Middle English Morphology

Loss of inflections

Loss of grammatical gender

two noun cases: possessive and non-possessive

all adjective inflections lost, loss of weak/strong distinction

verbs: personal endings reduced, mood distinctions blurred

dual/plural distinction lost

change from synthetic to analytic language; reasons: interaction of different inflectional systems in English, French, and Scandinavian; reduction of unstressed final vowels; relative rigidity of word order; increasing use of prepositions and particles

Changes more visible in North of England where reduction of inflections began

Old English vocabulary in dynamics (Borrowings).

Modern estimates of the total OE vocabulary range from about 30.000-100.000 words. The last digit is probably too high, but it depends on the treatment of polysemy and homonymy. Word etymology throws light on the history of the speaking community. The OE vocab. was almost purely Germanic; except for a small number of borrowings, it consisted of native words, inherited from Proto-Germanic or formed from native roots and affixes.

Native words can be subdivided into some etymological layers coming from different historical periods: 3 main layers in the native words:1)common Indo-European words. They constitute the oldest part of the OE vocab. Among these words:natural phenomena, plants, animals, agricultural terms, verbs denoting men’s activities, pronouns, numerals. E.g. ђæt, bēon, mōna, mōdor, ic.