The Lexicon

Loan Resistance

English	computer	mobile phone/cell phone
Dutch	computer	mobiele telefoon/mobieltje
German	Computer/Rechner	Handy
French	ordinateur	téléphone mobile
Finnish	tietokone	matkapuhelin/kännykkä
Icelandic	tölva	farsími

Medieval Loans: Celtic

• A very small number of landscape terms: crag survives
• Evidently considered a low-status source (cf. wealh)

Medieval Loans: Latin

• OE period: ecclesiastical word-field
  • psealm, prēost, mæsse
• Generally: learning and administration
  • contradiction, item, scribe, simile

Medieval Loans: Old Norse

• OE period
  • Nautical word-field: wīcing, æsc, cnearr, liþ
  • Legal word-field: lagu, griþ, saclēas
• Later loans: thousands, many now core vocabulary
  • Lexical words:
    • Verbs: call, cast, choose, die, get, hit, loan, raise, rid, seem, take, want
    • Nouns: anger, dirt, egg, fellow, guest, husband, keel, knife, leg, outlaw, skull, sky, window, wing
    • Adjectives: flat, ill, loose
  • Function words: Both, same, they, though

Medieval Loans: French

~900 pre-1250 (Norman), ~10,000 after; especially higher-register lexical words:

• Law and administration: administration, count, crime, duke, judgement, judge, jury, liberty, peasant, prince, prison, state; accuse, complain, condemn, govern
• Church: abbey, clergy, confession, convent, creator, devotion, miracle, religion, saint, sermon, theology; adore, convert, pray, preach
• High culture: beef, diamond, fur, jewel, mutton, pearl, pork, satin, venison
• Military: banner, battle, siege, standard

Lexical Competition

OE ey ↔ ON egg
OE þēah ↔ ON þó
NF reward ↔ CF regard
NF wile ↔ CF guile
Latin debita (< dēbitum) ↔ French dette

(Early) Modern Loans: Science

• Latin: antenna, data, fauna, genus, inertia, larva, nucleus, pendulum, species, tentacle, vertebra, virus
• Greek: cosmos, metereology, narcosis; indirect: anaesthesia, camera, electric
• French: anatomy, muscle

(Early) Modern Loans: Culture and Food

• French: ballet, beau, cabaret, casserole, champagne, elegant, etiquette, genteel, liqueur, ragout, salon, soup, vogue (food terms mostly c18)

(Early) Modern Loans: Law, Military, Politics

• Latin: propaganda, ultimatum, veto
• French: bayonet, brigade, colonel, envoy, platoon

(Early) Modern Loans: General

• Latin: agenda, area, dismiss, exit, instructor, popular
• French: role, trophy
• Greek: attic, crisis

(Early) Modern Loans: Trade, Art

• Dutch: cookie, dock, dollar, landscape, sketch, tea, yacht
• Portuguese
• Celtic
• British colonial languages

Semantic Field

Consociated Versus Dissociated Lexicon

Base Word	Derivative	Base Word	Derivative
Mund	mündlich	mouth	oral
Gesetz	gesetzlich	law	legal
Zahn	Zahnarzt	tooth	dentist

Normalization of Foreign Morphemes

• Negative prefixes: (un-); a-, dis, in-, non-
• Privative prefixes: de-, dis-
• Locative, temporal, pejorative, intensifying, quantifying prefixes
• Suffixes: -age, -ist, -ique, -ment, etc.