Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/671

 LANGUAGE.] FRANCE 635 s -&amp;gt;und fj before i and e (guess for gesse). Some of the Early Modem etymological spellings were imitated in England ; fleam and autour were replaced by phlegm and aitthonr, the latter spelling having corrupted the pronunciation. (e) Inflexions. In the earliest Old French extant, the influence of analogy, especially in verbal forms, is very marked when these are compared with Latin (thus the present participles of all conjugations take ant, the ending of the first, Latin antem}, and becomes stronger as the lan guage progresses. Such isolated inflexional changes as saveit into savoit, which are cases of regular phonetic changes, are not noticed here. i. Verbs. (1.) In the oldest French texts the Latin pluperfect (with the sense of the perfect) occasionally occurs avret (habucrat), roveret (rogdverat); it disappears early in the 12th century. (2.) The u of the ending of the 1st pers. plur. mus drops in Old French, except in the perfect, where its presence (as 0) is not yet satisfactorily explained amoms (amdmus), but amames (amdvimus). In Picarcl the ending mcs is extended to all tenses, giving amomes, &c. (3.) The replacement of the 2d plur. ending eiz (Latin etis) by the cz (Latin dtis) of the first conjugation begins early in Norman ; in the Roland both forms occur, porterciz (portdre habetis) assonating on rci (roi, regem), and the younger portcrez on diet (cite, ciritdtem). In Eastern French, where cz, iu accordance with phoni-tic laws, appears as eiz, ciz for the same reason becomes oiz and ois, and is found in the 13th century avois and avroiz corre sponding to avciz (habctis) and avrciz, but ameiz to amcz (amdtis). (4.) In Eastern French the 1st plur., when preceded by i, has c, not o, before the nasal, while Western French has u (or o), as in the present; jmsdomcs (possedmus) in the Jonah homily makes it probable that the latter is the older form Picard avicmcs, Burgun- diari avicns, Norman aviums (habebdmus). (5.) The subjunctive of the iir.st conjugation has at iirst in the singular no final e, in accord ance with the iiual vowel laws plur, plurs, plurt (plurcm, plores, plorct). The forms are gradually assimilated to those of the other conjugations, which, deriving from Latin am, as, at, have e, es, c(i); Modern French plcurc, plcurcft, pleurc, like pcrde, pcrdes, pcrde, (perdam, pcrdds, perdat). (6.) In Old French the present sub junctive and the 1st sing. pros. ind. generally show the influence of the i or c of the Latin iam, earn, id, cd Old French muirc or wocrgc (moriat for moridtur), ticgnc or tienge (tencat), muir or mocrc (morio for morior), tieng or tienc (tcncd). By degrees these forms are levelled under the other present forms Modern French mcxre and incurs following mcurt (morit fovmoritur), ticnne, and ticns following ticnt (tenet). A few of the older forms remain the vowel of aie (habeam) and ai (habed) contrasting with that of a (kabct). (7.) A levelling of which instances occur in the llth century, but which is not yet complete, is that of the accented and unaccented stem-syllables of verbs. In Old French many verb- stems with shifting accent vary in accordance with phonetic laws parler (paraboldrc), amtr (amdrc) have in the present indicative parol (parabola), paroles (jmrabolds), parolet (parabolat), parlums (paraboldmus), parlcz (paraboldtis), parolent (parabolant) ; aim, (amo), aimes (amds), aimct (amat), amums (amamus), amcz (amdtis), aiment (amant). In the first case the unaccented, in the second the accented form has prevailed Modern French parle, parler; dime, aimer. In several verbs, as tcnir (tenere), the distinction is retained tiens, ticns, tient, tenons, tenez, ticnnent. (8.) In Old French, as stated above, ie instead of ^ from a occurs after a palatal (which, if a consonant, often split into i with a dental); the diph thong thus appears in several forms of many verbs of the 1st conjugation prefer ( prci-icr, prccdre), vengicr (vindicdrc), laissicr (laxdre), aidier (adjutdre). At the close of the Old French period, those verbs in which the stem ends in a dental replace ie by the e of other verbs Old French laissier, aidier, laissicz (laxdtis), aidicz (adjutatis); Modern French laisscr, aider, laisscz, aidcz, by analogy of aimer, aimez. The older forms generally remain in Picard laissicr, aidier. (9.) The addition of c to the 1st sing. pros. ind. of all verbs of the first conjugation is rare before the 13th cen tury, but is usual in the 15th ; it is probably due to the analogy of the third person Old French chant (canto), aim (amo); Modern French chantc, aime. (10.) In the 13th century s is occasionally added to the 1st pers. sing., except those ending in e ( = y) and ai, and to the 2d sing, of imperatives; at the close of the 16th cen tury this becomes the rule, and extends to imperfects and condi tionals in QIC after the loss of their c. It appears to he due to the influence of the 2&amp;lt;1 pers. sing. Old French rend, (vendo and vcndc), ecndoie (vcndebam), parti (partlvi), ting (tcnul) ; Modern French vends, vendais, partis, tins ; and donne (dond) in certain cases becomes donncs. (11.) The 1st and 2d plur. of the pres. subj., which in Old French were generally similar to those of the in dicative, gradually take an i before them, which is the rule after the 16th century Old French perdons (pcrddmus), pcrdez (per- ddtis) ; Modem French perdions, perdicz, apparently by analogy of the imp. ind. (12.) The loss in Late Old French of final s, I, &c., when preceding another consonant, caused many words to have in reality (though often concealed by orthography) double forms of inflexion, one without termination, the other with. Thus in the 16th century the 2d sing. pres. ind. dors (dormls) and the 3d dort (donn.it) were distinguished as dbrz and dbrt when before a vowel, as dors and dbrt at the end of a sentence or line of poetry, but ran together as dor when followed by a consonant. Still later, the loss of the final consonant when not followed by a vowel further reduced the cases in which the forms were distinguished, so that the actual French conjugation is considerably simpler than is shown by the customary spellings, except when, in consequence of an im mediately following vowel, the old terminations occasionally appear. Even here the antiquity is to a considerable extent artificial or delusive, some of the insertions being due to analogy, and the popu lar language often omitting the traditional consonant or inserting a different one. (13. ) The subsequent general loss of e = s in unaccented final syllables has still further reduced the inflexions, but not the distinctive forms, pcrd (perdit) and pcrde, (perdat) being generally distinguished as per tm&perd, and before a vowel as pert ecoApird. ii. Substantives. (I.) In Early Old French (as in Provencal) there are two main declensions, the masculine and the feminine; with a few exceptions the former distinguishes nominative and accusative in both numbers, the latter in neither. The nom. and ace. sing, and ace. plur. mas. correspond to those of the Latin 2d or 3d declen sion, the nom. plur. to that of the 2d declension. The sing. fern, corresponds to the nom. and ace. of the Latin 1st declension, or to the ace. of the 3d; the plur. fern, to the ace. of the 1st declension, or to the nom. and ace. of the 3d. Thus masc. tors (taunts), lerc (latro); tor (taurum), laron (latroncm); tor (taurl), laron (lalronl for -nes); tors (tauros), larons (latrdnes) : but fern, only ele (dla and dlam), Jlor (florem); eles (aids), flors (flores nom. and ace.). At the end of the llth century feminiues not ending in e = a take, by analogy of the masculines, s in the nom. sing., thus distinguish ing nom. Jtors from ace. Jlor. A century later, masculines without in the nom. sing, take this consonant by analogy of the other masculines, giving leres as nom. similar to tors. In Anglo-Norman the accusative forms very early begin to replace the nominative, and soon supersede them, the language following the tendency of contemporaneous English. In Continental French the declension- system was preserved much longer, and did not break up till the 14th century, though ace. forms are occasionally substituted for nom. (rarely uom. for ace.) before that date. In the 15th century the modern system of one case is fully established ; the form kept is almost always the accusative (sing, without s, plural with s), but in a few words, such as fils (fUius), sa:ur (soror), the nom. survives in the sing., and occasionally both forms exist, in different senses sire (senior) and seigneur (scniorcm), on (homo) and homme (hominem). (2.) Latin neuters are generally masculine in Old French, and inflected according to their analogy, as dels (caclus for caelum nom.) del (caelum ace.), del (cacll for caela nom.), dels (caelos for caela ace. ) ; but early cases of nom. sing, without s occur, which, if not due to substitution of ace. for nom., are the older forms (del = caelum nominative). Many neuters lose their singular form and treat the plural as a feminine singular, as in the related languages mcrvcille (mlrdbilia), fcuille (folia). But in a few words the neuter plural termination is used, as in Italian, in its primitive sense carre (carra, which exists as well as carrl), dcie, later doie (digita for digitl) ; Modern French chars, doigts. This form became extinct after the 13th century pairc (Latin paria), in Old French both fern. sing, and neut. plur. (as Italian poja, is fern, plur.), being now. only the former. (3. ) In Old French the in flexional s often causes phonetic changes in the stem ; tlms palatal I before s takes t after it, and becomes dental I, which afterwards changes to u or drops fil (f Ilium and fllil) with palatal I, filz (filiiis and fllios), afterwards/::, with z = ts (preserved in English Fitz), and then/s, as now (spelt fils). Many consonants before s, as the t of fiz, disappear, and I is vocalized vif (vlvum), mal (malum), nominative sing, and ace. plur. vis, maus (earlier mals). These forms of the plural are retained in the IGth century, though often etymologically spelt with the consonant of the singular, as in vifs, pronounced vis ; but in Late Modern French many of them disappear, vifs, with/ sounded as in the singular, being the plural of vif, bals (formerly baux) that of bal. In many words, as chant (cantus) and cJuimjJS (cantos) with silent t and p (Old French chans in both cases), maux (Old French mals, sing, mal), ycux (oculos, Old French oelz, sing, oeil) the old change in the stem is kept. Sometimes, as in deux (caclus) and dels, the old traditional and the modern analogical forms coexist, with different meanings. (4.) The modern loss of final s (except when kept as z before a vowel) has seriously modified the French declension, the singulars fort (for) and forte (fort) being generally (indistinguishable from their plurals forts and fortes. The subsequent loss of 3 in finals lias not affected the relation between singe and jilur. forms ; but with the frequent recoining of the plural forms on the singular present Modern French lias very often no distinction between sing, and plur., except before a vowel. Such plurals as maux have al-