Dieter Kastovsky
ic's
vocabulary
foreign,
strange
martyr
dare
prepare,
supply
church
in the
sense
of
community
of
people
Lat.
virtus
=
virtue
Lat.
virtus
=
power,
might,
heavenly powers
terror,
fright
correct,
mend one's
way

—
martir
113
martirdom
53
dyrstigness
30
—
—
maegen"
40
heafodnuegen
1
heahmsegen
1
—
broga
2
ege71
fyrhto
25
gerihtan
18
rihting
12
—
pryte
1
cynehelm"
25

Bible-translations
early
late
Orosius
Benedictine group
wsr{scipe)
n>a>r(scipe)
gleaw(mss)
ghawiness)
gleaw{scipe)
snotetiness)
(snyttru)
snotoriness)
ofermod/-mtttu
ofermod/-mettu
ofermodigness
ofermod{nets)
ofermod{ness)
ofermodig(ness)
ofermodigl -mettu
modig{ness)
348
Semantics and vocabulary
Seebold (1974:320) suggests that the difference between the Benedictine
group and the other three groups is almost certainly due to dialectal
variation, and not just a matter of diachrony within a single dialect.
Thus the Benedictine group must have relied rather heavily on a local
southern dialect when establishing their written norm, which also
spread to the area of the Bible translations (possibly Canterbury). This
conclusion basically agrees with the findings of Gneuss (1972), except

besargian
'lament',
eornostlice
'therefore, indeed', gedeorf 'labour', msersian
'praise',
scrudnian
'examine, consider', pxslic 'suitable', wxfels 'dress,
cloak' (Gneuss 1972:80),
behatan
'promise',
hundfeald
'hundredfold',
wipxftan 'from behind', tima 'time',
wiperwinna
'opponent' (Wenisch
1978:21).
5.3.1.5
Dialects tend to differ not only at the level of the individual
lexeme, but also at the more general level of word-formation, in that
they select or at least favour certain patterns over other functionally
equivalent ones. This is corroborated by a number of observations,
although a systematic investigation of this aspect of OE word-formation
does not yet exist.
One clear-cut difference between Anglian and non-Anglian dialects is
the employment of
-icge
vs.
-estre
for the formation of female agent
nouns (von Lindheim 1958, 1969; Schabram 1970). For example,

lufestre
'female
lover', etc., occur only in WS texts.
Similarly, the suffixoids (Sauer 1985:283)
-berende
and
-bxre
acting as
equivalents of Lat. -fer/-ger (cf. Lat.
lucifer,
floriger)
seem to occur in
complementary dialectal distribution (von Lindheim 1972). Thus
-berende
(in
adlberende
'carrying illness',
mppelberende
'apple-bearing',
atorberende'
poisonous',
blostmberende'
flower-bearing',
etc.) is practically
exclusively Anglian; only
deapberende
'death-bearing' CP 280.7,
leoht-
berende
'light-carrying' Hept Gen XV.

points to the Northumbrian compounds in
-welle,
e.g. lifwelk 'living',
harwelle
' hoary',
hundwelle
'
a
hundredfold',
rumwelle
' spacious',
deadwelle
'barren' (Jordan 1906:109), which are not found in the south.
Another example is -nis/-nes, forming abstract nouns, which ac-
cording to Jordan (1906:101) 'in WS in general is only denominal, i.e.
is added to the participle (mainly pret. part.), while in Anglian it is added
to the verbal stem. EWS has more formations derived from the verbal
stem than LWS' [my translation]. There are indeed many doublets
(Jordan lists
acennis/acennedness
'birth',
gecignes,
cignes
/gecyg(e)dness
'call-
ing', gedrefnis/gedrefednis 'tempest',
gemengnis/gemengednys
'mingling',
tostemnisItostencednis ' dispersion, destruction',
geswencnes/'geswencednes

diachronic or a diatopic phenomenon.
5.3.2
Diaphasic variation
5.3.2.1
As pointed out in §5.1.2, there are various dimensions of
variation besides ' region' that affect the structure of
the
OE vocabulary.
Of these, ' social group' (or ' diastratic variation') and ' medium' are
necessarily monostratal because of the nature of the OE texts, which all
come from the same type of social group and represent only the written
language. At the same time this limits the dimension of' attitude' to the
formal level. There have been some attempts to discover OE
colloquialisms in vocabulary and meaning on the basis of the OE
Riddles and of native words that appear for the first time in early ME.
Thus,
von Lindheim (1951/2) suggests that
wamb
'womb',
neb
'nose',
Pyre/
'hole',
steort
'tail', all typical riddle-words with possibly obscene
connotations and not occurring in other types of poetry, as well as the
meaning 'lust' oiwlonc and^a/ might have been colloquial in OE. But
both the method and the available material have strong limitations, and
the conclusion must necessarily remain rather tentative. Within the
formal level, however, there are remarkable differences between poetry

Dieter Kastovsky
e.g.
abbod
'abbot',
borg
'surety',
ege
'fright',
hopa
'hope', nouns in
-ere,
verbs in
-Isecan,
loan-translations, later loans from Latin, etc. (cf. Stanley
1971).
Purely poetic words have always received special attention and
are usually also given specific labels in dictionaries (cf. Clark Hall 1960)
or editions (cf. Klaeber 1950:lxiii, 293ff.). But, as Schabram (1966:85,
1969:101) has pointed out, such indications are far from reliable,
because they are usually not based on a complete survey of the prose
texts.
The existence of specifically prosaic words has also been known
for quite a long time, but the first systematic study was Stanley (1971),
who investigated those specifically prosaic words that occasionally also
occur in strict verse (cf. also Gneuss 1982:158).
5.3.2.3
The existence of specifically poetic words as such is not too
surprising, because poetry not infrequently tries to use a diction that
differs from everyday language, for example, by employing rare,
frequently archaic words. The same is of course true of OE, and many

Ic )?ses wine Deniga,
frean Scyldinga frinan wille,
beaga bryttan swa
\>u
bena eart
)?eoden maerne ymb )?inne si6
'I shall ask the lord of Danes, the ruler of the Scyldings, giver of
rings,
as you make petition, ask the famous prince concerning your visit '
35*
Semantics and vocabulary
Here, wine
Deniga
'lord of the Danes', frean
Scyldinga
'ruler of the
Scyldings',
beaga bryttan
'giver of rings',
peoden mserne
'famous prince'
all refer to King Hrothgar, but describe him from different points of
view, attributing different properties to him. This rhetorical figure
obviously requires a large number of synonyms, either simple or
complex, especially in those areas that form the central topics of
the
OE
poetic literature. It is not surprising, therefore, that there are so many
(partial) synonyms for notions such as 'sea' (see Buckhurst 1929) (e.g.
sse,

and many others. And this is also the reason why
the determination of the precise shade of meaning of those synonyms is
so difficult, at least as far as simple lexical items are concerned. Items
such as brimwudu,
sxhengest
at the same time represent another
phenomenon characteristic of Germanic poetry in general and also
directly related to the principle of variation: the systematic use of simple
and complex metaphorical expressions called heiti and
kenningar
(cf.
Marquardt 1938; Brodeur 1959:247-59). Following Snorri Sturluson's
categorisation in
Skdldskaparmdl
(see Brodeur 1952; 1959:247ff.), three
categories may be distinguished.
The
o'kend
heiti ('uncharacterised terms') are simple, unqualified
nouns with a literal (e.g.
scip,
bat)
or a metaphorical/figurative (e.g. flota
'that which floats = ship',
ceol
'keel = ship') interpretation; the kend
heiti
and the
kenningar
are complex expressions serving as metaphorical

rodores
candel'
heaven-candle' or
beofnes
gim
'heavenly gem', except in a metaphorical sense (but cf. Marquardt
1938:116fF., who rejects this distinction and treats both types as
kenningar).
In the kennings, there is thus 'a tension between the concept
and the base-word; the limiting word partially resolves the unreality of
that relation it depends on the hearer's ability and willingness to see
likeness within unlikeness' (Brodeur 1959:150-1).
Both types of periphrasis, typically associated with variation struc-
tures,
are extremely frequent in OE poetry. Further examples of
kend
heiti are expressions for earth (hxlepa epel 'home of men',
feeder
ealdgeweorc '
ancient work of the Father'), the sea
(fisces
epel'
home of the
fish',
seolhbxp '
seal-bath', jpa
geswing
' surge of the waves'), thunder
{wolcna sweg
'sound of the clouds'), dragon

hildenxdre
'battle-adder = javelin, arrow',
garbeam
'spear-tree = warrior',
heafodgim
'head-gem = eye'. These latter come
from religious poems such as
Genesis,
Exodus,
Elene
or
Andreas,
and are
regarded as 'riddle-like and far-fetched' by Brodeur (1959:35), who
sees in these more extravagant formations a typical feature of the later
religious poems, i.e. there seems to be a difference in this respect
between the traditional heroic and the later religious poems which have
adopted but also modified the format of heroic poetry.
The phenomenon in question highlights a property of OE repeatedly
mentioned already, the prolificness of its word-formation patterns,
because many, although by no means all of the
kend heiti
and
kenningar
are compounds. It is certainly no accident that, for example, in
Beowulf
about one third of the entire vocabulary consists of compounds. In the
3,182 lines of the poem, Brodeur (1959:7) has counted 903 distinct
substantive compounds, 518 of which occur only in
Beowulf,

pecular
to
Beowulf.
Beowulf certainly
is an
extreme,
but it is
nevertheless
representative
of the OE
poetic diction
and its
vocabulary
and
thus
demonstrates, perhaps most clearly,
how
strongly poetic diction
is
based
on a
specific type
of
vocabulary.
5.3.2.4
Compared
to
poetic diction,
the
prose vocabulary

had a
considerable influence
on the
formation
of the OE
vocabulary should
be
mentioned again
in
this connection, namely
the
dependence
of
many
OE
texts
on a
Latin original.
In
§5.2.1.5
the
phenomena
of
semantic loans, loan-translations
and
loan-creations have
already been discussed extensively,
and it is
quite obvious that they play
a much greater role

by
Latin
originals.
And
even
if
many
OE
translations
may
have
had a
rather
esoteric status
- cf. e.g. the
grammatical terminology
in
^Elfric's
Grammar
-
they still provide clues
as to the
productivity
of OE
word-
formation patterns.
But
there again,
a
comprehensive description

dt
wseter
winter
forf
sin
feond
l*r
/
/
/
/
/
/
/
dm
berere
setl
faran
cald
. scipe
end
' bearer of water'
' winter-quarters'
'go forth, depart'
' perpetually
(sin-)
cold'
'hostility = state
(-scipe)
of being an enemy

series of formations loses its original meaning (usually by
a process of meaning generalisation) and is only employed with this new
meaning in new formations. This may in time lead to the status of an
affix, e.g. with
-scipe
'state, status',
-bsere
'carrying',
-wende
'conducing',
or at least an affixoid, as with
-dom,
-lac,
-rxden 'state, status' (Sauer
1985:283). A slightly different development took place with
leod,
peod
'
people',
which in
leodcyning,
Peodcyning
' king of the people = mighty
king' have still preserved their original meaning, although with an
additional intensifying function, whilst in
peodloga
'arch-lier',
peodwiga
356
Semantics and vocabulary

5.4.1.2
Marchand (1969:2) defines word-formation as 'that branch of
the science of language which studies the patterns on which a language
forms new lexical units'. Applying this definition to a language no
longer spoken raises a number of serious problems.
Firstly, there is no way of testing productivity directly; all we have is
circumstantial evidence such
as
the number of new formations occurring
in texts of a given period, their semantic quality (i.e. their semantic
regularity, homogeneity, degree of lexicalisation), the correlation of
morphophonemic alternations with the overall morphophonemic
system operating also in inflexion (i.e. the degree of morphological
transparency, the type of conditioning, etc.) or continued productivity
in subsequent periods. Taken together, these factors will give us a
reasonably good indication as to whether a pattern was productive or
not, but no more than that. Moreover, productivity is a cline, and we
have to determine a cut-off point after which we should no longer
include the respective formations.
Secondly, neither productivity nor transparency are static phenom-
ena; they can vary diachronically, cf. -nis, which apparently lost the
ability to combine with verb-stems and came to be restricted to
participles and adjectives in LWS (see §5.3.1.5). When one has to deal
with a linguistic period such as OE, stretching over some 600 years,
there are bound to have been many such changes, not all of which can
be reconstructed because of our limited evidence, which covers only the
last 200 to 250 years and is rather fragmentary at that. Much of what
would actually constitute various historical layers within a given pattern
will therefore inevitably appear projected onto a two-dimensional
plane, since only the output of the patterns as recorded in the later

blaw-{an)
'blow'
has
f. 'command, bidding' <
hat-{ari)
'command'
Iws
f. 'letting of blodd' <
lset-{an)
'let'
rsesf.
'counsel,
deliberation' < rxd-(an) 'advise'
on the other hand, constitute the limiting case and should probably be
disregarded because of semantic and morphological irregularities.
But there are more complicated situations such as the following four
groups of deverbal nouns (see also Kastovsky 1985:231ff.):
(2) (a) m. han-cred' cock-crow' <
craw-(an),
geblxd'
blister <
blaw-(ari)
n. ap-swjrd ' oath' <
swer-{tari)
' swear', sxd ' seed' <
saw-(ari)
'sow'
f. fierd 'national levy or army' <far-{ari) 'travel, go'; byrd
'birth, burden' < ber-(an) ~
borieri)

eac-
(an)/ic-{ari)
'increase', nxft 'need, want' <
nabb-{an)
'have
not, want',
gesiht/gesihp
'slight' <
seon
~
seg-{en)
'see',
peoftIpiefpIpeofp ' stolen goods' <
peof-{iari)
' steal', wist
' food, sustenance' <
wes-{an)
'
be,
exist'
m/f/n
cyst
'what is chosen' <
ceos-(an)
~
cur-{pti)
'choose',^///
'giving, gift' <
gief-(ari)
'give',

' harrying' <
herg-{ian) '
harry',
hzletop '
greeting' <
hselett-
(an)
'greet',
huntop
'what is hunted' <
hunt-{ian)
'hunt',
folgap 'train, retinue'
<folg-{iari)
'follow',
migopa
'urine' <
mig-iati)
'make water',
spiivepa
'what is vomited, vomit' <
spiw-(ari)
'vomit',
sweo/op(a)
'heat, burning' <
sivel-{ari)
' burn',
sceafoPa '
chip'
<

-t(a,e),
-/> and
-opa
as independent suffixes,
it should be noted that a fairly systematic complementary distribution
359
Dieter Kastovsky
seems to obtain, -d occurring after roots ending in a glide, liquid or
nasal, -/ after roots ending in a fricative, -p after roots ending in a stop,
-op with weak class 2 verbs,
-opa
with strong verbs. There are a few
exceptions, e.g. the doublets gesiht/gesihp, peoft/peofp, piefp or hzletop
(with a class 1 base), but these might be explained as analogical
reformations indicating that the complementary distribution was no
longer fully effective. Since none of these suffixes is tied to a specific
meaning but all have roughly the same semantic range, we can probably
treat them as partly morphologically, partly phonologically conditioned
alternants. This in fact corresponds to their historical origin, a ProtoIE
suffix family clustering around the formative -/- (Krahe and Meid
1967:19ff.), to which various vocalic extensions functioning as stem-
formatives were added
{-to-,
-ta-,
-tio-,
-tia-, -ti-, -tu-, etc.). These stem
formatives originally determined gender and class affiliation, but were
lost in PrOE; they were responsible for the gender differences in (2a—c).
The consonantal alternation reflects Pre-Germanic stress differences
(root vs. suffixal stress) and the effects of Grimm's and Verner's Laws.

< */sat-j-an/ 'set', trum ~
trymP
'trimness'
2 consonant gemination (accompanied by /-mutation): gram ~
360
Semantics and vocabulary
gremman, we/an ~
webba,
secgan
~ sagu ' saying' (reverse alter-
nation)
3 palatalisation/assibilation:
ceosan/curon
~
eyre,
lugon
~
lygen,
bre-
can/brucon ~
brye'e
' breach \gangan ~
genga
' goer',
J"on/fangen
~
fing
'grasp'
4 /ae/~/a/: faran ~ fssr 'journey',
grafan

' noble' besides
mennisc
( < man)
'human', etc. The status of/ae/ ~ a/ is questionable but was probably
still phonologically conditioned.
Certain prefixes exhibit stress-conditioned alternations; in verbs they
are unstressed or have secondary stress, in nouns they have full stress.
This is also accompanied by allomorphy, cf.
awe'orpan
'throw away' ~
sewyrp
' what is cast away',
bnsdean
' contest' ~
dndsic
'
denial',
dndsaea
'adversary', began 'go over, worship' ~
bigeng
'worship',
bigenga
'worshipper', besides homological
onskc,
begdng,
begdnga.
This is the
source of Modern English
record
vb. ~

' crown',
grist-bit{i)an '
gnash the
teeth', etc. are derivatives from nominal compounds
{cyne-helm
' crown')
or back derivations from deverbal compounds
{grist-bite
'gnashing').
One major problem is the delimitation of compounds from cor-
responding syntactic groups. Spelling or semantic isolation (lexi-
calisation), sometimes suggested as appropriate criteria, do not work.
Spelling in OE was as erratic in this respect as it is in present-day
English, and according to the other criterion,
morgengifu
as well as
halig
gast 'Holy Ghost', se
hrvita sunnandxg
'Whit Sunday' would count as
compounds, while
morgenleoht
'morning-light',
morgensweg
'morning-
cry' would not, which is certainly counter-intuitive. According to
Marchand (1969:21), the only decisive criterion is the morphological
isolation of the compound from the corresponding syntactic group; this
isolation can take various forms. Stress is one possibility, cf. the
compound type

'word of praise',
rsdeboc
'reading-book', and
exocentric compounds like
bserfot
'barefoot',
heardheort
'hard-hearted'.
Adj-N compounds are easily recognisable in their inflected forms,
because the adjective is not inflected, cf.
heahenglas'
archangels',
wilddeora
'wild beasts',
heahcyninges
(gen.) 'high-king'; but occasionally there are
syntactic group doublets with an inflected adjective, e.g.
rvilde
deor,
pone
362
Semantics and vocabulary
hean
cyninge,
and in the nominative singular, where the adjective may be
uninflected - cf. heah engel, heah
cyning
- the criterion is neutralised.
Thus,
since idelgylp, idelwuldor 'vainglory' in their inflected forms occur

treatment of these linking elements or ' bridge-vowels' see Carr
(1939:281-98).
Compounds must also be kept apart from prefixations and suf-
fixations, but the delimitation is not absolute, there being a number of
borderline cases. Thus,
cyne-
'royal' in
cynegild
'king's compensation',
cynestol
'throne',
cynecynn
'royal race' only occurs as a determinant in
compounds and might therefore be interpreted as a prefix. But since it
is in complementary distribution with
cyning,
cyning
being extremely rare
as a determinant in compounds (save for
cyninggereordu
'royal meal',
cyn[in)gestun
'royal town'), and since there are formations like cynelic
'royal',
cynescipe
'kingship', where -lie and
scipe
have to be regarded as
suffixes,
cyne-

bedstreaw
'straw for bedding' is a subcategory of
streaw,
swefen-reccere
'interpreter of dreams' is a kind of
reccere
'in-
terpreter',
edlean
'reward' is a kind of
lean
'gift, loan', etc.
On the basis of this criterion certain combinations that look like
compounds in that they consist of two lexemes do not qualify as
expansions: an
anhorn
' unicorn' is not a horn, but an animal with one
horn, a
hundestunge'
hound's tongue' is not a
tunge
but a plant with leaves
like a dog's tongue; and
bserfot'
barefoot',
rihtheort'
righteous \yfelwilk
' malevolent' should be nouns, but are actually adjectives. Traditionally,
these are called bahuvrihi or exocentric compounds, because the
determinatum lies outside the formation. Marchand uses the term

agree with their function, they were often reformed by either changing
the inflexional class (usually to the weak declension), cf. anhorna,
bundenstefna
m. 'ship with an ornamented prow'
{stefn
was probably
originally an /-stem, cf. Campbell 1959:74n.4), or by adding a
derivational suffix, cf.
cliferfete
'cloven-footed' {-ja-suffix),
eapmodig,
eapmodlic
'humble' (besides eapmod), etc. These are usually called
' extended
bahuvrihi
compounds' (Carr 1939:252ff.), but in actual fact are
clearly derivatives and not compounds. They will therefore be treated
under the corresponding suffixes.
One further type of compound deserves special consideration,
formations such as
wxter-berere
'water-carrier',
ap-swerung
'oath-
swearing ',
feper-berend'feather-bearing
creature',
zlmesgifa
'almsgiver'.
These are characterised by the fact that the determinatum itself is a

lit. 'protection-bearer',
tacnbora
'standard-bearer' as a suffix, because it
does not occur outside such compounds (cf. Sprockel
1973:11,
41ff.,
Quirk & Wrenn 1957:115). Such formations should also be treated as
synthetic compounds, cf. PDE formations such as
nutcracker,
chimney
sweep.
A further subclassification and description of compounds is best
based on the word-class affiliation of
the
determinatum (noun, adjective
including participles, verb; other categories are marginal), and of the
determinant (noun, adjective including participles, verb, particle), on
the distinction between simple and derived determinata, on further
morphological distinctions, e.g. between stem vs. genitive compounds,
and on semantic-syntactic criteria, see, for example, the classification in
Marchand (1969 :ch. 2), or Kastovsky (1985) for deverbal nouns. The
semantic description of word-formation syntagmas, especially com-
pounds, has been a much-discussed topic, which cannot be taken up
here.
The labels used in the following are not intended to represent a
particular theoretical framework, but are used in their traditional
signification to provide a frame of reference for something that in view
of space limitations can only exemplify the possibilities but cannot be an
exhaustive description.
5.4.2.2

eoforswin'
pig
(swin)
which is a boar
(eofor)',
freawine
'friend
(wine)
who is also a lord (jrea)'. There are two sub-
groups, attributive and subsumptive compounds (Marchand
1969:40ff.).
In attributive compounds, the determinant attributes a specific
property to the determinatum, while with subsumptive compounds, the
determinant denotes a subclass of the determinatum. Typical examples
of attributive compounds are sex-denoting nouns, e.g.
cilforlamb
'ewe-
lamb',
cnihtcild
'boy', cucealf'heifer-calf',
fearhryper
'bull',
mxgpmann
'maiden',gummann 'man',
wifmann
'woman'. The reverse order occurs
in
assmyre
'
she-ass',

compounds among the subsumptive type).
(a) The determinant denotes a concept with which the determinatum is
compared:
colmase
'coal-tit',
goldfinc
'goldfinch',
selepute
'eel-pout',
sperewyrt
'spearwort'.
(b) The determinant denotes the species, the determinatum the
genus
proximum:
cederbeam
'cedar', cirisbeam 'cherry-tree', marmanstan
'marble',
hwxtecorn
'grain of wheat',
piporcorn
'peppercorn',
regenscur
'rain-shower',
eagxpple
'eyeball'',
fugolcynn
'birds', xfentid 'evening'.
(c) Both constituents denote different aspects of the same thing, e.g.
werewulf ' a
being which is both a wolf and a man'; there is a close

wuduholt 'wood', mxgencrxjt 'strength', willspring 'spring'. Many of
these compounds also occur in reversed order without any apparent
change of meaning, cf.
bealucwealmIcwealmbealu
'violent death', beot-
word/wordbeot 'boast, threat', cearsorg/sorgcearu 'anxiety', rimge-
txlIgetxlrim 'number'.
Rectional compounds are best denned negatively as those that do not
allow a copulative paraphrase. Morphologically, we can distinguish two
subcategories, pure nominal compounds and synthetic compounds, i.e.
those having a deverbal noun as the determinatum. Semantically
speaking, both groups can express the same kinds of relationship (cf.
Marchand 1969:31ff.). The following examples are extremely selective;
a comprehensive description is not possible in this connection.
1 Synthetic compounds
(a) The determinatum is an agent noun, the determinant denotes the
goal (object), place, instrument or time of the action, e.g. man-swara
'perjurer', freols-gifa 'giver of freedom',
wudu-heawere
'wood-cutter',
blod-lsetere 'blood-letter', sweord-bora 'sword-bearer', reord-berend
'speech-bearer — human being', eorp-bmnd 'earth-dweller', land-buend
'land-dweller', sae-lipend 'sailor', sx-genga 'sailor', sx-lida 'sailor,
pirate',garwigend'spear-fighter', nid-nima 'one who takes by force', xsc-
wiga 'spear-fighter', mete-rxdere 'monk reading at meals', nihte-gale
'nightingale',
niht-genga
'a creature that goes by night, goblin', etc.
(b) The determinatum is an action noun, the determinant denotes the
agent, goal, place, instrument or time of the action:

or this activity
itself:
brofiorbana 'fratricide', dureweard 'janitor',
secermann 'ploughman', gathyrde 'goatherd', ssefisc 'seafish', smmann
'seaman', hereflyma 'deserter', sweordfreca 'a warrior who uses his
sword', nihtbrxfn 'night raven', ceapmann 'merchant', jmstingmann
'retainer'.
(b) The determinatum represents some object or phenomenon that
could be regarded as in some sense affected or effected by an implied
action or being in some state or position; the determinant specifies an
agent, source, material, place, time, instrument or the action
itself:
beobrsed
'honey', smipbelg 'bellows',
stveostorsunu
'sister's son', fotspor
'footprints', bwmtemelo 'wheatflour', arfxt 'bronze vessel', sigekan
'reward for victory',
beafodwwrc
'headache', zfensteorra 'evening star',
sumorhxte 'summer heat', rsedhors 'riding-horse', bletsingboc 'bene-
dictional',
eringland
'arable land'.
(c) The determinatum is part of the determinant: bordrima ' edge of a
plank',
cawelstela
'cabbage-stem', earlxppa 'earlobe',
earmsceanca
'arm-

warrior (= panther)' (/W
people,
nation'). Carr (1939:351) also lists
heoru
' sword' as an intensifying element of alliterative poetry, but his
gloss 'fearsome, dangerous, cruel' (cf.
heoruwearg
'bloodthirsty
wolf,
etc.) indicates that although
heoru
may have been subject to some
meaning generalisation (e.g. towards '
battle,
fight, war'), it has not been
sufficiently bleached to be regarded as a mere intensifier.
While firen,
mmgen
and
peod
may be regarded as pattern-forming in
their intensifying function, the other examples listed in Carr
(1939:351ff.), e.g.
beaducwealm
'violent death'
(beadu
'battle'), farcyle
'intense cold' (Jkr 'sudden danger'),
folcegsa
'great terror',

godspell-bodung
'gospel preaching',
godweb-wyrhta
'weaver of purple' or a compound determinatum (e.g.
bisceop-heafodlin
'bishop's head ornament',
niht-butorfleoge
'moth'). Com-
pounds with more than three members do not seem to exist.
The above description is by no means exhaustive and covers only
some of the more frequent patterns; for more detailed surveys cf. Carr
(1939),
Rubke (1953), Reibel (1963), Gardner (1968), Talentino (1970)
or Sauer (1985).
5.4.2.2.2 For Noun (genitive) + Noun combinations it cannot always
be decided with absolute certainty whether a given combination
should be treated as a syntactic group or a genitive compound
('secondary compound' in Carr 1939:309ff.) but it would seem
unjustified to deny the existence of genitive compounds (see Nickel eta/.,
1976:11,
20) in view of the behaviour of words such as
domesdxg,
cristesboc.
These never appear with a modified determinant, i.e. we only
find
se egesfullica
domesdxg,
'the terrible judgment day', but never se/pxs
egesfullican domesdmg
(Sauer 1985:275).

rest day', uht{an)tid' time of dawn, twilight', or
just formal parallelism, e.g.
sunnanleoma'
sunray',
sunnanscima
' sunshine',
sunnansetlgong
'sunset'; (b) a set of person-denoting nouns, e.g.
cynnesmann
'kinsman' (alongside the group
heora agenes cynnes
mannum
Chron C and D 1052),
landesmann
'native', rxdesmann 'counsellor',
xhtemann
'farmer'',gatahierde 'goatHerd',
oxanbyrde
'herdsman', etc.; (c)
place-names, e.g.
cyn{iri)gestun
>
Kingston,
etc.; (d) plant-names, e.g.
dsegeseage
' daisy',
oxan-slyppe
' oxlip', etc.; some of the latter could also
be interpreted as
bahuvrihi

surmeolc
'sour milk',
wildgos
'wild goose', etc. The pattern was also very productive with
bahuvrihi
compounds of the type
heardheort
'hard-hearted', see §5.4.5.
5.4.2.2.4 The pattern V (verbal stem) + N was a recent development
in the Germanic languages (Carr 1939:162) and resulted from instances
where the determinant was a deverbal noun which was formally
37°
Semantics and vocabulary
identical with the verb stem, as in
delf-isen
'spade' (del/'digging' and
stem o(
del/an'
dig').
Consequently, many OE formations are ambiguous
between an N + N and a V + N interpretation, although it would seem
that the latter is preferable in all those instances where the determinatum
can unambiguously be analysed as a potential argument of the verbal
determinant. Thus
isen
in
delfisen
is interpretable as an Instrumental with
regard to
delfan,

vowel may be found (e.g.
bzcering
'gridiron', vs.
bxchus
'bakery',
eteland
' pasture'); for these cases, alternative interpretations (verb,
bsecan,
noun
ete)
have been suggested (Holthausen 1963: s.v.
bsecering,
eteland).
But
since the weak verbs, as well as the strong verbs having a ^/-present,
preserve their stem-formative -j- as -e-, although not completely
systematically (cf.
hwetestan
'whetstone',
wecedrenc
'emetic',
steppescoh
'slipper' vs.
tyrngeat
'turnstile'), analogical extension of
-e-
as a linking
vowel is also a plausible explanation. The major semantic types are:
V
+ Agent/Subject: wigmann 'warrior', ridwiga 'mounted soldier',

plaited mane'. Regular compounds are broden-,
sceaden-,
wunden-
mzl 'damascened sword',
nxgledcnearr
'nail-fastened vessel', etenlxs
'pasture'.
37'
Dieter Kastovsky
5.4.2.2.6 For Adverb+ N compounds in principle two different
cases have to be distinguished: (a) the adverb is combined with an
independent primary or derived noun, e.g.
oferealdorman '
chief officer',
oferbiterness '
excessive bitterness'; (b) the combination is a derivative
from a verbal compound, e.g.
oferleornes '
transgression '<
oferleoran
' transgress',
ofersceawigend
' overseer, bishop' <
ofersceawian
' superin-
tend'. But in practice this distinction cannot always be upheld, for
sometimes both analyses seem possible, e.g.
oferfxreld
'passage over'
could be either

'addition',
anbuend 'hermit', eftlean 'recompense', forebreost 'chest', forebysen
'example',
forpweg
'departure',
forpjaider
'forefather', inadl 'internal
disease',
inflsescness
'incarnation',
innanearm
'inner side of arm',
midgesip
'companion',
oferbraw
'eye-brow', oferlufu 'too great love',
onbring
'instigation',
ongeancyme
'return',
ongeansprecend
'one who reproaches',
samodeard
'common home',
underhwitel
'undergarment',
undercyning
'underking',
tvipersteall'resistance',ymbhoga
'care, anxiety'.