Re: s-stems in Slavic and Germanic

From: Andrew Jarrette
Message: 62877
Date: 2009-02-06

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> ---
> > OK I get what you're saying, but remember OHG extended neuter
> > plurals in <-ir> (e.g. <hu:sir>) long before the Hansa and its
> > period of widespread trade. I doubt that it developed primarily as
> > a reaction to foreigners and the rabble.
>
> That's where I have to draw on conclusions that seem to be entirely my
> own only at least for the time being: Proto-Germanic, which was one of
> many para-Germanic dialects spread through what then became Germania
> with the campaign of Ariovistus in the mid first century BCE from
> Southern Poland and Silesia. According to what I read I believe in
> some article by Kuhn, but now I can't find it, in the earliest sources
> the rabble in Northern Germania were called laeti (that would be the
> people of the NWBlock area, of the Harpstedt-Nienburg culture
> http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpstedt-Nienburger_Gruppe
> those of the south, the defeated Celts or para-Celts were called
> *skalk- vel sim. But as you know, words in Germanic in p- are
> substrate, many of those words are concentrated in especially
> Northwestern Germany and Holland, but most of those words exist in
> Standard, ie. Southern German too (but with pf-). That means that
> whoever brought Germanic speech to Southern Germany must have included
> a large contingent of original NWB-speakers, which means the social
> factors which eradicated the 'practical' s-plural were active there
too.

You talk as though you've discussed this topic before, and probably
you have, but I only know about this issue, as you have discussed it,
as it regards Caxton's observation about the "wyf" who called eggs
"eyren". So I don't really know exactly what you're talking about
when you say "the social factors which eradicated the 'practical'
s-plural". In High German-speaking areas there were no s-plurals to
speak of; in Low German and Dutch-speaking areas, I don't really get
your idea of a shibboleth. I don't really believe that foreigners
would have that much influence on native grammar. And if it was due
to creolization: since in this area Low German, Dutch, and English
were all of common origin, wouldn't they at least originally have the
<-s> plural in the same nouns, and the <-en> plural in the same nouns?
I.e. it wouldn't be a favorable environment for foreign influence to
cause a change, since the foreigners' language was so similar?

This is all weak reasoning, it's becuase I find the concept of
creolization and shibboleth causing the loss of <-s> plurals difficult
to understand. The process is not clear to me from what you have said.

>
> Another thing: all the creolized Germanic languages, English, Dutch,
> Low German, 'Scandinavian' have an 'Einheitsplural', ie verbs are not
> inflected for person in the plural, instead the original 3rd pl. (in
> -n�) is substituted, which might be a feature of the substrate (it is
> extremely hard for adult learners of a language to learn logically
> meaningless distictions in a new language, ie. for English speakers to
> learn noun gender, for Scandinavians to learn to inflect verbs for
> person and number), which i suspect came about for the same reason as
> why the French substitute 'on + 3g.' for 'nous + 1pl.': to save a
> syllable and get rid of a deviant form (so I suspect that substrate
> language, like the Romance languages, was not initial-stressed).
> Now, in the PIE thematic verb inflection, the thematic vowel was
>
> -o-
> -e-
> -e-
>
> -o-
> -e-
> -o-
>
> Since -e- > -i- causes umlaut in Germanic, the umlaut pattern of
> strong verbs in the 'high' languages (those least affected by
> creolization) should be
>
> no umlaut
> umlaut
> umlaut
>
> no umlaut
> umlaut
> no umlaut
>
> but it is
>
> no umlaut
> umlaut
> umlaut
>
> no umlaut
> no umlaut
> no umlaut
>
> which means the substrate 'Einheitsplural' has been present in the
> circumstances where the formation of the 'high' verb took place too,
> eradicating (probably by shibboleth hypercorrection) the 2pl umlaut.
>
>
>
>
> > I would put it in much
> > the same category as the extension of the plural <-en> to
> > originally strong feminines as well as weak feminines, i.e. a
> > natural internal change.
>
> German still has a sizable number of strong feminines AFAIK.
> I would put that process in the same creolization bin, since it makes
> learning the language easier for a foreigner.

What about natives? The loss of gender makes English a lot easier to
learn for its natives, but I'm sure it did not occur for foreigners'
benefit. I think you're greatly overmagnifying the importance of
foreigners for the development of a language. Just my opinion.

>
> > OK, I read it. I actually wish Low German had survived as a
> > national language, if only because I always thought Old Saxon was
> > the prettiest (on paper) Germanic language, while remaining
> > conservative, and it "deserves" a modern representative with full
> > literary development (weird reasoning, I know -- perhaps I'll end
> > my responses to this thread with that).
>
> You see around Hamburg etc bumper stickers with 'wi snakt platt' "we
> speak Low German" (note the Eastern Platt Einheitsplural in -t)
>
> On the German third state TV channel which I had on cable for a while
> they had once a month an hour in Platt, with invited guests etc before
> an audience. It was my impression that it was more like a code switch,
> High German with Low German phonology, back-translated on the fly,
> with few separate words. If you are going for the weird experience,
> learn Dutch. The further you get into the language, the culture and
> the literature, the stranger it gets, unless the natives manage to
> throw you off the track insisting they are very international etc.
> Check out these Scottish girls' Dutch lessons and in particular the
> hate mail they get in the comments from some Dutch speakers:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGzwZH03QLE
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZf07Stnh-E
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfEuhAlUgkc
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceemw1LkCH0
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_zHHm5T24Q
>
>
> Torsten
>


Where and how do you find stuff like that? Or more importantly, WHY
do you find stuff like that (LOL)? Those girls' videos are the
definition of "silly". By the way, at least one, if not both, of the
girls is Dutch, not Scottish (the one with narrower eyes and darker hair).

I actually started to learn Dutch some years ago, but lost interest as
there was little opportunity to speak it here. But I wasn't looking
for a weird experience. I just think it's weird that I find it sad
that Old Saxon doesn't have a modern national representative (and one
that is as conservative and thoroughly developed as modern High
German). I fell in love with Old Saxon at the age of 11, in the
library (after having discovered, but not exactly fallen in love with,
Old English -- it's not pretty on paper like Old Saxon, nor as
conservative especially phonetically).


Andrew