LL-L: "Morphology" LOWLANDS-L, 03.MAY.2000 (08) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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From: Jasmin Harvey [jharvey at ucla.edu]
Subject: Re: LL-L: "Morphology" LOWLANDS-L, 03.MAY.2000 (05) [E]

At 08:27 AM 5/3/00 -0700, Mike wrote:
>From: Mike Adams [abrigon at yahoo.com]
>Subject: -s, -es, -en suffix/plurals
>
>I know from memory that Oxen is the last remnant of an old germanic form
>for the plural..

Well, one of the last.  There is also 'children', and, if you still read
older translations of the Bible, 'brethren'.

> Related likely to how man becomes men.

No; man becomes men (become men? <grin>) through i-umlaut under influence
of an old plural ending, which is also how mouse become mice and foot
becomes feet.

>I know in German
>to do a plural it is often -en

-en is also one of the two main forms of plural in modern Dutch (with -s).

Jasmin Harvey
jharvey at ucla.edu

Germanic Linguistics,
UCLA

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From: Ian James Parsley [parsley at highbury.fsnet.co.uk]
Subject: Re: LL-L: "Morphology" LOWLANDS-L, 03.MAY.2000 (05) [E]

Mike,

I would suggest there are a few others, most notably 'child-children'. The
vowel change in pairs such as 'foot-feet' would also be conservative.

Ulster-Scots has retained several plurals in -n, such as 'een' (eyes),
'treen' (trees), and in fact 'oosen' (oxen). One of these also has a vowel
change, 'shae-shuin' (shoes).

There is a particularly interesting plural formation with 'beast-beece'
(beasts), with vowel modification and reduction (loss of the last
consonantal sound) - the only other example I've come across of a plural
being formed by losing a final sound was in Letzeburgish (though typically I
can't remember it now!)

Best,
-------------------------------
Ian James Parsley
http://www.gcty.com/parsleyij
0772 0951736
"JOY - Jesus, Others, You"

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From: R. F. Hahn [sassisch at yahoo.com]
Subject: Morphology

Jasmine wrote above:

> -en is also one of the two main forms of plural in modern Dutch (with -s).

The same applies to Low Saxon (Low German), by the way.  However, it also has
lots of examples of plural formation through umlauting, something that in
Dutch and English (and Frisian?) is seen only in a handful of remnants.

> No; man becomes men (become men? <grin>) through i-umlaut under influence
> of an old plural ending, which is also how mouse become mice and foot
> becomes feet.

And Ian (also above):

> I would suggest there are a few others, most notably 'child-children'. The
> vowel change in pairs such as 'foot-feet' would also be conservative.

In Low Saxon (Low German) dialects, this is preserved in a somewhat more
archaic or "purer" form:

(1) Foot [foUt] 'foot' -> Fööt [fœYt] 'feet'
(2) Goos [goUs] 'goose' -> Göös' [gœ.Yz] 'geese'
(3) Muus [mu:s] 'mouse' -> Müüs' [my:.z] 'mice'
(4) Huus [hu:s] 'house' -> Hüüs' [hy:.z] 'houses'
(5) Tuun [tu:n] 'fence', 'garden' -> Tüün [ty:n] 'fences', 'gardens'

In this sister or cousin language of English (i.e., Saxon connection), a back
rounded vowel is umlauted by simply fronting it.  In English, the vowels in
the umlauted forms have become unrounded, hence _foot_ -> _feet_ (not
*_fööt_).  This unrounding has also taken place in many of the eastern Low
Saxon (Low German) dialects, including those used by Mennonites
("Plautdietsch" < "Plattdüütsch"):

(1) Foot -> Feet
(2) (Gauns -> Jans) [< *Gans -> *Gens, < German?]
(3) Müss -> Mies
(4) Hüss -> Hiesa
(5) Tün -> Tien

Regards,

Reinhard/Ron

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