Examine the Scandinavian Influence on English Language

A:-To the element of his language, an Englishman might apply what Wordsworth says of the daisy:

“Thou unassuming common-place

Of Nature, with that homely-face

And yet with something of a grace

Which Love makes for thee!”

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     The Old English language, was essentially self-sufficing, its foreign elements were few and did not modify the character of the language as a whole.  It was almost a purely Teutonic tongue, but practically from the close of the Old English period the foreign elements that began to enter into the language gradually modified its character to a great extent.  The Scandinavian element is one of the three that have really changed the character of the Old English language as no other element has done. The other two are French and Latin. These were, according to Jespersen, “Three super structures, as it were, that came to be erected on the Anglo-Saxon foundation, each of them modifying the character of the language, and each preparing the ground for its successor.”

         The Danish influence is of considerable importance from the point of view of the development of the language.  The contribution of the Danish settlers in the growth of British civilization and the permanent effects on English language have been very wide and deep and intimate, as is seen from the permanent place in English of purely Scandinavian words that are primarily grammatical elements in the language, such as the pronouns they, them and their. The early linguistic influence of the Danes can be felt in the use of the Scandinavian loan-word ‘to call’ in a glorious patriotic war-poem written shortly after the Battle of Maldon (993).

        A great number of Scandinavian families settled in England,specially in Norfolk,Suffolk,Lincolnshire,Northumbria,etc. Names of places ending in –by- thorp,-back and names of persons testify to the predominance of the invaders in great parts of England.

Scandinavian influence on place-names and proper names-

                      Certain names of places ending in –by,-thorp,-beck,-dale,-thwaite,-toft etc show Scandinavian influence. These suffixes are not found in English proper, e.g. - Whitby, Goldthorp, Braithwaite, Lowestoft, etc.

All these suffixes have the meaning ‘village’ or ‘hamlet’. This preponderance of the Scandinavian place-names shows that a great number of Scandinavian families settled in England.. It is apparent that these families entered intimately into the speech of the people of the Danelaw.Quite a large number of such place-names are found in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Cumberland, Westmoreland, Norfolk etc.  Personal names ending in-son as Gibson, Jonson, and Thomson also show Scandinavian preponderance.

The similarity between Old English and Old Norse was very great as both the English and Scandinavians were descended from the same Germanic stock. On account of the almost identical vocabulary of these two languages, it seems rather difficult to indicate the extent of the Scandinavian element in English. And say definitely whether some words which are used in English today originally belonged to the native English or they were borrowed from Scandinavians, though they could be distinguished from one another by a few sound tests.

However, number of words were then identical in two languages, as even now there is some correspondence between two languages, like man, wife, father, mother, wise, well, ill, over,under,come,sit,etc. Among the settlers there were Norwegians too, and it is difficult to say to which nation England owed most. Some words as ‘bound’, ‘busk’, ‘boon’ are Norwegian.

---------------   “And though the forms of grammar were very different, much of the vocabulary was shared between Old English and Old Norse dialects, with differences of pronunciation. Moreover, among the aristocracy of England and  Scandinavia there was a common Germanic heroic tradition and many commonly inherited cultural features which Christianity in England had not obliterated‘’ (Wrenn). “The most important and the most far-reaching influence of the Danish, however, was not so much upon the vocabulary as upon the pronunciation, grammar and syntax, and to some extent upon the development of dialect.”(F.T.Wood)

“Words are like leaves; and where they most abound.”

The influence of the Scandinavian conquest thus, manifests itself in three directions. They are-

(a) In certain place names and proper names

(b) In the introduction of new words of Danish origin and,

(c) In modification in respect of grammar and syntax, but more often pronunciation of the existing language.

Scandinavian influence in respect of law-terms and war-terms-

The attempt of the Scandinavians to impose on the English is clearly seen in a certain number of Scandinavian law-terms to some extent which have entered the language, though a great number of Scandinavian law-terms have gone out of use after the conquest of England by the Normans who took charge of legal affairs.

 Mention may be, however made of few of these Scandinavian terms which are in common use in Modern English like law, by-law, thrall, crave etc.

  As the Scandinavians were superior in land and sea fight, the English borrowed from them a few words in this sphere like orrest (battle),fylcian(to marshall),lith (fleet),barda (kind of warship),etc. These words, however soon disappeared.

Scandinavian influence on architecture and cooking-

Though the Scandinavians were not very superior in these spheres, still a few words from them were borrowed like-

Window (< Scandinavian word ‘vindauga’> ‘vinde’ is ‘wind’ +’auga’ is ‘eye’. So Scandinavian word literally meant ‘wind-eye’, i.e. an eye or hole for the admission of light and air), Steak (< Scandinavian word ‘steik’), Knife (< Scandinavian word knif)    etc.

Obsolete native words revitalized through Scandinavian influence-

Some words which had existed in Old English but had gone out of use, gained back the vitality and currency through Scandinavian influence.

The preposition ‘till’ is found only once or twice in Old English texts belonging  to the pre-Scandinavian period, but after the Danish conquest it begins to be exceedingly common  in English. Other words were blend, rim, run were very rare in old English but later their use was strengthened by the Scandinavian influence.

Survival of Scandinavian words due to agreement with other native words-

Here, the English took Scandinavian words for conveying ideas which could adequately be expressed with words of their own language.E.g. - The word ‘Die’-

The Scandinavian verb was ‘deya’ (die). This Scandinavian word was more easily associated with Old English ‘death’ and ‘dead’, probably because of the similarity of the initial sound than Old English ‘steorfan’ and ‘sweltan’. Old English noun and adjective ‘death’ and ‘dead’ had corresponding Old English verbs ‘steorfan’ and ‘sweltan’.

The Scandinavian word ‘deya’ replaced the Old English verbs ‘steorfan’ and ‘sweltan’, and survives in Mod. English as ‘die’.

‘Sweltan’ was totally discarded but ‘steorfan’ was retained and it attained a specialised sense ‘to starve’.

Similarly, the word ‘seat’ comes from the Scandinavian word ‘saete’. In Old English the verbs were ‘to sit’  and ‘to seat’. The  Scandinavian, ‘saete’ was adopted in English as noun because it agreed so well with the existing Old English verbs ‘to sit’ and ‘to seat’.

The Scandinavian word ‘want’ survived because of its agreement with Old English ‘wan’ means ‘wanting’ and ‘wana’ means ‘to want’.

The Scandinavian word ‘ill’ was retained because it agreed so well with Old English ‘evil’.

The Scandinavian word ‘same’ survived because it was easily associated with the Old English ‘swa’ means ‘so’.

The Scandinavian pronouns, they, them, their   survived and supplanted the Old English plural pronouns hie, heom, heora.

It is because of two reasons-

1) The Scandinavian pronouns with initial’th’ sound were readily associated with the Old English forms beginning with ‘th’sound in ‘the’, ‘that’,’this’ (Native Words)

2) These Scandinavian words were felt to be more distinct forms than the Old English forms hie,heom,heora which were supplanted.

          Otherwise, after the vowel sounds had become obscured, it would no longer have been possible to keep easily apart ‘he’ and ‘hie’,’him’ and heom.Her(hire)  and  heora,so that we would always have got confusion between Old English singular and plural forms: 

(i) He (singular) and hie (plural)

(ii) Him (singular) and heom (plural)

(iii) Her (singular) and heora (plural).

It took a long time before the Old English forms were finally discarded. The Old English dative ‘hem’ (heom) still survives in the form ‘em as take’,’em’which is ignorantly taken as the shortened form of ‘them’.

Scandinavian influence on form words-

Thus, the Scandinavian words not only made their way into English confined to nouns and adjectives and verbs, but also extended to pronouns,prepositions,adverbs and even a part of the verb to be.  Such parts of speech are not often transferred from one language to another.

(i) Pronouns- The pronouns they,them,there are Scandinavian,but they are not the only Scandinavian pronouns to be found in English. ‘Both’ and ‘same’, though not primarily pronouns,have pronominal uses and are of Scandinavian origin.

(ii) Prepositions-The preposition’till’ was at one time widely used in the sense of ‘to’.,besides having its present meaning.  The word ‘fro’, likewise in common use formerly as the equivalent of ‘from’,survives in the phrase ‘to and fro’.  Both words are from Scandinavian.

The Conjunction ‘though’,the Old Norse  equivalent of Old English ‘theah’. The scandanavian use of ‘at’ as a sign of the infinitive ,is to see in the English ‘ado’(at-do) and was widely used in this construction in Middle English.

(iii) Adverbs- The adverbs aloft,athwart,aye(ever) and seemly and the earlier hethen(hence) and whethen (whence) are all derived from the Scandinavian.

(iv) Verbs- While ‘we aron’ was the Old English form in the North, the West Saxon plural was ‘syndon’ and the form ‘are’ in Modern English undoubtedly owes its extension to the influence of the Danes.

Cases where Scandinavian forms survive in dialects, native in literary language-

There are cases where the old English forms belong to the literary language, while the Scandinavian forms occur only in some dialects. In the following pairs, the English word is given first.

Leap-loup,church-kirk,yard-garth, mouth-mun, chest-kist,dew-dog.

Cases where native form has survived, Scandinavian form has disappeared-

There are cases where the native form has remained and has ousted the Scandinavian form in course of time. E.g.-

Old English that has ousted the Scandinavian forms-(These Scandinavian (Sc.) forms have disappeared from the English Language.)

Loathe (Old English)              >                            laithe (Sc.)

Few      (Old English)              >                            fo (Sc.)

   Fish       (Old English)             >                            fisk (Sc.)

 Bench      (Old English)          >                            bennk (Sc.)

Yarn         (Old English)          >                             garn (Sc.)

 Naked        (Old English)       >                             naken (Sc.)

Origin of thence, hence, whence-

Thanon    (Old English) >    has ousted > thethen (Sc.)  and has become > ‘thence’,--- when at a later stage adverbial ‘s’ was added to the Old English form, and this ‘s’ gradually became ‘c’ that ultimately the Old English form became ‘thence’. Here we find that the Scandinavian ‘e’ has been retained, while the Old English vowel ‘o’ has disappeared.

Heonan  (Old English) >    has ousted > hethen (Sc.) and has become >  ‘hence’,--- when at a later stage adverbial ‘s’ was added to the Old English form, and this ‘s’ gradually became ‘c’ that ultimately the Old English form became ‘hence’. Here we find that the Scandinavian ‘e’ has been retained, while the Old English vowel ‘eo’ has disappeared.

Hwanon  (Old English) >    has ousted > hwethen (Sc.) and has become >  ‘whence’,---  when at a later stage adverbial ‘s’ was added to the Old English form, and this ‘s’ gradually became ‘c’ that ultimately the Old English form became ‘whence’<( hwanon  +c). Here again, we find that the Scandinavian ‘e’ has been retained, while the Old English vowel ‘o’ has disappeared.

Collateral existence of the Old English and the Scandinavian forms of the same word with slightly different shades of meaning-

As a result of the Scandinavian influence we come across a class of words, having two forms- one the Old English and the other the Scandinavian influence. Both of these forms are retained with slightly different shades of meaning, as in the following pairs where the first word is and the second Scandinavian, e.g.-whole -hale, no-nay, from-fro, shirt-skirt, edge-egg(incite),shriek-screech, rear-raise. All these forms are used in standard speech.

Cases where Scandinavian form has survived, native form has disappeared-

In these cases the Scandinavian forms have survived and have ousted the legitimate native forms, e.g.-

Sister> comes from > syster (Old Norse) has ousted sweoster (Old English)

They (Sc.)        >         yete (Native)

Get (Sc.)          >         yelde (Native)

Guild (Sc.)       >         yive (Native)

Gift (Sc.)          >          yift (Native) -- In this word, not only initial ‘g’ due to Scandinavian influence, but also has the modern meaning. The Old English word ‘yift’ meant ‘the price paid by a suitor in consideration of receiving a woman to wife.’

Kettle (Sc.)      >         chetel (Native)

              The Scandinavian verb ‘take’ replaced Old English ‘niman’, ‘cut’ took the place of Old English ‘smithan’, ‘window’ drove out the equally appropriate English word ‘eagthyrel’ means eye-thirl, i.e. eyehole, ‘sky’ took the place of Old English ‘wolcen’ is now being preserved only in poetical word ‘welkin’.  All these native forms have disappeared from the English language.

Sense-Shifting-

In some cases where, native form has survived but the meaning adopted is that of the corresponding Scandinavian word.

E.g. - The word ‘Dream’-

Old English Word                          Meaning in Mid. English and Modern English < Scandinavian influence

Dream ,(which originally meant ‘joy’) but,  in Mid. English, it is assumed modern meaning ‘vision of the night < taken over from the corresponding Old Norse ‘draumr’, Danish word as ‘drom’ which had also the meaning ‘vision of the night’.

Analogous cases are-

‘Bread’, an Old English word meant ‘fragment’. The word had survived but adopted in Mid. English the modern meaning ‘loaf’< taken over from the meaning of Danish ‘brod’.

‘Bloom’ (bloma), an Old English word meant ‘mass of metal’. The word had survived but adopted in Mid. English the modern meaning ‘shine’ taken over from the corresponding Scandinavian word.

‘Dwell’, an Old English word meant ‘to lead astray’. The word had survived but adopted the modern meaning ‘to remain in a place’ taken over from the corresponding Scandinavian word.

‘Gift’ (yift), an Old English word meant ‘the price paid by a suitor in consideration of receiving a woman to wife.’ The word had survived but adopted the modern meaning which is general, not specific, taken over from the meaning of Scandinavian word.

‘Earl’, an Old English word meant ‘nobleman’. The modern meaning is something specific (nobleman ranking between marquis and viscount) < has been taken over from the meaning of Old Norse ‘jarl’.

Scandinavian influence on pronunciation-

 Thus, the hard pronunciation of ‘g’ in give and get is due to the Scandinavian influence. In Old English these were ‘yive’ and ‘yete’.

Scandinavian influence on Grammar-

 A certain number of inflectional elements peculiar to the Northumbrian dialect have been attributed to Scandinavian influence-

(i) The ‘-s’ of the third person singular, present indicative of verbs and the participial ending-and, corresponding to’-end’ and ‘-ind’ in the Midlands and South, and now replaced by ‘-ing’ are said to be due to Scandinavian influence.

(ii) The final ‘t’which is the neuter adjective ending of Old Norse is  preserved in and forms an inseparable part of words like scant,want,athwart.

(iii) Except a few verbs like take, thrive, etc. which are strongly inflected as in Scandinavian, almost all Scandinavian strong verbs have been made weak in conjugation in English. ‘Die’, was a strong verb in Scandinavian but in English conjugation it has become a weak verb ‘died’.

(iv) Scandinavian nominative ending ‘-r’ in nouns was dropped in English, e.g. Scandinavian word ‘byr’ became ‘by’ in Native.

(v) There is at least one interesting word with the Scandinavian passive voice in ‘-sk’ as ‘busk’, but in English it is treated like an active form.

(vi)As the result of the influence, admixture was the leveling of the terminations in English, that is, the simplicity of declension and conjugation.

(vii) Certain prominal forms like ‘they,them,their’ ,adverbial forms ‘thence,hence,whence, present plural ‘are’ of the verb ‘to be’ and the prepositions like ‘till’ and ‘fro’ are all due to Scandinavian influence.

The bulk of Scandinavian words are of a purely democratic character. The French words introduced in the following centuries represent the rich and the refined. The Scandinavian influence is felt in the English grammar and syntax. The ‘-s’ of the third person singular in the present indicative tense of verbs is said to have been due to Scandinavian influence.

Scandinavian influence on Syntax-

(i)Relative clauses without any pronoun were very rare in Old English, but they became very common in Mid. English due to Scandinavian influence. E.g.-

The man whom I know.The man I know.

This is the book which I lost. This is the book I lost.

(In these second cases the relative prononouns whom and which are omitted.)

(ii) According to Jespersen the omission of the relative pronoun in relative clauses (This is the book I lost, in the example given in syntax) – the relative pronoun ‘which’ is omitted here, and the retention and omission of the conjunction ‘that’ are also due to the Scandinavian influence.

(iiii) The use of shall and will in Mid. English corresponds well Scandinavian.

Other points in syntax might perhaps ascribed to Scandinavian influence, such as the universal position of the genitive case before its noun (where Old English like German placed it very often after it),but in these delicate matters it is not safe to assert too much, as in fact many similarities may have been independently developed in  both languages.

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Except Settings, Ideas and To Contextualize, Words/References/Sentences from Manual of English Philology (P.K.Bose), Jespersen and West Bengal State University Book.