Well, we don't normally converse in
recitative style, but there is something in what you're saying. Alliteration
means extra emphasis on the root syllable for semantic reasons, and the same
motivation underlies the Germanic principle of initial (actually, root-initial)
prominence. I doubt if alliterative poetry alone could be responsible for
the shift; rather, the shift and alliteration were two sides of the same coin --
or manifestations of the same preference. Areal influence exerted by
initially-stressed languages, such as Baltic Finnic, is often given as the
ultimate cause of the stress shift, though the tendency to pronounce the root
syllable as clearly as possible is also understandable on its own, and initial
stress is one of the world's most common patterns.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, July 31, 2001 12:10 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Germanic stress
I've noticed that those languages that use initial stress in
North Europe: Germanic, Baltic Finnic, Latvian, all have traditional poetry that
use alliteration. The obvious thought is that the causality here is from
language to poetry: In an initial-stress language alliteration is more natural
that end-rhyme. But what if it's the other way round. In a traditional society
poetry is the storehouse of thought. Suppose a substrate culture had
alliterating poetry, and the style of recital spread to everyday
language?