PGmc. *-ārjaz was borrowed from Latin, and became a productive masculine agentive suffix in the older Germanic languages, gradually displacing various native agentive suffixes. Despite some assertions to the contrary, OE -estre can be shown to have been a feminine agentive suffix of Germanic origin that was also applied to certain feminine animal names. During the Old English period, a pattern obtained whereby masculine agent nouns were frequently derived using -ere (< PGmc. *-ārjaz), while the corresponding feminine agent nouns used -estre. This system was partially preserved in Modern Dutch, but died out in English as -er was increasingly used to form agent nouns of both genders.*

A proposal to abandon the assumption of word accent (either pitch or stress) for Germanic is seen overall as unprofitable. The dilemma of syllable division is resolved against CVC.V and for CV.CV on general considerations following Murray and Vennemann and specific considerations allowing a better analysis of the conditions surrounding Verner's Law. It is proposed that a new Germanic heavy syllable accent, when double-peaked on words with heavy suffixes gave rise to Scandinavian accent 2, and when single-peaked on heavy roots with light suffixes, gave rise to accent 1 and to Danish stød.

Medieval Iceland had two different systems of reckoning time which were used concurrently for different purposes: it had adopted the Julian calendar, prevalent in all of Europe, and it had also developed a separate calendar with no close parallels in any other country. This distinctly Icelandic calendar can be traced back to pre-Christian times, and it remained popular throughout the Middle Ages up until early modern days. This article uses brief excerpts from a computer program to analyze the structure and main features of the Icelandic calendar and to demonstrate by which methods its divisions into years, months and weeks were reconciled with the natural solar year as well as with the interlocking cycles of “fixed” and “movable” ecclesiastical holidays of the Julian calendar.

Although it has long been recognized that the i of OHG gi-could be lost before vowels and certain consonants, the handbooks recognize no loss of i in bi-. This is one reason why many scholars are reluctant to derive OHG irbarmên from *ir-bi-armên and irbunnan from *ir-bi-unnan, instead positing an original prefix ab- and comparing semantically similar forms such as OE ofearmian. In fact, however, loss of i in hi-, though highly sporadic, is attested before vowels and before r and l from the 8th century on, and provides a basis for the etymology of two hitherto unexplained words in Notker: ferbrasên and prázelig. There are thus clear parallels for a similar explanation of irbarmên and irbunnan.

This paper examines four dative reflexive verbs of motion in Old Saxon:faran, gangan, kuman and giuuitan. The linguistic universals of GB syntax and the universal phenomenological categories of Peircean semiotics provide the theoretical framework for this paper. Various syntactic and semantic aspects of the dative reflexive verbs are targeted in the analysis: binding of the reflexive, word order patterns and subject types. The article suggests that a link exists between subject types, V1 syntactic configurations and the appearance of the dative reflexive — only human, animate subjects can license a dative reflexive and the reflexivized verbs exhibit a strong tendency to appear in the narratively visible V1 structure.

The ME term falding, used of a heavy cloth type imported from Ireland, has been traced to MIr.fallaing. It is proposed that this, in turn, derives not from ON feldr ‘cloak’ but from faldr ‘fold’, reference being made to the voluminous folds of the garment or to the weaving technique of folding short lengths of yarn around the threads of the warp to give a shaggy exterior finish. Also reviewed are questions of early Irish dress, the medieval cloth trade, and Irish motifs in the Icelandic Laxdæla saga.

The verbal particle durch shows two stress patterns: stressed and unstressed. These are correlated with two different construals of the relation of a Trajector to a Landmark. When the relation is construed to be sequential from one side of the Landmark to the other, the particle is stressed. Non-sequentiality is correlated with unstressed particles.

This article addresses a problem at the interface between morpho-syntax and semantics: How to treat “double-accusative” constructions in German. The solution is given in relational terms, which suits the framework of CRMS-theory*. With regard to the first type of “double accusative” constructions [sie lehrt ihn die deutsche sprache ‘she teaches him the German language’], the option of different case marking is explained by general principles of CRMS-theory. With regard to the second type [sie nennt ihn einen lügner ‘she calls him a liar’], the clue for its full understanding comes from the following observation: in addition to the accusative marking of both complements there is a strong semantic tie between the two. That is why traditional grammar rightly speaks of such forms as einen lügner as an “accusative of identification”. As this idea of identification is realized at the content level in my approach, I do not see any reason for establishing a special relation “predicative” for the second type.