Lectures on the Science of Language

by F. Max Müller

Singular.	Dual.	Plural.
nas-i-dêdjau	nas-i-dêdeiva	nas-i-dêdeima.
nas-i-dêdeis	nas-i-dêdeits	nas-i-dêdeiþ.
nas-i-dêdi	——	nas-i-dêdeina.

This is reduced in Anglo-Saxon to:

Singular.	Plural.
ner-ë-de	ner-ë-don.
ner-ë-dest	ner-ë-don.
ner-ë-de	ner-ë-don.

Subjunctive:

ner-ë-de	ner-ë-don.
ner-ë-de	ner-ë-don.
ner-ë-de	ner-ë-don.

Let us now look to the auxiliary verb to do, in Anglo-Saxon:

Singular.	Plural.
dide	didon.
didest	didon.
dide	didon.

If we had only the Anglo-Saxon preterite nerëde and the Anglo-Saxon dide, the identity of the de in nerëde with dide would not be very apparent. But here you will perceive the advantage which Gothic has over all other Teutonic dialects for the purposes of grammatical comparison and analysis. It is in Gothic, and in Gothic in the plural only, that the full auxiliary dêdum, dêduþ, dêdun has been preserved. In the Gothic singular nasida, nasidês, nasida stand for nasideda, nasidedês, [pg 233] nasideda. The same contraction has taken place in Anglo-Saxon, not only in the singular but in the plural also. Yet, such is the similarity between Gothic and Anglo-Saxon that we cannot doubt their preterites having been formed on the same last. If there be any truth in inductive reasoning, there must have been an original Anglo-Saxon preterite,[215]

Singular.	Plural.
ner-ë-dide	ner-ë-didon.
ner-ë-didest	ner-ë-didon.
ner-ë-dide	ner-ë-didon.

And as ner-ë-dide dwindled down to nerëde, so nerëde would, in modern English, become nered. The d of the preterite, therefore, which changes I love into I loved is originally the auxiliary verb to do, and I loved is the same as I love did, or I did love. In English dialects, as, for instance, in the Dorset dialect, every preterite, if it expresses a lasting or repeated action, is formed by I did,[216] and a distinction is thus established between “'e died eesterdae,” and “the vo'ke did die by scores;” though originally died is the same as die did.