Page:The Sources of Standard English.djvu/131

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This root same is good Sanscrit and Gothic; the Norse sams means ejusdem generis. Nothing in English is more curious than that this Scandinavian word should have driven out the older ylc.

Allderrman here still means a Prince, as in Old English times; Orrmin even uses it for Abbot. He talks also of Eorless, earls, ranking them not much lower than kings.

Líc was the Old English word for corpus, though it is now found only in Lichfield and lych-gate. Bodig usually meant the trunk or chest; but Orrmin uses bodi&#x0293;, far oftener than lic, in our sense of the word. In one line he forms a new substantive out of the two, speaking of bodi&#x0293;lich.

He uses chilldre for the Plural of child, and the former still lingers in Lancashire as childer. Our corrupt Plural children came from the South, as also did brethren and kine.

The word drugoð is now turned into druhhþe. The word flail, akin to the flegil of the mainland, now first appears in English.

The old gœrshoppan now becomes gresshoppe, grass&shy;hoppers.

The old crœt (currus) now becomes karrte.

The diphthong œ had long been giving way, and it was doubtful whether a or e was to replace it. Orr&shy;min's na&#x0293;&#x0293;l instead of nœgel has been followed by us rather than the neil of the South.

We now find for the first time such compounds as overking, overlord; words happily revived in our own day.

Our fathers had a rooted objection to beginning their