minimal pairs

[Thomas McFadden]

This is incorrect.  For one thing, the modern German t (which these th's
are standing in for) doesn't have a fricative as its immediate
predecessor.  It comes, via the 2nd consonant shift, from WGmc. *d, which
seems to come from a Gmc. voiced fricative, but if I'm not mistaken, the
frication on the Gmc. d is thought to have been lost quite early, earlier
than that on g and b.  The outcome of Gmc/WGmc thorn (voiceless
fricative) in the high German dialects is, again via the 2nd consonant
shift, d.  Now, in early OHG there are spellings of this as th, suggesting
that the change had not gone to copmpletion yet, but they disappear
quite early.  But like I said, this isn't the sound represented by the th
in Goethe and Luther.  the spellings of german t with th are a relatively
recent phenomenon (the last few centuries) and I believe are usually
thought of as an imitation of the Latin rendering of Greek aspirates/
a sort of overly correct attempt at representing the aspiration on German
t.  no frication is or ever was intended.  consider for example the word
tun, which was very commonly spelled with th in the 19th century.  the
normal OHG spelling was tuon - with a t - and this is cognate of course
with English do.  it is thus not possible for the 19th cent. thun to be a
holdover of some Gmc. *edh that has been forgotten in all intervening
spellings.

> I believe that the "th" in Goethe and Luther (which I've also seen
> as Ludher) is an orthographic survival of the dental fricatives
> in German.

> --
> Brent J. Ermlick		Veritas liberabit uos
> brent at bermls.oau.org