Medieval Dialectology 9783110892000, 9783110139518

Table of contents :
The phonetic phenomena connected with the strengthening and weakening of sonants in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects
Parasite consonants: A homographic clash
The nature of Old English dialect distributions, mainly as exhibited in charter boundaries
Geographical and linguistic distance in thirteenth-century Dutch
Copyist behavior: Historical linguistics and text filiation
Contractions of preposition and plural article without s (e. g. a + les > au) in Old French, a completely overlooked problem of paradigm formation with implications for the theory of language change
Slavonic Pomerania in the past: Its links with neighboring areas and its internal division
New methods in textual criticism: The case of the Charroi de Nîmes
“Sociolectalization” as a feature in different versions of medieval drama
Realizations of the definite article in dialectal English and how and when they originated
A hypothesis on the structure of macaronic business writing
Index of subjects
Index of languages and dialects
Index of names

Citation preview

Medieval Dialectology

W G DE

Trends in Linguistics Studies and Monographs 79

Editor

Werner Winter

Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York

Medieval Dialectology

Edited by Jacek Fisiak

Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York

1995

Mouton de Gruyter (formerly Mouton, The Hague) is a Division of Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin. © Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines of the ANSI to ensure permanence and durability.

Library of Congress

Cataloging-in-Publication-Data

Medieval dialectology / edited by Jacek Fisiak. p. cm. - (Trends in linguistics. Studies and monographs ; 79) Nine of the eleven papers were presented at a workshop on medieval dialectology held at the 10th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Amsterdam. Aug. 16, 1991. Includes bibliographical references and index. Contents: The phonetic phenomena connected with the strengthening and weakening of sonants in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects / Jerzy Duma - Parasite consonants : a homographic clash / Thera de Jong [etc.], ISBN 3-11-013951-0 1. Dialectology - Congresses. 2. Historical linguistics Congresses. I. Fisiak, Jacek. II. International Conference on Historical Linguistics (10th : 1991 : Amsterdam, Netherlands) III. Series. P367.M43 1994 417'.2-dc20 94-24163 CIP

Die Deutsche Bibliothek — Cataloging-in-Publication-Data Medieval dialectology I by Jacek Fisiak. — Berlin ; New York : Mouton de Gruyter, 1995 (Trends in linguistics : Studies and monographs ; 79) ISBN 3-11-013951-0 NE: Fisiak, Jacek [Hrsg.]; Trends in linguistics / Studies and monographs

© Copyright 1995 by Walter de Gruyter & Co., D-10785 Berlin All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Typesetting and printing: Arthur Collignon GmbH, Berlin. Binding: Lüderitz & Bauer, Berlin. Printed in Germany.

Preface

The present volume contains eleven papers, nine of which were presented at the workshop on medieval dialectology held at the 10th International Conference on Historical Linguistics in Amsterdam on August 16, 1991. The papers cover a wide range of issues concerning language variation in Old and Middle English, Old French, Middle High German, Middle Dutch, and Slavic languages. Some of the papers treat medieval dialects as a source of explanation for present-day phenomena (e.g., Duma and Viereck). One paper deals with a rather neglected form of language, i. e., macaronic business writing (Wright). Although the contributions included in this volume usually focus on one language, their implications are much broader and concern both the research methodology of historical dialectology as well as general historical linguistic issues (e. g., van Reenen). The workshop has proved, however, that to the detriment of the field there is little contact and almost no cooperation between linguists working on early dialects of particular languages. Often issues which are at the center of interest for, say, Romance scholars, are of marginal importance to other dialectologists. Furthermore, it seems that historical dialectology has attained a different degree of advancement and evolution in the study of particular languages and language groups/families. The Amsterdam workshop has undoubtedly demonstrated that there is a need for a close collaboration between dialectologists and has made its participants aware of the existence of certain solutions and methodological proposals previously unknown to them. It is hoped that the present volume will contribute to cross-fertilization in the field and thus to further progress in the study of language variation in medieval times, by collecting in one volume a number of new insights and research proposals coming from different quarters. As presented below they are open to testing and subsequent verification in future investigations. Washington, D. C., May 1992

Jacek Fisiak

Contents

Jerzy Duma The phonetic phenomena connected with the strengthening and weakening of sonants in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects

1

Thera de Jong Parasite consonants: A homographic clash

7

Peter R. Kitson The nature of Old English dialect distributions, mainly as exhibited in charter boundaries

43

Marijke Mooijaart Geographical and linguistic distance in thirteenth-century Dutch . . 137 Margot van Mulken Copyist behavior: Historical linguistics and text filiation

153

Pieter van Reenen Contractions of preposition and plural article without s (e. g. a + les > au) in Old French, a completely overlooked problem of paradigm formation with implications for the theory of language change 175 Ewa Rzetelska-Feleszko Slavonic Pomerania in the past: Its links with neighboring areas and its internal division 217 Lene Schosler New methods in textual criticism: The case of the Charroi de Nimes 225 Max Siller "Sociolectalization" as a feature in different versions of medieval drama

277

VIII

Contents

Wolfgang Viereck Realizations of the definite article in dialectal English and how and when they originated 295 Laura Wright A hypothesis on the structure of macaronic business writing

309

Index of subjects Index of languages and dialects Index of names

323 325 327

The phonetic phenomena connected with the strengthening and weakening of sonants in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects Jerzy Duma

The phenomena I am dealing within this paper concern stronger or weaker realization of the sonants r, I, n, m, and ν (w). They are connected with the general tendencies observable in the phonetic-phonemic development of the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects in question. To a varying extent they affect all other Slavic languages and dialects as well. Two contradictory tendencies can be established in the evolution of Slavic. The first, more recent of these leads to the extension of consonantal oppositions at the cost of the reduction of syllabic segments. The second tendency, more conservative, is towards maintaining and developing inherited vocalic oppositions while limiting consonantal differentiation. In this regard, there are certain differences between the eastern Bulgarian (and partly eastern Macedonian) dialects which exhibit to a certain extent the first of the above-mentioned tendencies, and the western Bulgarian and most of the Macedonian dialects showing the second type. However, this difference is not as great as, for example, that between Polish and Serbo-Croatian, which in such a classification would occupy the extreme positions. Such a generalized and very schematic view allows the process of weakening of the articulation of sonants to be seen as a manifestation of the former tendency—the "consonantal" one, while the process of strengthening of sonants is symptomatic of the vocalic tendency in the phonetic-phonemic development of a language. In the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects the phonetic tendencies mentioned above lead to a differentiated behavior of particular sonants depending on the degree of their inherent loudness, on their position within a word (initial, medial or final) and on their direct segmental context (vocalic or consonantal). Using the methods of linguistic geography, it is very easy to observe the rise of articulatory effort associated with a sonant accompanying its syllabification, i. e., when a sonant begins to function as the center of a syllable, the stress is realized on the sonant and not on its vocalic part (a weak quasivocalic sound which may accom-

2

Jerzy Duma

pany the realization of the syllabic sonant). The stronger articulation of a sonant leads, as a rule, to the reduction of the accompanying vowel. In the past, the tendency toward open syllables in Slavic languages caused the appearance of the syllabic sonants *r, *r\ *l, */' originating from the old clusters *ür, *ir, *ul, *il. These syllabic sonants were probably pronounced with a slight vocalic sound after the sonant (which is why they were written as rll+jer in the Church Slavic texts). Today, in the western Bulgarian and in some of the Macedonian dialects, traces of the secondary syllabification can be found, such as, for example, g"rnica < granica 'the border', pbrlicam < prilicam Ί am similar'. This is due to the weakening of the vowel occurring in the vicinity of the sonant. Consequently, the new clusters br, rb are considered phonetic allophones of the syllabic r, as the phonemic value of syllabic sonants is uncertain in these dialects. In some dialects the pronunciation of syllabic sonants appears not to be decomposed in 80 to 90 percent of all investigated examples. In some other dialects however, words with such a pronunciation of sonants are very few. This may cause a certain scepticism in evaluting such examples. This applies mainly to some eastern Bulgarian dialects where the syllabic realization of r appears to be very rare. In such cases doubts are solved by the comparison with other examples, cf. forms like brbzam instead of bbrzam Ί hurry', dlbk instead of dblbk 'long', cbren instead of ceren 'black', etc. In medial position the scope of r (< *r, *r\ *TrbT) is larger than the extension of / (< */, */', *TlbT, *TlbT). On the other hand, in a number of dialects from regions bordering on the zone where the syllabic / appears, the vocalization of the strengthened variety of [/] occurred: */ > &, ö, a or u (cf. bua, bbxa, boa, baa < *blxa < *bhxa 'flea'). In some dialects (for example in Trästenik Plevensko) a compensatory lengthening of the vowel is distinctly heard before a stop, cf. gb(l)tbm Ί swallow'. The old texts show that in the tenth to eleventh centuries the processes of syllabification of sonants in eastern Bulgaria were quite active. They also affected the clusters rll+jer in consonantal contexts, cf. pbltbsk'bodily' (an example from the tenth century, from tiles found in Preslav). On the other hand, in western texts vocalization of the strong jer is met, cf. krovb < *krbvb 'blood'. Such a vocalization is not common in the western Church Slavic texts from the tenth and eleventh centuries, which is probably due not to tradition, but is the result of the strong realization of sonants. The same reason, after all, led to its abandonment in the twelfth century. In that period (i. e., the twelfth to fourteenth centuries) the strengthened pronunciation was characteristic also of the sonants

The phonetic phenomena in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects

3

nlm, which caused a change in the quality of nasal vowels: *g (*om/n), (emln) > Hmln, *'bmln. Although the sonants *m/n influenced changes in neighboring vowels, they were themselves not as strong as r and / and did not shift into syllabic segments (up to now we have not found any proof in the form of nlm written instead of *g, Thus it was only the palatality of the preceding consonant that differentiated etymological > 'bn/m and *g > bn/m. When this palatality disappeared in some cases (for example after the hardening of s, z, c > s, z, c), the so-called middle Bulgarian merger of nasal vowels occurred. As a result of further development, in most of the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects the sonants «/ m were lost in the reflexes of nasal vowels, and the vowel & (and sometimes also 'δ > &) became identified with those vowels which developed as a consequence of desyllabification of syllabic sonants of various origin: *r, */ > br/rb, &///&, with the vocalized weak (and sometimes strong) jers (cf. mbgla < *mbgla 'fog', bbdni < *bbdbnbjb 'watch, wake'). This vowel also, to a certain extent, became identified with the reflexes of the socalled secondary vowels—in those cases where, as before -r [< *-r < *-rb], to for a long time a secondary vowel could not develop in a similar way to the strong jer in *-&r& < -or (cf. Mac. sfekor < *svekbrb 'father in law', but usually iter, itar < *xytr < *xytrb[jb] 'sly'; ostar < *ostr < *ostrb[jb] 'sharp'; veter, vetahr < *vetr < *vetrb 'wind'). With the exception of the western Bulgarian and northern Macedonian dialects, where, as in Serbian, the change *g > u occurred very early (in the tenth to eleventh century), in the rest of the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects, the jer-like vowels of different origin developed in a very similar way. One of the phenomena accompanying the strong and syllabic pronunciation of r and r is the change *cr > er- > cr- (cf. crn 'black') which appears in most of the Macedonian and some western Bulgarian dialects. In the eastern Bulgarian dialects the weakened *r ( < *r) after palatal *c- undergoes desyllabification into er in dialects from quite a large area. In the same territory secondary vocalism (of various origin) occurs, cf. ceren < *crtib 'black', cevrbst < *cbvrstb 'strong', see Polish czerstwy, Macedonian cm and cfrs. In eastern Bulgarian dialects the soft consonants c, ζ influence to different degrees the decomposition of the weakened χ or Γ into er or el. The geographical extension of the forms with erll as opposed to forms with &r// shows that the area where er occurs is larger than the area where el is found, cf. the words ceren 'black', cerven 'red', zeit 'yellow', and zeltica 'yellow coin'. This means that *r after *c is more open to decomposition than */' after z. On the other hand, the extension of the decomposition of */' into el is much smaller in the mono-

4

Jerzy Duma

syllabic word zeit || zblt than in the polysyllabic zeltica where */' stands between two palatal consonants. This phenomenon may be also connected with the diminishing extension of syllabic r and / in polysyllabic words when compared with monosyllabic words in contemporary Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects. These examples illustrate the influence of the strong pronunciation of sonants on the depalatalization of the preceding consonants, but on the other hand they also show the influence of palatal consonants on the weakening and desyllabification of sonants. The behavior of the syllabic sonants described above proves that the syllabic *r and */' postulated for Common Slavic were ephemeral, and they underwent either hardening or desyllabification very early. The reflexes of syllabic sonants in the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects shown on maps (Duma 1990-1992) allow us also to observe the weakened articulation of sonants before another hard sonant standing before a vowel, cf. gbrlo 'throat', and kblna Ί swear'. Another phonetic phenomenon, mentioned already at the beginning of this paper, is the tendency, occurring alongside the strong pronunciation of sonants, towards depalatalization of consonants before front vowels (the so-called nonaccommodative pronunciation)—this appears mainly in the area of the Macedonian and western Bulgarian dialects. Along the border with the eastern dialects both phenomena occur together: strong realization of sonants and the strong palatality of consonants before front vowels ('e, '/). A paradoxical fact is that by itself strengthened pronunciation of sonants may, in the first stage, cause the emergence of unmotivated palatality of the consonant, cf. prespal > pr'bspal (region of Gevgelija), gladen > glad'bn (region of Teteven), *mgso > *m'abnso > m'cfsotu (Sucha, region of Thessaloniki), etc. In these examples the front vowel standing next to a sonant changed into &, but the preceding consonant remained soft. If the strong or syllabic pronunciation of sonants lasts longer, this palatality may be lost, especially when its phonological load is small. Thus, it seems that a persistent strong articulation of sonants in dialects may be connected with the loss of palatal consonants and the tendency towards non-accommodative pronunciation. This observation seems to be confirmed by the restricted number of soft consonantal phonemes in Czech, Slovak, Serbo-Croatian, and Macedonian, where we also have syllabic f and, sometimes, /. Thus, the presence of traces of the strengthened pronunciation of sonants (even if there are sometimes only "concomitant phenomena", see point 4 below) may be considered the first sign of the tendency towards the "vocalic" direction in the phonetic development. The properties in question may be

The phonetic phenomena in Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects

5

then, under the influence of the standard form, restrained, moderated, or further developed. So, for example, in the western Bulgarian dialects loss of the syllabic sonants can be observed in the pronunciation of the middle and younger generation. In the Macedonian dialects on the contrary, br, br has been corrected into r in certain words under the infuence of the standard form, although such a decomposition in the position before the cluster "hard sonant + vowel" is common in a considerable area in the regions of the Bulgarian and Macedonian dialects (cf. kblna Ί swear', zbrno 'grain'). To the observations described above I would like to add some remarks resulting from the geographical location of the phonetic phenomena in question: 1. The change of they'er-like vowel & (of various origin) into ö, e is usually met on the periphery of the occurrence of r, I or strong r, / (pronounced more strongly than in eastern Bulgarian dialects), for example in Erketch, Teteven, and in the Rodopi dialects in Bulgaria, in Debar and other places in Macedonia. 2. Nowadays, the appearance of r- in dialects and the traces of initial */have a much smaller extension than the realization of r, I in word-medial position, see, for example, the extension of the forms: brg'a 'rust', ο '

aljica

ο

'spoon' ( < */- < *lb-) and the forms: vrba 'willow',

strniste

'stubble-field', vlk 'wolf', slza 'tear'. In the final position, syllabic -r or -/ appear only exceptionally (cf. western Macedonian ostr 'sharp'). 3. The degree of strengthening of particular sonants in dialects is not the same. For example, in the western Macedonian dialects, where, usually, desyllabification of the medial / into ol took place (cf. molca Ί am silent'), the "vocalization" of *v& > u occurred, cf. cuti 'it blooms'. On the periphery of the occurrence of r, r, the strengthening of *-n left a trace in the quality of the preceding vowel, cf. ogan 'fire' (the region of Kostur), cerbn 'black' (Vresovo, Golica—eastern Bulgaria). 4. Affricatization of the fricatives ζ, ζ > j , j after the sonants r, I, η can be a trace of their strengthened pronunciation, cf. bbrjam Ί hurry' (Bulgaria), sblja 'tear' (Macedonia), rmnc < *m