Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-rdgjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-09T03:58:13.565Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Open Syllable Lengthening in West Germanic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2026

Aditi Lahiri  and
B. Elan Dresher
Aditi Lahiri*
Affiliation:
University of Konstanz
B. Elan Dresher*
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
*
Lahiri, Fachgruppe Sprachwissenschaft, Universität Konstanz D186, 78457 Konstanz, Germany [aditi.lahiri@uni-Konstanz.de]
Dresher, Dept. of Linguistics, University of Toronto, 130 St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada MSS 3H1 [dresher@epas.utoronto.ca]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Vowels in stressed syllables in the West Germanic languages—e.g. Middle English, Middle Dutch and Middle High German—were lengthened under certain circumstances. There have been two different explanations for this change. The traditional assumption is that a process of open syllable lengthening (OSL) was introduced to standardize the quantity of stressed syllables (Prokosch 1939, among others). The second, quite different, approach assumes that the lengthening process (at least in Middle English) is not OSL but some sort of compensatory lengthening caused by the loss of a final schwa (Minkova 1982, 1985, Lass 1985, Hayes 1989, Kim 1993). We attempt to show that OSL was part of the grammar of all three languages, but that the motivation depended on the local contexts. We claim that all three languages endeavored to maintain and maximize the Germanic foot (Dresher & Lahiri 1991), and OSL contributed in different ways to do so.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 75 , Issue 4 , December 1999 , pp. 678 - 719
Copyright
Copyright © 1999 Linguistic Society of America

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.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 1998. Prosodic optimization: The Middle English length adjustment. English Language and Linguistics 2.2.169–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bliss, A. J. 1952/53. Vowel-quantity in Middle English borrowings from Anglo-Norman. Archivum Linguisticum 4. 121–47.Google Scholar
Bosworth, Joseph, and Toller, T. Northcote. 1898. An Anglo-Saxon dictionary. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Braune, Wilhelm, and Mitzka, Walther. 1967. Althochdeutsche Grammatik. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Brunner, Karl. 1970. An outline of Middle English grammar. Translated by G. Johnston from the fifth edition of Abriss der mittelenglischen Grammatik, Tübingen. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Campbell, A. 1959. Old English grammar. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
CELEX. 1995. Centre for lexical information, Lexical database release 2. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.Google Scholar
De Vries, Jan. 1971. Nederlands etymologisch Woordenboek. Leiden: E. J. Brill.Google Scholar
De Vries, Jan, and Follenaere, F. de. 1983. Etymologisch woordenboek. Waar komen onze woorden vandaan? Utrecht: Uitgeverij Het Spectrum.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan. 1978. Old English and the theory of phonology. Amherst: University of Massachusetts dissertation. [Published, New York: Garland, 1985]Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan. 1980. The Mercian second fronting: A case of rule loss in Old English. Linguistic Inquiry 11. 47–73.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan. 1998. Analogical levelling in West Germanic. Analogy and markedness, ed. by Lahiri, Aditi. Berlin: Mouton, to appear.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan, and Lahiri, Aditi. 1991. Metrical coherence in Germanic. Linguistic Inquiry 22. 251–86.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan, and van, Harry Hulst, der. 1993. Head-dependent asymmetries in phonology. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 12. 1–17.Google Scholar
Dresher, B. Elan. 1995. Head-dependent asymmetries in phonology. Leiden in last: HIL phonology papers 1, ed. by van, Harry Hulst, der and van, Jeroen Weijer, de, 401–31. The Hague: Holland Academic Graphics.Google Scholar
Erdmann, Peter. 1972. Tiefenphonologische Lautgeschichte der englischen Vokale. Frankfurt: Athenäum.Google Scholar
Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen. 1989. Ed. by Pfeiffer, Wolfgang. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.Google Scholar
Franck, Johannes. 1971. Mittelniederländische Grammatik. 2. Aufl. Arnheim: Gysbers and van Loon.Google Scholar
Hayes, Bruce. 1989. Compensatory lengthening in moraic phonology. Linguistic Inquiry 20. 253–306.Google Scholar
Hogg, Richard M. 1992. A grammar of Old English, vol. 1. Phonology. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hogg, Richard M. 1996. Old English open syllable lengthening. Transactions of the Philological Society 94. 57–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holthausen, Ferdinand. 1934. Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. 3. unveränderte Aufl. 1974. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitätsverlag.Google Scholar
Jones, Charles. 1989. A history of English phonology. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Jordan, Richard. 1974. Handbook of Middle English grammar: Phonology. Translated and revised by Eugene Joseph Crook. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Kim, Myungsook. 1993. On lengthening in the open syllables of Middle English. Lingua 91. 261–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Robert D. 1969. Historical linguistics and generative grammar. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Kury$lsowicz, Jerzy. 1945-49. La nature des procès dits 'analogique'. Reprinted in Readings in linguistics 2, ed. by E. P. Hamp, R. A. Householder, and R. Austerlitz, 158–74. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966.Google Scholar
Kury$lsowicz, Jerzy. 1973. Esquisses linguistiques 1. Munich: Wilhelm Fink.Google Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi. 1982. Theoretical implications of analogical change: Evidence from Germanic languages. Providence, RI: Brown University dissertation.Google Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi. 1994. Prosodic shifts in Germanic. Talk presented at the European Science Foundation ninth Word Prosody Systems conference, Strassbourg.Google Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi. 1995. Pervasion, simplification and optimization in language change. Plenary talk at the thirteenth international Congress of Historical Linguistics, Manchester.Google Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi, and Dresher, B. Elan. 1983-84. Diachronic and synchronic implications of declension shifts. Linguistic Review 3. 141–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi, and Fikkert, Paula. 1999. Trisyllabic shortening in English: Past and present. English Language and Linguistics 3. 229–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lahiri, Aditi, Riad, Tomas; and Jacobs, Haike. 1999. Diachrony. Word prosodic systems in the languages of Europe, ed. by van, Harry Hulst, der, 335–421. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Lass, Roger. 1985. Minkova noch einmal: MEOSL and the resolved foot. Folia Linguistica Historica 4. 245–65.Google Scholar
Lass, Roger. 1992. Phonology and morphology. The Cambridge history of the English language, vol. 2, ed. by Blake, Normal, 23–155. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leys, Odo. 1975. Die Dehnung von Vokalen im Niederländischen und im Deutschen. Leuvense Bijdragen 64. 421–49.Google Scholar
Lieber, Rochelle. 1979. On Middle English lengthening in open syllables. Linguistic Analysis 5. 1–27.Google Scholar
Luick, Karl. 1898. Beiträge zur englischen Grammatik 3: Die Quantitätsveränderungen im Laufe der englischen Sprachentwicklung. Anglia 20. 335–62.Google Scholar
Luick, Karl. 1914-40. Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache. Erster Band, 1 Abteilung. Reprinted, 1964, Stuttgart/Oxford: Tauchnitz/Blackwell.Google Scholar
Minkoff, Marco. 1955. English historical grammar. 3rd edn. 1972. Sofia: Nauka i izkustvo.Google Scholar
Minkova, Donka. 1982. The environment for open syllable lengthening in Middle English. Folia Linguistica Historica 3.2.29–58.Google Scholar
Minkova, Donka. 1985. Of rhyme and reason: Some foot-governed quantity changes in English. Papers from the fourth international conference on English theoretical linguistics, ed. by Eaton, R. et al., 163–78. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Minkova, Donka, and Stockwell, Robert P. 1998. The origins of long-short allomorphy in English. Advances in English historical linguistics 1996, ed. by Fisiak, Jacek and Krygier, Marcin, 211–39. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Morsbach, Lorenz. 1896. Mittelenglische Grammatik, Halle: Max Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. 1994. Ed. by Onions, C. T. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Oxford English dictionary. 1989–. 2nd edn. prepared by Simpson, J.A. and Weiner, E.S.C. 20 vols. [Note: Includes first edition and supplements, reset with additions and corrections. First edition issued as: Murray, James Augustus Henry, Sir, 1837–1915. The Oxford English dictionary 1933. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Includes bibliographical references.]Google Scholar
Paul, Hermann, and Mitzka, Walther. 1959. Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik, 18th edition revised by Walther Mitzka. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Pijnenburg, W. J. J., and van der Voort van der Kleij, J. J. 1984. Woordenboek Middelnederlands. Utrecht: Uitgeverij Het Spectrum.Google Scholar
Priebsch, Robert, and Collinson, W. E. 1934. The German language. London: Faber & Faber.Google Scholar
Prince, Alan, and Smolensky, Paul. 1993. Optimality theory: Constraint interaction in generative grammar. New Brunswick, NJ and Boulder, CO: Rutgers University and University of Colorado, @@sc@@ms@@/sc@@.Google Scholar
Prokosch, Eduard. 1933. An outline of German historical grammar. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Prokosch, Eduard. 1939. A comparative Germanic grammar. Pennsylvania: Linguistic Society of America, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.Google Scholar
Reis, Marga. 1974a. Lauttheorie und Lautgeschichte. München: Wilhelm Fink.Google Scholar
Reis, Marga. 1974b. Zum lautgeschichtlichen Erkennungswert moderner Lauttheorie. Vorträge und Berichte der Stuttgarter Germanistentagung 1972, ed. by Müller-Seidel, Walter, 77–92. München: Wilhelm Fink.Google Scholar
Ritt, Nicholas. 1994. Quantity adjustment: Vowel lengthening and shortening in early Middle English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sarrazin, G. 1898. Mittelenglische Vokaldehnung in offener Silbe und Streitbergs Dehnungsgesetz. Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen 101. 65–86.Google Scholar
Schade, Oskar. 1969. Altdeutsches Wörterbuch I. Teil 1 und Teil 2. Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung.Google Scholar
Sievers, Eduard. 1885. An Old English grammar. Trans, and ed. by A. S. Cook. Boston: Ginn & Company.Google Scholar
Sweet, Henry. 1888. A history of English sounds. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
van Bree, Cor. 1977. Leerboek voor de historische grammatica van het Nederlands. Klanken vormleer met een beknopte grammatica van het Gotisch. Groningen: Wolters Noordhoff.Google Scholar
van Loey, A. 1954. Schönfelds historische grammatica van het Nederlands. Klankleer, Vormleer, Woordvorming. 5th edn. Zutphen: W. J. Thieme.Google Scholar
van Loey, A. 1969. Middelnederlandse spraakkunst 1. Vormleer. Groningen: Wolters-Noordhoff.Google Scholar
van Wijk, Nikolaas. 1949. Franck's etymologisch Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.Google Scholar
Vennemann, Theo. 1988. Preference laws for syllable structure and the explanation of sound change. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Wright, Joseph. 1906. Old High German primer, 2nd edn. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Wright, Joseph, and Wright, Elizabeth Mary. 1925. Old English grammar, 3rd edn. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wright, Joseph. 1928. An elementary Middle English grammar, 2nd edn. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar