Last modified 8 March 2009
Answer the questions below in a Word file and upload it to the Assignments Module in the class Owlspace site by latest Tuesday March 17, 9:00 a.m. (Think of the exam as due the night before. The grace period will then be until 9 am on the 17th.)
The exam is open book, notes, video, and written sources in general, but you need to work alone. So no discussion of the exam with either classmates or people not taking the class is allowed. (You can ask instructor if there are any unclarities in the questions.) Suggested time about 2 hours.
If any conflicting information with that given in the textbook is found elsewhere, the textbook takes priority (unless specifically corrected in the class); if you use such conflicting information in your exam, point out that it conflicts with the book and give a reference to where you found the conflicting information outside the textbook (e.g. specific book, website, etc. )
(You should be aware by now that some websites are more authoritative than others. In particular, word origins found on the web are often just wrong. Consult the Oxford English dictionary for the most authoritative etymological information. )
Part I. Phonetics (10 points)
Which sound does not fit with the others, and why? (2 each)
Example:
| t | d | z | k | s |
k, because it is a velar sound. All the others are alveolar.
(All characters are intended as International Phonetic Alphabet symbols for particular sounds. In 3., the character ʒ is supposed to be the phonetic character for the second consonant sound in Modern English measure.)
| 1. | b | k | s | t | p |
| 2. | n | ŋ | g | k | |
| 3. | ð | ʒ | θ | v | z |
| 4. | e | ɪ | ɛ | u | i |
| 5. | v | h | f | z | dʒ |
6. Old English brid meant 'baby bird'. Modern English has a descendent of this word.
a. Between Old and Modern English, what type of sound change has operated in the word?
b. Between Old and Modern English, what type of meaning change (semantic change) has operated?
c, d. Give two other examples of the same type of sound change as in (a). (Include both the Old English and the Modern English for each word).
7. Old English fugol meant 'bird'. Modern English has a descendent of this word.
a. What sound changes have operated between Old English and Modern English that are visible in the history of this word? Use the appropriate sound change terminology.
b. What type of meaning change (semantic change) has operated between Old English and Modern English in this word?
c. Give another example of a word exhibiting this type of semantic change between Old English and Modern English. (Include both old and modern meaning.)
Part III. Early writing (10)
8. What are runes and what do they have to do with English? What type of writing system do runes represent? (Write in complete sentences; about a paragraph)
Part IV. Grimm's law, cognates, sound change (15)
9. Which language family underwent the sound changes summarized by Grimm's Law? (The correct answer names a family of languages all of whose members were affected by these changes.)
10-17. The following are pairs of cognates, that is, words that go back to the same source word. (Although meanings often change over time, in these cases the meanings have pretty much remained unchanged.)
For each pair of cognates, give the specific Grimm's Law consonant change(s) that are illustrated by the example. (Find all Grimm's law changes that apply to a given example. Use the closest symbol you can to represent the phonetics of a given sound; you can use digraphs like sh, th instead of phonetic characters if you wish, but where a symbol is ambiguous, e.g. th, indicate whether it is voiced or voiceless ).
| 10. | genu | knee |
| 11 | tu | thou |
| 12. | cornu | horn |
| 13. | pater | father |
| 14. | duo | two |
| 15. | dentis | tooth |
| 16. | centum | hundred |
| 17. | noctis | night |
Part V. Old English Text (23)
Passage from Gregory and the Anglo-Saxons.
Refer to the handout of this passage given out in class for the translation if you need it. Vowel length is not marked here. The line numbers are in brackets. Use them when referring to a particular part of the text.
[8] Þa sæde him man þæt hi of Englalande wæron,
[9] and ðæt ðære þeode mennisc swa wlitig wære.
[10] Eft þa Gregorius befran, hwæðer þæs
[11] landes folc cristen wære ðe hæðen.
[12] Him man sæde þæt hi hæðene wæron....
[13] Eft he axode, hu ðære ðeode nama wære þe hi of comon.
[14] Him wæs geandswarod, þæt hi Angle genemnode wæron.
[15] Hwæt, ða Gregorius gemenode mid his wordum to ðam naman and cwæð,
[16] "Rihtlice hi sind Angle gehatene, for ðan ðe hi engla wlite habbað,
[17] and swilcum gedafenað þæt hi on heofonum engla geferan beon."
19. Find in the passage the following. Use the line numbers in the passage to indicate where you found each word. You can substitute regular characters such as ae and th for the special characters in Old English, to make it easier to type your Old English examples in Word. (15 points)
a) a word that contains an example of palatalization
b) another word that contains an example of palatalization
c) an example of a word with a consonant cluster that has disappeared in many (but not all) Modern English dialects
d) a word with a consonant that has disappeared in the Modern English sound system (the consonant is no longer present in English at all, not just in this word)
e) a word that has undergone a change in form in modern Standard English but remains similar to its Old English form in some modern dialects
f) a word that later undergoes the Great Vowel shift
g) a dative pronoun
h) a dative singular noun
i) a dative plural noun
j) a genitive noun
k) a genitive demonstrative
l) a nominative plural pronoun
m) a word with a plural verb agreement ending
n) a word that was used in Old English but has essentially fallen out of use in ordinary Modern English; it survives only in poetic use.
o) an example of a weak verb.
20-23. Using the above passage (Gregory and the Anglo-Saxons) for examples, state 4 differences between Old English and Modern English morphology/syntax and illustrate them from the passage. Give the line number along with the illustrating example, and give the contrasting Modern English equivalent showing the change. (8 points)
20.
21.
22.
23.
Part VI. Middle English text (15)
Passage from the Introduction, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
[1] Siþen þe sege and þe assaut watz sesed at Troye,
[2] þe borȝ brittened and brent to brondeȝ and askez,
[3] þe tulk þat þe trammes of tresoun þer wroȝt
[4] Watz tried for his tricherie, þe trewest on erþe:
[5] Hit watz Ennias þe athel, and his highe kynde,
[6] þat siþen depreced prouinces, and patrounes bicome
[7] Welneȝ of al þe wele in þe west iles.
"After the siege and the assault were ended [lit. 'ceased'] at
Troy,
the city broken and burnt to brands and ashes,
the man
who had wrought there the plots of treason
was tried for his
treachery, the truest [example] on earth.
It was Aeneas the noble
and his high kindred
that afterwards conquered provinces and
became masters
of well-nigh all the wealth in the western isles
[regions]."
What are some archaic features of this Middle English text? (i.e. features that are more like Old English than like later Middle English. These can include spellings, sounds, poetic devices, morphology, syntax.) List 3 archaic features, citing the examples with their line numbers.
24.
25.
26.
List 3 differences between Old English and Middle English morphology and syntax as illustrated by the above passage in Middle English. (Cite the M.E. text with line numbers. )
27.
28.
29.
List 9 loanwords in this text that came from French during the Middle English period.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
Part VII. Scandinavian influence. (15)
39. get, give, kill, kilt, and kettle are all Scandinavian borrowings that in most cases replaced Old English words (which may or may not have been cognate with them).
What is it about the above words that allows us to recognize them as Scandinavian loans? If they were Old English words, how would they be different? (5 points)
40-44. Give 5 examples of Scandinavian loanwords which underwent some semantic change from their original meaning when they got into English. Indicate the original and the changed meaning in each case. (10 points).
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
Part VIII. Survey (2 points for answering. Specific answers are obviously not graded however. Don't worry about how long it took you; we are just trying to determine averages.)
45. How long approximately did it take you to do this exam?
46. How many sittings? (i.e. how many times did you go back to it after leaving your computer for more than 5 minutes?)
© 2001-2009 Suzanne Kemmer
Last modified 8 March 2009