Re: Wuz

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham"
<richard.wordingham@...> wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...>
> wrote:
> > At 7:00:29 AM on Thursday, July 15, 2004, tgpedersen wrote:
> >
> > > *va- > *vo- > *o- is common in Danish. Besides (w)ooze, do
> > > you know of other similar examples in English (esp. the
> > > *wo- > *o- part)?
>
> > Only in dialect. I don't know the geographical details, but
> > Scots had <oo>, <oull> 'wool' in the 16th century.
>
> Onions gives just five examples:
>
> 1. _ooze_ 'exudation, exude' < OE _wo:s_ 'juice, sap'.
>
> 2. _ooze_ 'mud, slime' < OE _wa:se_
>
> 3. _ood_ dialect form of _wood_
>
> 4. _ool_ dialect form of _wool_

Swedish _ull_. This is considered as a case of North Germanic loss of
w- before /u/ and /o/. One might see it as a loan from Old Norse?

>
> 5. _ooman_ dialect form of _woman_.
>

>I suppose _two_ < OE
> twa: doesn't count - sporadic loss of /w/ in environment C_O: has
> been going for a long time - e.g. _c(w)o:m_ 'came' OE, _sword_,

_so_

> < OE _swa:_, occasional /kO:t/ for <quart>.
>

Danish _to_ (cf. Swedish _två_) is considered as an application
of /va/ > /vo/ > /o:/. _kom_ "came" (for Old Danish _kvam_) is a
paradigmatic regularisaton (_kwam_ "came" in Dutch is the only
remaining form of the verb with /kw-/).

Torsten