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<p>--- In <a href="mailto:gothic-l%40yahoogroups.com">gothic-l@yahoogroup<wbr>s.com</a>, "Tim Caldwell" <vikingtimbo650@<wbr>...><br>
wrote:<br>
><br>
<br>
> Is the gothic language archaic only because it's attested earlier <br>
> than other germanic languages, or could there be other reasons as <br>
> well? If texts written in other contemporary germanic languages from <br>
> western Germany and Scandinavia were to be discovered, would we <br>
> expect the languages they were written in to be just as archaic?<br>
<br>
Hi Tim,<br>
<br>
In some ways, the precursors of the attested North and West Germanic<br>
languages would actually have been more archaic than Gothic was in the<br>
4th and 5th centuries! A nice illustration of this is the Gallehus<br>
Horn inscription: ek Hlewagastiz holtijaz horna tawidô, which Nielsen<br>
reconstructed in Gothic as: ik Hliugasts hulteis haurn tawida.<br>
<br>
(In the following, AN = Ancient Nordic, the language of the earliest<br>
Scandinavian inscriptions, called by some Proto-Norse, Proto-Nordic or<br>
Old Runic, etc.; NWG = Northwest Germanic, NG = North Germanic; WG =<br>
West Germanic; Go. = Gothic; ON = Old Norse; OE = Old English; OS =<br>
Old Saxon; OHG = Old High German.)<br>
<br>
1. Words in Proto-Germanic consisted of a root, so for example *stadiz<br>
"place" can be analysed as stad- + a stem vowel -i- + a grammatical<br>
ending -z. Gothic had already lost the stem vowels in certain endings<br>
which are preserved in some later WG languages, and would have still<br>
existed in NG at the time of the Gothic Bible, for example in the<br>
nominative singular of masculine i-stems with a short root: Go. staþs,<br>
OE stede, OS stedi, OHG stat, ON staðr, AN *stadiz. Runic<br>
inscriptions of the 4th and 5th centuries from NWG areas show stem<br>
vowels also in types of word from which they had dissappeared by the<br>
time that the descendant dialects were attested in manuscripts: AN<br>
gastiz : Go. gasts; AN stainaz : Go. stains; AN hlaiwa : Go. hlaiw; AN<br>
horna : Go. haurn.<br>
<br>
2. Biblical Gothic had lost the distinction between Germanic *i and *e<br>
which is preserved in later NWG languages. Also the distinction<br>
between Germanic *u and *o, if the Proto-Germanic dialect from which<br>
Gothic descended ever made this distinction. I don't know if it did.<br>
Old Gutnish, the variety of Old Norse spoken on Gotland, also doesn't<br>
make this distinction, and like Gothic regularly has `o' before `r',<br>
but `u' in other positions. On the other hand, there is some (very<br>
tenuous!) evidence of the distinction being preserved in Crimean<br>
Gothic, especially in the word `schuos', a misprint for *schnos? `o'<br>
appears in some other Crimean Gothic words where it does in NWG, but<br>
this one could be significant because it wasn't among those recognised<br>
as Germanic by Busbeque.<br>
<br>
3. Gothic lost the distinction between Proto-Germanic final unstressed<br>
*ô and *ôn, which both became `a'. In North Germanic final unstressed<br>
*ô became `u' and final unstressed *ôn became `ô'. Thus in the<br>
nominative singular: Go. rûna : AN *rûnu (cf. `liubu' on the Opedal<br>
stone) : OE rûn; versus the accusative singular: Go. rûna : AN rûnô :<br>
OE rûne.<br>
<br>
4. In Gothic, Proto-Germanic unstressed final *ê2 fell together with<br>
*ôn as Go. `a'. Because of this, Gothic lost the distinction between<br>
the 1st and 2nd person singular past indicative endings of weak verbs<br>
(the kind that form their past tense by adding a dental ending). Thus<br>
we find forms like AN `fa(i)hidô' "I painted" (ON fáða) and AN<br>
`fa(i)hidê' "he or she painted" (ON fáði), but Go. `melida' "I wrote"<br>
= Go. `melida' "he/she wrote".<br>
<br>
5. Gothic had lost the final *z in the dative plural. This is<br>
preserved in the 7th c. Stentoften stone runic inscription, which has<br>
the dative plural ending -umz, and even survives in a limited way in<br>
Modern Icelandic in variants of the dative of the numerals 2 (tveimur)<br>
and 3 (þremur). In the WG area, the dative plural is attested in some<br>
Latin inscriptions dedicated to goddesses: Aflims (besides the Latin<br>
dative Afliabus), Vatvims (besides Latin Vatviabus), but had may have<br>
disappeared in WG by the time that Gothic is attested. The exact date<br>
of the loss of final -z in WG is uncertain, as far as I know.<br>
<br>
6. Gothic devoiced final fricatives in a way that hadn't happened in NWG.<br>
<br>
7. Gothic removed many traces of the operation of Verner's Law by<br>
paradigmatic analogy, especially in the past tense strong verbs and<br>
causative verbs of the 1st weak conjugation.<br>
<br>
8. Later attested WG dialects preserve the instrumental case much more<br>
extensively than Gothic does. In Gothic, only a couple of pronouns<br>
survive of the old instrumental. Like Old Norse, Gothic used the<br>
dative in place of the instrumental.<br>
<br>
9. On the other hand, WG had some early innovations such as gemination<br>
(doubling) of consonants before [j], attested in the Weser runes, c.<br>
400 (kunni), and the precise dating of other innovations in NG is<br>
unclear...<br>
<br>
10. SHARED ARCHAISMS. The NWG dialects of Wulfila's time were either<br>
yet to experience the various changes known as i-mutation or i-umlaut,<br>
or at least the results had yet to show up in inscriptions and<br>
certainly wouldn't have been phonemically distinct (i.e. unpredicable<br>
from neighbouring sounds). NWG dialects of Wulfila's time, like<br>
Gothic, would still make a phonemic distinction between the reflexes<br>
of Proto-Germanic *z and *r. No doubt there were lots of other shared<br>
archaisms for which the evidence is lacking.<br>
<br>
Llama Nom<br>
<br>
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