Cover not available
Part of
Sociocultural Dimensions of Lexis and Text in the History of English
Edited by Peter Petré, Hubert Cuyckens and Frauke D'hoedt
[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 343] 2018
► pp. 201–226

Chapter 9
Betwixt, amongst, and amidst

The diachronic development of function words with final /st/

The purpose of the paper is to examine, using historical corpora, the diachronic development of variants of the function words between, among, and amid with emphasis on the variants with final /st/, i.e. betwixt, amongst, and amidst. In Present-day English, the variants with final /st/ have a more formal, literary, or archaic ring to them than their counterparts without it. In older English, however, the former variants were more widely used than they are today. This paper addresses how individual variants – especially ones with final /st/ – came into being, how they competed with one another in terms of frequency in each period, and how this resulted in the Present-day English distribution.

Keywords: Middle English, Modern English, preposition, paragoge, corpus
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Between
    • 2.1Etymological notes and historical overview based on the HC
    • 2.2Period-by-period description
    • 2.3Historical summary of between
  • 3. among
    • 3.1Etymological notes and historical overview based on the HC
    • 3.2Period-by-period description
    • 3.3Historical summary of among
  • 4. amid
    • 4.1Etymological notes and historical overview based on the HC
    • 4.2Period-by-period description
    • 4.3Historical summary of amid
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Proposed accounts of final t
    • 5.2Paragoge
    • 5.3Word boundary morphonology
    • 5.4Semantic association with the superlative
    • 5.5Small lexical group of function words
    • 5.6Accounting for the decline of the types with /st/
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 4 July 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.343.09hot
References

Corpora and dictionaries

ASD = Bosworth, Joseph & T. Northcote Toller (eds.) 1898–1921 An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Barnhart, Clarence L., Sol Steinmetz & Robert K. Barnhart
(eds.) 1973 The Barnhart dictionary of New English since 1963. Bronxville, NY: Barnhart.Google Scholar
BNCweb = Hoffmann, Sebastian & Stefan Evert (eds.) 1996–2008 BNCweb CQP-edition. [URL] (2 February, 2015.)
CLMET3.0 = De Smet, Hendrik, Hans-Jürgen Diller & Jukka Tyrkkö (eds.) 2013 The corpus of Late Modern English texts, version 3.0. Leuven: Department of Linguistics, University of Leuven.Google Scholar
DOEC = Healey, Antonette diPaolo, Joan Holland, Ian McDougall & Peter Mielke (eds.) 2000 The dictionary of Old English corpus in electronic form, TEI-P3 conformant version, 2000 release. CD-ROM. Toronto: DOE Project 2000.Google Scholar
EDD = Wright, Joseph (ed.) 1898–1905 The English dialect dictionary, 6 vols. Oxford: Henry Frowde.Google Scholar
EEBO = Early English books online. ProQuest LLC. 2003–. [URL] (2 February, 2015.)
eLALME = Benskin, Michael, Margaret Laing, Vasilis Karaiskos & Keith Williamson 2013 An electronic version of A linguistic atlas of late mediaeval English. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh. [URL] (2 February, 2015.)
HC = Rissanen, Matti, Merja Kytö, Leena Kahlas-Tarkka, Matti Kilpiö; Saara Nevanlinna, Irma Taavitsainen; Terttu Nevalainen & Helena Raumolin-Brunberg (eds.) 1991 The Helsinki corpus of English texts. Helsinki: Department of Modern Languages, University of Helsinki.Google Scholar
LAEME = Laing, Margaret & Roger Lass (eds.) 2007 A linguistic atlas of early Middle English, 1150–1325. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh. [URL] (2 February, 2015.)
LALME = McIntosh, Angus, Michael Louis Samuels & Michael Benskin 1986 A linguistic atlas of late mediaeval English. With Margaret Laing & Keith Williamson. Aberdeen: Aberdeen University Press.Google Scholar
MED = Kurath, Hans, Sherman McAllister Kuhn & John Reidy (eds.) 1962–2001. Middle English dictionary. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
MEGC = Stenroos, Merja, Martti Mäkinen, Simon Horobin & Jeremy Smith 2011 The Middle English grammar corpus, version 2011.1. Stavanger: University of Stavanger. [URL] (2 February, 2015.)
OED = Simpson, John & Edmund Weiner (eds.) 1989 Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar

Secondary sources

Burchfield, Robert
(ed.) 1998 Fowler’s modern English usage. Revised 3rd edn. Oxford: Oxord University Press.Google Scholar
Ciszek-Kiliszewska, Ewa
2013 Middle English preposition and adverb twix . Token 2. 75–91.Google Scholar
Dobson, Eric John
1968 English pronunciation 1500–1700, vol. 2, 2nd edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hotta, Ryuichi
2014 Betwixt and between: The ebb and flow of their historical variants. Journal of the Faculty of Letters: Language, Literature and Culture 114. 17–36.Google Scholar
Kitson, Peter
1993 Geographical variation in Old English prepositions and the location of Ælfric’s and other literary dialects. English Studies 74. 1–50. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mustanoja, Tauno Frans
1960 A Middle English syntax. Helsinki: Société Néophilologique.Google Scholar
Wełna, Jerzy
2014 Insertion and loss of the voiceless dental plosive [t] in Middle English. In Michael Bilynsky (ed.), Studies in Middle English: Words, forms, senses and texts, 329–342. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Wright, Joseph
1968 [1905] The English dialect grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar