neuter gender	Feminine gender	All three genders
Nom.	hē (he)	hit (it)	hēo	hīe (hī, hӯ)
Gen.	his (his)	his	hire (her)	hiera (hyra)
Dat.	him (him)	him	hire (her)	him
Acc.	hine	hit (it)	hīe	hīe (hī, hӯ)

Only five OE forms have developed into NE. The rest have been lost or replaced. The genitive case of personal pronouns could be used as an attribute (like a possessive pronoun): sunu mīn (my son), his fæder (his father).