The Sources of Standard English/Contents

by Thomas Laurence Kington-Oliphant

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

English in its earliest shape.

A.D.		page
	The Aryan Clan on the Oxus	1
	Their way of life	2
	Words common to Sanscrit and English	3, 4
	Aryan Suffixes kept by us	5
	The origin of ward and like	6
	Aryan Comparatives and Superlatives	7
	The Aryan Verb - Strong Perfects	8
	The Participle, Strong and Weak	9
	Aryan Irregular Verbs	10
	Our forms akin to Latin and Greek	11
	Our forms akin to Lithuanian	12
	The Three divisions of Teutons	13
	Inflections of their Substantive and Verb	14
	Teutonic Endings of Nouns	15
	Weak Perfects - Inroads on the Celts	16
	The Teutons attack the Latins	17
450.	The Beowulf, an English Epic	18
	The English seize Britain	19
600.	They are Christianized	20
	Old English Substantives	21
	Old English Adjectives	22

A.D.		page
	Old English Pronouns	23
	Old English Verbs	24
	Letters cast out or put in	25
	Exchange of letters	26
	Prepositions still used in the old way	27
	The use of man - English Negation	28
	The Verb - The Article	29
	The Verb do prefixed to other Verbs	30
	Adverbial Idioms	31
	Corruption of words - Loss of Accents	32
	Alliterative Poetry	33
	It still keeps its hold on us	34

CHAPTER II.

the old english, 680-1120.

the middle english, 1120-1300.

	Northumbrian English	35
680.	Cadmon's Runes on the Ruthwell Cross	36
737.	Another piece of Cadmon's	37
800.	The Northern Psalter	38
	Its peculiarities	39
876.	The Norse Settlement in England	40
	Its abiding influence	41
900.	The Rushworth Gospels	42
	Southern and Northern English contrasted	43
924.	King Edward's Conquests	44
941.	The Five Danish Burghs	45
954.	Eadred becomes the One King of England	46
	The Danish influence on New English	47
970.	The Lindisfarne Gospels	48
	Southern and Northern English contrasted	49
	Norse corruptions	50
1066.	The French Conquest	51
1090.	The Legend of St. Edmund	52

A.D.		page
	Corruptions in the Saxon Chronicle	53
	Slow change from Old to New	54
	Interest attached to Peterborough	55
1120.	Its Forged Charters	56
	The letters h and g replaced	57
	The Dative replaces the Accusative	58
	Break-up of Case-endings	59
	New use of Prepositions	60
	Clipping of Infinitives and Participles	61
	The Northern, Midland, and Southern Shibboleths	62
	New Teutonic words crop up	63
	Scandinavian words come in	64
1120.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	65, 66
1120.	Specimen of Southern Dialect	67
	A later Version of Ælfric's Homilies	68
	O and ch replace a and c	69
	New Relatives - The letter ʓ	70
	Lines on the Grave	71
1160.	The Peterborough Chronicle	72
	Southern corruptions appear	73
	K, qu, and gh are found	74
1160.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	75, 76
1160.	Specimen of Southern Dialect	77, 78
	Early Rimes - The Sound au	79
	V and w replace f and g	80
	Sh replaces sc	81
	Change in Nouns and Verbs	82
	Change in Meaning of Words	83
1170.	The Moral Ode - The Worcester Manuscript	84
	Ou replaces o - The new besiden	85
	The Hatton Gospels	86
1180.	The Essex Homilies - The form ie	87
	Clipping of Words - New phrases	88
	The Masculine and Neuter Article confused	89
	New Norse words	90
1200.	King Alfred's Proverbs	91
	Orrmin	92

A.D.		page
	His Norse origin	93
	His probable abode	94
	His many corruptions	95
	His new Pronouns	96
	His Norse words, kept by us	97
	His Prepositional compounds	98
	He uses that for thilk	99
	Theirs, what man, thyself	100
	Forthwith, right, or, alone, same	101
	He replaces œ by a	102
	Change in the meaning of words	103
	The Norse auxiliary mun	104
	Strong Verbs corrupted into Weak	105
	Hid, sicken, shown	106
	Mid and niman die out	107
1200.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	108, 109
1205.	Specimen of Western Dialect	110
	Layamon's Brut	111
	He is the last to use œ	112
	The Corrupt Participle in ing	113
	His Norse Words	114
	The Legend of St. Margaret	115
	The letters ea - The ending ful	116
1220.	The Hali Meidenhad	117
	The Ancren Riwle	118
	The use of one for man	119
	The New Relative	120
	The Superlative replaced by most	121
	New Norse words	122
	New Low German words	123
	Salopian works	124
1230.	The Bestiary	125
	Ou replaces u; one	126
	The Genesis and Exodus	127
	Drag, dray, draw - The i and oo	128
	Clipping of words in East Anglia	129
	Whilum, seldum, muste, these	130

A.D.		page
	New Norse words	131
1230.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	132
1230.	Specimen of Southern Dialect	134, 135
1240.	The Lincolnshire Creed	136
	Interchange of f and g	137
1240.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	138, 139
1240.	Specimen of South Western Dialect	140
	The Owl and the Nightingale	141
1250.	Mercian Religious pieces	142
1250.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	143, 144
1250.	Specimen of Northern Dialect	145
	The Yorkshire Psalter	146
	Gh replaces h	147
	Brake, feet, gives	148
	The New Relatives - Those	149
	New Substantives	150
	Through hap, gainsay	151
	New Norse words	152
	New Version of Layamon's Brut	153
	The Jesus Manuscript	154
1270.	Huntingdon (?) Poem	155
1270.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	156
1270.	Specimen of Southern Dialect	157
	The Proverbs of Hending	158
	The Sir Tristrem	159
	The new sense of bond	160
	New Norse words	161
1280.	The Harrowing of Hell	162
	The curious dialogue	163
	The Strong Perfect corrupted	164
	The Havelok	165
	Northern and Southern forms meet	166
	You used for thou	167
	The mangling of drake; lark	168
	New Norse words	169
	Loss of old Prepositions	170
1280.	Specimen of East Midland Dialect	171, 172

A.D.		page
1280.	Specimen of Southern Dialect	173
	The King Horn.	174
1290.	Kentish Sermons	175
1300.	Robert of Gloucester's Chronicle	176
	His Life of Becket	177
	His Life of St. Brandan	178
	The Romance of Alexander	179
	The New English, where compounded	180
1300.	Few new Teutonic idioms since this date	181

CHAPTER III.

the rise of the new english.

A.D. 1303.

	Robert of Brunne in Lincolnshire	182
1303.	His Work, The Handlyng Synne	183
	His dialect, partly Southern	184
	Partly Western, partly Northern	185
	Went, second, right, full, down	186
	Kind, mind, truth, buck	187
	Adder, one after an Adjective	188
	Wholly, lost, to be blamed	189
	Sack, toy, cannot	190
	New words - St. Audre	191
	Yon, what time, the which	192
	Somebody, once, inasmuch	193
	Would God, Lord, side by side	194
	He asks pardon for his diction	195
	His tale of Bishop Robert	196
	His account of Charity	197
	Taken from St. Paul	198
	His advice about Mass	199
	His tale of the Norfolk Bondeman	200
	His account of himself	201
	Specimens of Dialects - North Lincolnshire	202

A.D.		page
	Yorkshire - Durham	203
	Lancashire	204
	Salop - Herefordshire	205
	Gloucestershire - Irish Pale	206
	Somersetshire	207
	Oxfordshire - Kent	208
	Middlesex	209
	Bedfordshire	210
	Tables - Words akin to Dutch and German	211
	Scandinavian words of the Fourteenth Century	212
	Celtic words - Dutch words	213
	Scandinavian words of the Fifteenth Century	214

CHAPTER IV.

the inroad of french words into england.

	Harm done in the Thirteenth Century	215
1066.	English Poetic words die out	216
	French alone is in favour	217
1160.	How French words first came in	218
	Forty of them in use very early	219
	Proper names spelt in French	220
1220.	The Ancren Riwle abounds in French	221
	The foreign sound oi	222
	Words of Religion - The foreign j	223
	Table of French words akin to English	224
	English words drop in the Thirteenth Century	225
	This fact explained	226
	The Franciscans in England	227
1250.	Their daily work	228
	They bring in French words	229
	The 'Luve Ron' of a friar	230
	Poem by one of the Old School	231
1290.	The Kentish Sermons	232
	Treatise on Science	233
1300.	Coarse English Words cast aside	234

A.D.		page
	French used by Architects	235
	French used by Ladies	236
	Warlike Romances Englished	237
	Our French words for soldiering	238
	French employed by lawyers	239
	The number of new French words	240
	These take English endings	241
	French words used by the lowest	242
1303.	French brought in by Robert of Brunne	243
	Jolly, party, divers, nice	244
	Touch, trail, single, afraid	245
	Certain, passing, bondage	246
	English roots take French endings	247
	The decay of Teutonic words arrested	248
	Corruption of the Franciscan Order	249
1360.	Robert's words need explanation	250
	Gradual loss of Old English Words	251
	Table of Words, Obsolete and Romance	252

CHAPTER V.

the new english.

a.d. 1303-1873.

	English differs from other Literatures	253
	Each shire had its own speech	254
	Norse influence in England	255
1303.	The East Midland advances Southwards	256
	Contrast between it and the London speech	257
	Edward I. neglected English	258
	The New Standard English spreads	259
1349.	Edward III. favours it	260
	New Forms of old words	261
	Poem on the Carpenter's Tools	262
1356.	Mandeville's writings	263
	Nassington at Cambridge	264

A.D.		page
1380.	Wickliffe's version of the Bible	265
	Young one, wast, shipwreck, haply	266
	His Latin idioms bad	267
	Purvey and Hereford	268
	New forms used at this time	269
1400.	Creed and Prayers	270
1408.	Forms of Matrimony	271
1450.	Lollard Tract on Scriptural translation	272
	The Speech of the Court	273
1390.	Chaucer's new forms	274
	Belike, bi and bi, scarcely, menes	275
1432.	Letters written by knights - Warwick	276
	Suffolk's letter to his son	277
1447.	East Anglian Letters - Shillingford	278
1450.	Pecock's Repressor	279
	The Word unless - Good Prose	280
1460.	Yorkshire letters of the time	281
1426.	Audlay in Salop	282
1454.	York's children at Ludlow	283
1471.	Caxton prints the First English Book	284
	He restores the hard g	285
1481.	His Renard the Fox	286
1482.	He alters Trevisa's words	287
1523.	Lord Berners - Tyndale	288
1525.	Corruptions in his Testament	289
	Once, father, coulde, righteous	290
	Abroad, waves, sad, roll	291
	Tyndale's sound Teutonic style	292
1542.	His version disliked by Gardiner	293
	His wrangles with More	294
1528.	His critical power - Roy's rimes	295
1536.	Plumpton's letter home	296
	English Poetry becomes more Teutonic	297
1524.	Abbot Malvern's verses	298
	Theology, the Classics, Travels	299
1560.	Cranmer's Prayer Book	300
	Latin and Teutonic in our Bible	301

A.D.		page
1583.	Fulke's scorn of the Douay Bible	302
1611.	Influence of our Version	303
	Romanism adverse to our Literature	304
	The Reformation unites England and Scotland	305
	The Bible a bond for the Angel cyn	306
1550.	Wilson's criticism - Shakespere	307
1590.	Spenser - Our Golden Age	308
	The form its - Loss of Old Forms	309
1640.	Strafford's Thorough - Milton	310
	His Lycidas - Bunyan	311
1650.	The Change in English Prose	312
1750.	Johnson's Corruptions	313
	The Study of Sanscrit	314
1810.	Scott, Byron, Coleridge	315
1820.	Scott's Romances - The Ballad revived	316
1830.	Cobbett - Monk's Life of Bentley	317
1870.	Speeches of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Bright	318
1873.	Mr. Tennyson, Mr. Morris	319
	Table of Dates bearing on English Literature	320, 321

CHAPTER VI.

good and bad english in 1873.

	Scholars and the Middle Class	322
	The Latter love Foreign phrases	323
	How a man writes to The Times	324
	Latin is too often a pitfall	325
	The Penny-a-liner of our day	326
	Blunder of Irish Prelates	327
	Correspondents of Journals	328
	Editors should put down bad English	329
	Americans misspell honour	330
	Fine writing in America	331
	To interview	332
	English abuse of the letter h	333
	Bad style of English preachers	334

A.D.		page
	English not taught at schools	335
	Good influence of the Classics	336
	Punch a good English critic	337
	We borrow from all sides	338
	We send our own staple abroad	339
	Bad English of a Queen's Speech	340
	Watchwords of English History	341
	Simplicity recommended by Mr. Freeman	342
	We have improved on our fathers	343
	Three ways of writing English	344
	Teutonic, Romance, and Penny-a-lining	345
	Parable of a maiden's dress	346
	Sometimes neat, sometimes outrageous	347
	Chaucer's advice to fine writers	348

CHAPTER VII.

twelve hundred years of english.

680.	Lines on the Ruthwell Cross	349
737.	Lines by Cadmon	350
800-900.	Northumbrian Psalter - Rushworth Gospels	351
970.	Lindisfarne Gospels	352
1090.	St. Edmund's Legend	353, 354
1220.	The Ancren Riwle	355, 356, 357
1356.	Sir John Mandeville	358, 359
1450.	Bishop Pecock	360
1550.	Lever	361, 362
1668.	Cowley	363, 364
1776.	Gibbon	365, 366
1872.	Morris	367, 368
	Advice as to Studying English	369
	Antiquam exquirite Matrem	370

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Erratum.

Page 262, lines 5, 6, 7, dele The form graciouser

ending in ous.