OLD ENGLISH VOCABULARY

Prepared by the student of HLT-1.17 (a),

Alia Sharipova
 PLAN
 1.
Differences between Old English vocabulary and
Modern English vocabulary
 2. Native Old English words.
 3. Celtic borrowings in Old English
 4. Latin borrowings in Old English
 5. Scandinavian borrowings in Old English
 6. Poetic vocabulary of Old English. Kennings.
We can divide English into two main
periods: Old and Modern English.
The Old English period can
be regarded as follows:
around 450 of our era (CE)
to 1150 CE. Anglo Saxon
dialects form the basis of
the language we now call
Old English
Old English was a synthetic rather than an analytic
language. Old English like modern German and
unlike modern English was synthetic. In terms of
grammar, Old English resembles modern German
more than it does modern English. Old English was
completely different from modern English in very
many respects. But here we’ll be talking only about
the vocabulary.
Old English vocabulary
was still based on the
Germanic peoples'
dialects that had
moved down from
Scandinavia and spread
over Central Europe in
successive waves.
 Native OE words can be subdivided into a
number of etymological layers coming from
different historical periods.

Common SPECIFICALL
IE words Y OE
Common
Germanic
words
COMMON IE WORDS

 the oldest part of the OE vocabulary

 Names of some natural phenomena, plants and animals and
so on
 Personal and demonstrative pronouns and most numerals
 Verbs belonging to this layer denote the basic activities of
man
 Adjectives indicate the most essential qualities
THE COMMON GERMANIC WORDS

This layer is certainly smaller than the layer of

common IE words. Semantically these words are
connected with nature, with the sea and everyday
life.
SPECIFICALLY OE
do not occur in other Germanic or non-Germanic languages

These words are few

OE clipian ‘call’, OE brid (NE bird)
and several others.

OE wīfman or wimman (ModernE woman) consists of two

roots which occurred as separate words in other OG
languages, but formed a compound only in OE.
Celtic borrowings in Old English
Abundant borrowing from Celtic is to be found
only in place-names.
The OE kingdoms Kent, Deira and Bernicia
derive their names from the names of Celtic
tribes.
Various Celtic designations of ‘river’ and
‘water’ were understood by the Germanic
invaders as proper names: Ouse, Esk, Exe,
Avon; Thames, Stour, Dover also come from
Celtic.
The name of York, the Downs and perhaps
London have been traced to Celtic sources.
 LATIN BORROWINGS IN OLD ENGLISH

Chronologically they can be divided into several layers:

The next period of

The earliest layer is The next period-
continental- words settlement period
that entered the came to Anglo-
language of the Saxons when they
Germans before began to settle in
Britain. It came not
their migration to
directly but through
the British Isles
Celtics
e.g. pillow, wine,
e.g. Portsmouth,
butter Greenport, Greenwich.
Latin influence on the
OE vocabulary began
with the introduction of
Christianity in the late
6th c. and lasted to the
end of OE.
1) words pertaining to
religion 2) words
connected with
learning.
e.g angel, anthem, rule,
temple, pope and other
 Scandinavian borrowings in Old English
.
The Scandinavian
loanwords that
survive into Modern
English are mostly
everyday words

hūsbonda - "householder“
wǽpentæc - "wapentake"
a subdivision of a shire hūsting -
"court, tribunal"
ūtlaga -"outlaw"
Poetic vocabulary of Old English. Kennings.

A kenning is a two word poetic

phrase constructed of nouns that is
substituted for the usual name of a
person or things

The word “kenning” is derived from

am Old Norse phrase kenna eitt vio,
“to express a thing in terms of
another” and is found throughout
Norse, Old English, and Celtic
Literature.
Used for memorization and to make descriptions interesting
Example: In Old English the sea could be called:

The sail road

The swan road

The bath way

The whale way

References

 https://wolfweb.unr.edu/homepage/dcronan/OEPL/
 Svartvik, Jan and Geoffrey Leech. English: One tongue, many voices.
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire [England: Palgrave Macmillan],
2006.
 https://www.scandinaviastandard.com/where-is-scandinavia-a-guide-
to-the-scandinavian-countries
/
 https://
www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-happened-to-the-latin-language.h
tml
ROMAN VICTOROVICH AFTER WATCHING
MY PPT: