The English Language

by R. G. Latham

NOUNS.

Of Gender.—In Anglo-Saxon there are three genders, the masculine, the feminine, and the neuter. With adjectives each gender has its peculiar declension; with substantives there are also appropriate terminations, but only to a certain degree; e.g., of words ending in -a (nama, a name; cuma, a guest), it may be stated that they are always masculine; of words in -u (sunu, a son; gifu, a gift), that they are never neuter; in other words, that they are either mas. or fem.

The definite article varies with the gender of its substantive; þæt eage, the eye; se steorra, the star; seo tunge, the tongue.

Of Number.—The plural form in -en (as in oxen), rare in English, was common in Anglo-Saxon. It was the regular termination of a whole declension; e.g., eágan, eyes; steorran, stars; tungan, tongues. Besides this, the Anglo-Saxons had forms in -u and -a, as ricu, kingdoms; gifa, gifts. The termination -s, current in the present English was confined to a single gender and to a single declension, as endas, ends; dagas, days; smiðas, smiths.

Of Case.—Of these the Saxons had, for their substantives, at least three; viz. the nominative, dative, genitive. With the pronouns and adjectives there was a true accusative form; and with a few especial words an ablative or instrumental one. Smið, a smith; smiðe, to a smith; smiðes, of a smith. Plural, smiðas, smiths; smiðum, to smiths; smiða, of smiths: he, he; hine, him; him, to him; his, his; se, the; þa, the; þy, with the; þam, to the; þæs, of the.

Of the dative in -um, the word whilom (at times, at whiles) is a still extant and an almost isolated specimen.

Of Declension.—In Anglo-Saxon it is necessary to determine the termination of a substantive. There is the weak, or simple declension for words ending in a vowel (as eage, steorra, tunga), and the strong, or complex declension for words ending in a consonant (smið, spræc, leáf). The letters i and u are dealt with as semivowels, semivowels being dealt with as consonants; so that words like sunu and gifu belong to the same declension as smið and sprǽc.

That the form of adjectives varies with their definitude or indefinitude, has been seen from [§ 93]: definite adjectives following the inflection of the simple; indefinite ones that of the complex declension.

The detail of the Anglo-Saxon declension may be collected from [§§ 83]-89.