Rustic Speech and Folk-Lore

by Elizabeth Mary Wright

(c) f. Initial voiceless f has become the voiced spirant v in e.Hrf., parts of Glo., w.Brks. Wil. Dor. Dev. Som. The change must have taken place at a very early period because it is confined almost exclusively to native words, hence it must have taken place before the influx of French words. Three examples of this dialect peculiarity have been incorporated into lit. Eng., viz. vixen, vat, vane (O.E. fyxen, fæt, fana).

(5) The Dentals. (a) t. The initial combinations tr and str have become tþr, stþr, or þr, sþr in Irel. Wm. e. and se. Yks. e. em. and s.Lan. I.Ma., as tþrī, þrī, tree, stþrīt, sþrīt, street. Medial t between vowels and vowel-like consonants has become d in the sw. dialects, as bodl, bottle, kedl, kettle; bodm, bottom, occurs also in Sc. and n.Cy. dialects, but this goes back to a form bodan which existed beside botm already in O.E. The t in French words which has become tʃ [the sound of the medial consonant in nature] in lit. Eng. through the influence of the following ü has remained unchanged in the dialects, as piktə(r, picture, fiətə(r, feature. Final t has disappeared in many dialects after voiceless consonants, especially in the combination st; finally after k and p it has disappeared in all Sc. dialects, as fak(t, korek(t, temp(t. Examples of the loss of t after s occur in all parts of Sc. Irel. and Eng. especially in such words as beast, joist, last, next. In a few instances a t has been added after n, f, or s, as sāmənt, sermon, sudənt, sudden, vāmint, vermin, teligraft, telegraph, aist, ice, naist, nice, wənst, once, tweist, twice. This excrescent t occurs in certain words in the standard language, e.g. against (M.E. ageines), amidst (M.E. amiddes), behest (O.E. hǣs), betwixt (O.E. and M.E. betwix), whilst (M.E. whiles), ancient (Fr. ancien), pheasant (O.Fr. faisan).

(b) d. Intervocalic d followed by r in the next syllable became in the first instance ð in all dialects, as blaðə(r, bladder, konsiðə(r, consider, foðə(r, fodder, pūðə(r, powder, &c., in addition to the words which have ð in the standard language, as father, gather, mother, weather, &c. (O.E. fæder, gædrian, mōdor, weder, &c.). Examples of the ð forms begin to appear about the year 1500, but the change has never been consistently carried out in the literary language, whilst in the dialects its operation has been regular. Where exceptions seem to occur they are due either to the influence of the standard language or to the sound-change given below. This ð from d (O.E. fæder, &c.) fell together with O.E. ð in the same position (O.E. feðer, &c.), and underwent all further changes in common with it. It has thus become (1) d beside dð n.Cum. Wm. and parts of Yks. and Lan., (2) d in sn.Sc. n.Cy. and se.Cy. dialects. The words burden (O.E. byrþen) and murder (O.E. myrþran) had a spirant already in O.E. The forms with ð are still very common in Sc. Irel. n.Cy. Lan. Stf. Der. e.An. Medial d very seldom occurs in any of the dialects between n—l or n—r in such words as bundle, candle, gander, thunder, &c. Medial d has regularly disappeared after n in the Sc. dialects except in those of the south, as sinər, cinder, wɒnər, wonder, &c. Final d has a tendency in all dialects except those of the e. and se. counties to become t in words of more than one syllable, especially after n and r, as bi-jont, beyond, &c. Final d has generally disappeared after n in Sc., but in the southern counties of Sc. it has only disappeared in the conjunction and, the present participles, and in the pret. and pp. of strong verbs whose present ends in -nd. This loss of final d in the pret. and pp. of verbs like bind, find, grind is quite regular in Sc. Irel. and the north and north Midl. counties.

(c) þ. Initial þ has generally remained voiceless except in pronouns and the adverbs derived from them, as in the lit. language. The definite article has undergone various changes. It has become (1) t in me.Nhb. Cum. Wm. n. e. nm. sw. and s.Yks. nw.Lan. n.Lin. (2) þ in m. and se.Lan. wm.Stf. (3) t, þ sm. and w.Yks. n. em. sw. and s.Lan. Chs. n.Stf. Der. Not. (4) də Ken. Sus. (5) d, t w.Dur. ne.Yks. (6) d, t, þ nw. and e.Yks. (7) e Cai. Bnff. In all other dialects it has had the same development as in lit. Eng., viz. ðī̆, ðə. In those dialects which have both t and þ, the former is used before consonants (tman, &c.), and the latter before vowels (þapl, &c.), and when the sentence begins with the definite article.

(6) The Sibilants. s. Initial voiceless s has become z in those dialects where f in the same position has become v, cp. (4)(c) above. There is in the dialects a large number of words beginning with s plus a consonant where in most cases the s is not original. It occurs most frequently in the combinations sk and sq. In fact nearly all the sq words occurring in the dialects have forms with and without initial s. No rule can be laid down about the geographical distribution of the words belonging to this category. Examples are: sclasp beside clasp, sclimb beside climb, scrawl beside crawl, scroodle beside croodle, to crouch, skist beside kist, a chest, snotch beside notch, squench beside quench, strample beside trample, &c., &c. Dr. Johnson was familiar with scraunch beside craunch, cp. ‘To Craunch. v.a. [schrantsen, Dutch; whence the vulgar say more properly to scraunch.] To crush in the mouth. The word is used by Swift.’ In Glo. and the s. and sw. counties sp has generally become ps by metathesis, as aps, asp, klaps, clasp, lipsy, to lisp; wæps and wæsp existed in O.E., so in the modern dialects there are double forms.

(7) The Gutturals. (a) k. Initial k, generally written c in O.E., has remained before n in such words as knave, knead, knit, knock, &c., in ne.Sc. In the remaining parts of Scotland it has disappeared in the dialect of the younger generation. In the early part of the last century it was preserved in all Sc. dialects. tn from older kn is still used by old people in w.Frf. and e.Per. A generation ago this tn was also common in the dialects of Cum. and Wm., but it is now obsolete. Initial cl has become tl in many of the dialects of Eng. especially in Yks. Lan. the Midlands, and the s. and sw. dialects, in such words as clap, claw, cliff, climb, cloak, cloud. No Sc. or Ir. dialect has changed initial cl to tl. In other respects initial c has generally had the same development in the dialects as in the standard language. Initial sc has become, ʃ [the initial sound in she] in native Eng. words just as in the lit. language, as shade, shell, ship, &c.; whereas in words of foreign origin it has remained in the dialects just as in the lit. language, as scaffold, scale, scatter, school, skin, &c. Excluding all sc- words which are of various origins and which are common both to the lit. language and the dialects—such as the words in the above list: scaffold, scale, &c.—it is a remarkable fact that the English Dialect Dictionary contains no less than 1,154 simple sc- words. This points to one of two things: either the dialects contain a far larger number of Norse words than is generally supposed, or else it is not certain that initial sc has under all circumstances become ʃ in native words in the dialects. Words where a final k has become tʃ in the lit. lang. generally have tʃ also in the dialects, as bleach, flitch, reach, stitch, &c. But in the dialects of Sc. Irel. n.Cy. and parts of the n.Midlands assibilation has not taken place to the same extent as in the lit. language, hence such forms as skrīk, sik, þak, &c., lit. Eng. screech, such, thatch, &c.

(b) g. Initial g has remained before n in gnat, gnaw in ne. and s.n.Sc., but it has disappeared in the remaining parts of Sc. Irel. and Eng. Initial gl has become dl in many dialects of Eng., especially in Yks. Lan. the Midlands, and the s. and sw. dialects, parallel to the change of cl to tl.

Final g. O.E. geminated g, written cg, has generally become dȝ [the final sound in sedge] in the dialects in such words as bridge, edge, ridge, &c., but as in the case of the change of final k to tʃ, in Sc. and the northern parts of Eng. assibilation has not taken place to the same extent as in the lit. language, hence such forms as brig, rig, seg, &c., lit. Eng. bridge, ridge, sedge, &c.

(c) h. Initial h has remained before vowels in Sc. Irel. Nhb. and perhaps also in portions of n.Dur. and n.Cum. In the remaining parts of Eng. it has disappeared, but words originally beginning with a vowel or h often have an h prefixed when the dialect speaker wishes to express a strong emphasis. The emphatic form of it has retained the h in Sc. and Irel. The emphatic form of us is hɒz in Sc. and Nhb., the only word in the Sc. dialects containing an inorganic h. Medial and final χ [the final sound in Sc. loch] has generally become f in the dialects of Eng. in those words which have f in the lit. language, as cough, laugh, rough, tough, but f also occurs in many dialects in certain other words besides, as daftər, slaftər, þoft, þruf, &c., lit. Eng. daughter, slaughter, thought, through, &c.

To turn now from phonology to accidence, we shall find that here, too, system and rule prevail to a surprising extent.