Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:40:45.522Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Synchronic Umlaut in Old Icelandic*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2008

Gregory K. Iverson
Gregory K. Iverson
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242USA
Get access

Abstract

Recent papers by Cathey and Demers (1975, 1976, 1977, ms) have incorporated an analysis of Old Icelandic phonology in which purely phonetically conditioned rules of i-Umlaut and u-Umlaut are crucial not only to the analysis itself, but to the theoretical implications theauthors draw from that analysis. Synchronically, however, the non exceptional application of i-Umlaut is restricted to just four morpho-syntactic classes: athematic and j-thematic verbs in the preterite subjunctive, j-thematic verbs in the non-preterite, adjectives with a consonant-initial comparative suffix, and athematic feminine or plural r-stem nouns. Historical u-Umlaut continues to round a to Q before u in the next syllable even in literary Old Icelandic, but its application is also morphologically induced, viz. a → Q in all feminines, plurals, and u-stems not followed by a vocalic suffix. All intraparadigmatic umlaut alternations are covered by these morphologizations, which in turn obviate the abstractions proposed by Cathey and Demers.

Type
Research Article
Information
Nordic Journal of Linguistics , Volume 1 , Issue 2 , December 1978 , pp. 121 - 139
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Andersen, , Stephen, R. 1974: The Organization of Phonology. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Cathey, , James, and Demers, , Richard, 1975: The Single Weak Verb Class of Old Icelandic. In Dahlstedt, , Karl-Hampus, (ed.) 1975: The Nordic Languages and Modern Linguistics 2. Almquist and Wiksell, Stockholm, pp. 407–418.Google Scholar
Cathey, , James, and Demers, , Richard, 1976: On Establishing Linguistic Universals. Language 52, 611–630.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cathey, , James, and Demers, , Richard, 1977: The Nominal Phonology and Morphology of Old Icelandic. To appear in Weinstock, , John, (ed.) The Nordic Languages and Modern Linguistics 3Google Scholar
Cathey, , James, and Demers, , Richard, MS: Vocalic Alternations in Old Icelandic de Vries, 01 1962: Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 2nd ed., E.J. Brill, Leiden.Google Scholar
Gordon, E.V. 1968: An Introduction to Old Norse. 2nd ed., revised by Taylor, A.R.. Clarendon Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Heusler, , Andreas, , 1964: Altisländisches Elementarbuch. 6th ed., Carl winter Universitätsverlag, Heidelberg.Google Scholar
Iversen, , Ragnvald, 1955: NorrØn Grammatik. 5th ed., Forlaget av H. Aschehoug & Co., Oslo.Google Scholar
Iverson, , Gregory, K. 1975: Review of The Organization of Phonology, by S. R. Anderson. Language Sciences 37, 23–26.Google Scholar
Iverson, , Gregory, K. 1977: On the Directionality of Paradigam Regularization. To appear in Goyvaerts, D. L. (ed.) Phonology in the 1970's. E. Story-Scienta, Ghent.Google Scholar
Iverson, , Gregory, K. and Anderson, , Stephen, R. 1976: Icelandic u-Umlaut: An Exchange of Views. Language Sciences 42, 28–34.Google Scholar
King, , Robert, D. 1971: Syncope and Old Icelandic i-Umlaut. Arkiv för Nordisk Filologi 84, 1–18.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, , Paul, , 1976: Abstractness, Opacity, and Global Rules. In Koutsoudas, , Andreas, (ed.) 1976: The Application and Ordering of Grammatical Rules. Mouton, The Hague, pp. 160–186.Google Scholar
Noreen, , Adolf, 1913: Geschicte der nordischen Sprachen, besonders in altnordischer Zeit. 3rd ed., Verlag von Karl J. Tröbner, Strassburg.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Noreen, , Adolf, 1970: Altnordische Grammatick I. 4th ed., Alabama Linguistic and Philological Series #19, The University of Alabama Press, University, Alabama.Google Scholar