Scandinavian third person

merijn · Post by **merijn** » Tue Apr 06, 2010 8:39 am

If I am informed correctly the ending for 3rd person singular on a verb in proto-germanic was -D. How did that become -r in North-Germanic languages? Is it a result of a regular sound change? Or influence from the 2nd person singular? And is the Modern English -s related to it? I know that middle English had -eth but could it be that some dialects had -s under viking influence (and then later North-Germanic had s =>r), and that that ending ultimately "won" in modern times? Or is it a completely independent change?

Before you ask I tried Google but I couldn't find any reliable information.

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Tue Apr 06, 2010 9:34 am

IIRC Nordic 3rd person -r is the result of levelling and not of a regular sound change.

merijn · Post by **merijn** » Wed Apr 07, 2010 7:05 am

Did this leveling take place before or after the s or z changed into r? And if it took place before the change could it be aided by the fact that D and s (or z) are sounds that are pretty close?

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Wed Apr 07, 2010 8:09 am

If you read German, this is what I could find online (Anmerkung 4). I don't know whether there is more information than that online, or something more up-to-date than Noreen's grammar. So it looks like the replacement happened after the development /*z/ -> Norse "R". If the replacement of thorn by /r/ would be a sound change, one would expect that development also in the 2nd pl., but Noreen doesn't mention such forms.

merijn · Post by **merijn** » Wed Apr 14, 2010 8:32 am

Thank you! This was the information I was looking for. They do say that this change may have happened earlier if my German is correct (wenn nicht frueher), so it could have happened before the change *z>R.
Anyway my other question remains, why did in English the change -eth>s occur?

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Wed Apr 14, 2010 11:01 am

merijn wrote:Thank you! This was the information I was looking for. They do say that this change may have happened earlier if my German is correct (wenn nicht frueher), so it could have happened before the change *z>R.

The "wenn nicht früher" refers to the Viking time, meaning that it happened in the 8th or 9th century or before. Whether this means it could have happened before *z>R, I don't know.

Nortaneous · Post by **Nortaneous** » Wed Apr 14, 2010 12:09 pm

merijn wrote:Anyway my other question remains, why did in English the change -eth>s occur?

I think both forms were used in different dialects and the -s form eventually took over. Not sure though.

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Wed Apr 14, 2010 10:55 pm

Nortaneous wrote:
merijn wrote:Anyway my other question remains, why did in English the change -eth>s occur?
I think both forms were used in different dialects and the -s form eventually took over. Not sure though.

That is correct, but it doesn't answer the question - the dialects where it started didn't have a general development OE /T/ > /s/, so we still need an explanation why this development happened in those dialects.
Merijn, if I understand you correctly, you want to check whether the English change can be linked to the Norse change?

merijn · Post by **merijn** » Tue Apr 20, 2010 10:23 am

hwhatting wrote:
Merijn, if I understand you correctly, you want to check whether the English change can be linked to the Norse change?

Yes.

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Wed Apr 21, 2010 2:38 am

merijn wrote:
hwhatting wrote:
Merijn, if I understand you correctly, you want to check whether the English change can be linked to the Norse change?
Yes.

Tell us if you find out - I at least would be interested to know.

Skomakar'n · Post by **Skomakar'n** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 10:48 am

So would I.
I, too, have thought of a connection between the varieties, and how *-z could form English -s, German/Dutch -t and Northern -r.

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 11:05 am

Skomakar'n wrote:So would I.
I, too, have thought of a connection between the varieties, and how *-z could form English -s, German/Dutch -t and Northern -r.

German & Dutch -t have nothing to do with Proto-Germanic *-z / Norse -r. Like older English -th, they go directly back to Proto-Germanic *-T / -D from PIE *-ti.

Skomakar'n · Post by **Skomakar'n** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 11:54 am

hwhatting wrote:
Skomakar'n wrote:So would I.
I, too, have thought of a connection between the varieties, and how *-z could form English -s, German/Dutch -t and Northern -r.
German & Dutch -t have nothing to do with Proto-Germanic *-z / Norse -r. Like older English -th, they go directly back to Proto-Germanic *-T / -D from PIE *-ti.

Yeah. I know that know.
I just wanted to state that I have thought of this too.

I actually didn't know of -ð in Old Norse third person before reading this, though, but I did know of the variation es of er.

Aszev · Post by **Aszev** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 12:12 pm

Skomakar'n wrote:I actually didn't know of -ð in Old Norse third person before reading this, though

There was no such thing.

Skomakar'n · Post by **Skomakar'n** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 12:19 pm

Aszev wrote:
Skomakar'n wrote:I actually didn't know of -ð in Old Norse third person before reading this, though
There was no such thing.

Maybe my memory fails me.
I am basing this off of something I think I read last month.

hwhatting · Post by **hwhatting** » Tue Apr 27, 2010 10:52 am

Skomakar'n wrote:
Aszev wrote:
Skomakar'n wrote:I actually didn't know of -ð in Old Norse third person before reading this, though
There was no such thing.
Maybe my memory fails me.
I am basing this off of something I think I read last month.

You're not totally off, Noreen posits -ð for Proto-Norse. But the only (to me) clear attestations he adduces from Runic and later Norse show -Þ.

Skomakar'n · Post by **Skomakar'n** » Tue Apr 27, 2010 11:27 am

hwhatting wrote:
Skomakar'n wrote:
Aszev wrote:
Skomakar'n wrote:I actually didn't know of -ð in Old Norse third person before reading this, though
There was no such thing.
Maybe my memory fails me.
I am basing this off of something I think I read last month.
You're not totally off, Noreen posits -ð for Proto-Norse. But the only (to me) clear attestations he adduces from Runic and later Norse show -Þ.

Those are often allophones, though, and generally, the orthography doesn't permit the usage of <þ> in final position, so I'd prefer <ð>, even if they actually had *[θ] there.

That's just me being stubborn, though.