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In OE the adjective had 2 numbers, 3 genders and 5 cases: Nominative, Genetive,
Dative, Accusative, Instrumental. Instrumental case was used when an adjective served as an attribute to a noun in Dative expressing an instrumental meaning.
Lytle werede = with (the help of) a small troop
Adjective had 2 declensions: strong and weak. The formal difference was similar to noun declensions. Strong and weak declensions arose due to the use of several stem-forming suffixes in Proto-Germanic: vocalic a,o,u,i and consonantal n. The endings of strong declension mainly coincided with the endings of a-stems of the noun for the adjective in masculine and neuter and of o-stems in feminine with some difference between long and short stemmed adjective variants with j, w, monosyllabic and polysyllabic adjectives, some remnants of other stems. Some endings in strong declension had no parallels in noun paradigm. They are similar to endings of pronouns:
-um (Dat. Sg.);
-ne (Acc. Sg. Masc.);
[ r ] (in some feminine and plural endings).
Strong declension is also called "pronominal" declension.
Weak declension uses the same markers as n-stem of nouns except in Gen. Pl.
(pronominal ending - ra instead of the weak - ena).
Most adjectives can be declined according to strong and weak declensions. The choice
of declension depends on semantic factors:
1) synthectical function of the adjective;
2) degree of comparison;
3) presence of noun determiners.
Adjectives have strong declension when used predicatively and attributively without noun determiners: pa menn sindon 3ode = the men are good, mid hnesere beddin3e = with soft bedding. Weak declension is used when the adjective is preceded by a demonstrative pronoun or Genetive case of a personal pronoun (noun-determiner): pжt weste land = that uninhabited land.
Exceptions:
- a few adjectives were always declined as strong: eall (all), mani3 (many), oper (other);
- several adjectives were always weak. They were adjectives in superlative and
comparative degrees, ordinal numerals and ilka (same).
There was semantic contrast between strong and weak forms. Strong forms were associated with the meaning of indefiniteness (semantically they were close to indefinite article), weak forms - with definiteness (close to definite article).
By the end of OE period the agreement of an adjective and a noun became looser, in EME -. practically lost. The changes took place in the North and North-East Midlands and spread to the South. The forms of gender disappeared in the 11th century. Cases:
Instrumental case fused with Dative (by the end of OE there were 4 cases); distinctions of other cases in EME were unsteady. By the end of the 13th century case distinctions were lost. The category of number was the most stable category. Even in the 14th century opposition plural - singular was indicated with the help of the ending - e in strong declension. But this marker was regarded as insufficient and the ending - s appeared. It was either the influence of the French adjectives or just ending -. s of nouns. The loss of final e in the transition to NE made adjective entirely uninflected.
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