<div style="text-align: center; font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">=========================================================================<br>L O W L A N D S - L - 07 March 2008 - Volume 05<br style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102);">
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=========================================================================<br></div><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">From: </span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="HcCDpe"><span class="EP8xU" style="color: rgb(0, 104, 28);"><a href="mailto:heatherrendall@tiscali.co.uk">heatherrendall@tiscali.co.uk</a></span> <span class="lDACoc"><<a href="mailto:heatherrendall@tiscali.co.uk">heatherrendall@tiscali.co.uk</a>></span></span><br style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Subject: </span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;" class="HcCDpe">LL-L "Phonology" 2008.03.06 (01) [E]<br><br></span><span style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">From Heather Rendall
</span><p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Tom Crane wrote Yes, where do all these neat words come from that begin with the kn/gn?</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">I don't know
whether you can still find copies but Krahe's Indogermanische Wortlehre
& ( separate book) Wortbildung both give lists and lists of sound
patterns that can be traced throught IE vocabularies</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">e.g. KR /CR - = a nasty sound sometimes with added SKR/SCR....</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">The longer the vowel, the longer the action rip ( fast cut) reap ( slow cut) sip (quick ) seep ( slow )</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">I will have to hunt for my copies to recall exactly what KN - originally appears to have indicated</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Again sorry
if my recall is at fault but I am trying to drag up from my memory some
pretty old learning: I recall that the premise is that IE appears to
have created words in 'sound families' that worked on at least two
planes -so a word's consonants would indicate a [maybe onomatopaeic]
relation to the object / concept being named and the vowels would
indicate another characteristic i.e. with verbs as the original verb
system was entirely based on strong verbs, the vowel indicated
tense/time.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Set prefixes could alter meaning by making it</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">absolute e.g. reissen zerreissen rip to shreds</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">negative e.g. lernen verlernen</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">transitive e.g. be- prefix ( originally)</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">etc etc</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Over the
years many of the patterns have been softened / assimilated to others /
been misidentified with another pattern / or just plain lost</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">But it is
still one of the most endearing ( to me at least) characteristics of
the IE family that some of these patterns have outlasted the many
cultures that they have passed through.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">I was asked
once at a seminar why the English word for 'black' was not 'swart' and
a fascinating discussion ensued that continued over email until a
satisfactory answer was arrived at which was in brief</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">English still
does have a cognate of 'schwarz' i.e. swarthy but it has developed a
specific meaning of ' dark skinned' or ' with dark hair and eyebrows/
beard & moustache.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">The colour however uses the Saxon word for 'ink' i.e. blac</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">A bit of
investigation reveals that the clue of further relations is locked into
the 'bl' of 'black' with is cognate with Latin 'fl' and Greek 'phl'
and the word in common is flagare / phlegein to burn </p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Blac was soot black used to make ink</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">The word moved meaning from 'ink' to the colour at sometime - I would love to know when.</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Does LS still have 'Blac' and with what meaning ?</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Is the word for the colour uniform over the LS Sprachgebiet?</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Yours curiously</p>
<p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">Heather</p><p style="font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;">----------<br><br>From: R. F. Hahn <<a href="mailto:sassisch@yahoo.com">sassisch@yahoo.com</a>><span class="HcCDpe"><span class="lDACoc"></span></span><br>
Subject: <span class="HcCDpe">Phonology<br><br></span>Interesting, Heather.<br><br>Low Saxon has <i>swart</i> ~ <i>swatt</i> for 'black'. However, it has <i>blak</i> (<i>Black</i>) for old-time soot-derived ink.<br>
<br>This is what the Oxford English Dictionary has to say about it:<br></p>
<div style="margin-left: 40px;"><b>BLACK</b><br>OE. <i>blæc</i>,
<i>blac</i> (def. <i>blace</i>) = OHG. <i>blah-</i>, <i>blach-</i> (in comb.);
a word of difficult history. In OE., found also (as the metres show) with long
vowel <i>bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>ce</i>, <i>bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>can</i>, and thus confused with <i>blác</i> shining,
white:<span lang="ZH-CN">— </span>OTeut. <i>*blaiko-</i> (see <span style="font-size: 10pt;">BLAKE</span><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">), as is shown by
the fact that the latter also occurs with short vowel, <i>bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>c</i>, <i>bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>cum</i>;
in ME. the two words are often distinguishable only by the context, and
sometimes not by that. (Cf. 7.) ON. <i>blakkr</i> is not an exact phonetic
equivalent, but, if native, points to an OTeut. <i>*blakko-</i> (for <i>blak'ko</i>:
see Kluge <i>Beitr.</i> ix. 162). Sievers suggests that the original Teutonic
types were <i>*'bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>kno-</i>, <i>*blak'ko</i>-,
subsequently levelled to <i>bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>ko-</i>, <i>blako-</i>,
<i>blakko-</i>, giving the OE. and ON. words; in this case <i>*bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>k-no-</i> might be pa. pple. of a vb. <i>*bl<span lang="ZH-CN">ǽ</span>kan</i> to burn (cogn. w. Gr. <i><span lang="ZH-CN">φλέγειν</span></i>),
and the original sense 'burnt, scorched.' Cf. </span><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">BLATCH</span><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">, which points to
an OTeut. <i>*blakkjo-</i>, from <i>blakko-</i>. In Eng. <i>black</i> has quite
displaced the original colour-word </span><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">SWART</span><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">, which remains in the other Teutonic
languages.] </span><br><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";"></span></div><p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";"><b>SWART</b><br>[Com. Teut.: OE. <i>sweart</i>,
= OS., OFris. <i>swart</i> (NFris. <i>sûart</i>, EFris. <i>suurt</i>, WFris. <i>swart</i>),
MLG., LG. <i>swart</i>, MDu. <i>swart</i> (Du. <i>zwart</i>), OHG., MHG. <i>swarz</i>
(G. <i>schwarz</i>), ON. <i>svartr</i> (Sw. <i>svart</i>, Da. <i>sort</i>),
Goth. <i>swarts</i>; f. root <i>swart-</i> 'dark', of which another grade is
found in ON. <i>sorta</i> black dye, <i>sorti</i> black cloud, <i>sortna</i> to
grow black, <i>Surtr</i> (see </span><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">SURTURBRAND</span><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">).<br>While surviving as the regular colour-word in the Continental
languages, it has been superseded in ordinary use in English by <i>black</i>.] <a name="50244040def1"></a></span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";"> <a name="50244040-m1"></a>1. Dark in colour; black or blackish; dusky,
swarthy.<a name="50244040def2"></a> <a name="50244040-m1.a"></a>a. gen.</span></p>
<p style="margin-left: 40px;"><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";"> <a name="50244040-m1.b"></a>b. spec. Of the skin or complexion, or
of persons in respect of these.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-family: "Arial Unicode MS";">Cheerio!<br><br>Reinhard/Ron</span><br></p><br><br>