Latin and Greek borrowings

Latin and Greek Borrowings

                                                       Outline:

1.      Foreign elements in English

2.      Latin borrowings

3.      Greek borrowings

1. Foreign elements in English

   The vocabulary of Modern English is a product of a number of epoch. It consist of two layers – the native stock of words and the borrowed stock of words. Native words comprise only 30% of the total number of words in the English vocabulary but the native words form the bulk of the most frequent words actually used in speech and writing. A native word is a word which belong to the original English stock, as known from the earliest available manuscript of the old English period. A loan words, borrowed words or borrowings is a word taken over from another language and modified in phonetic shape, spelling, paradigm or meaning according to the standards of the English language. [2]

   The present day English vocabulary, especially its terminological layers, is constantly enriched by words made up of morphemes of latin and Greek origin such as words with the morphemes – tron used chiefly in the field of electronics, e.g. mesotron, cyclotron, etc.; tele-, e.g. telecast, telelecture, telediagnosis, -in, e.g. protein, penicillin; -scope, e.g. iconoscope, oscilloscope; meta-, e.g. meta-culture,  metaprogram; para- meaning ‘related to, near’, e.g. paralinguistic, parabiospheric; video-, e.g. videodisk, videophone, etc. [3]

   The part played by borrowings in the vocabulary of a language depends on the history of each given language, being conditioned by direct linguistic contact and political, economic and cultural relationships between nations. English history contains innumerable occasions for all types of such contacts. It is the vocabulary system of each language that is particularly responsive to every change in the life of speaking community. Nowhere, perhaps, is the influence of extra linguistic social reality so obvious as in the etymological composition of the vocabulary. The source, the scope and the semantic sphere of the loan words are all depend upon historical factors. The very fact that up to 70% of the English vocabulary consist of loan words, and only 30 % of the words are native is due not to an inherent tolerance of foreign elements but to specific conditions of the English language development. The Roman invasion, the introduction of Christianity, the Danish and Norman conquest, and, in modern times, the specific features marking the development of British colonialism and imperialism combined to cause important changes in the vocabulary.   

   The number of loan words in the English language is indeed so high that many foreign scholars (L.P. Smith, H. Bradley and others) were inclined to reduce the study of the English vocabulary to the discussion of its etymology, taking it for granted that the development of English was mainly due to borrowings. They seemed to be more interested in tracing the original source, form and meaning of every lexical element than in studying its present functioning and peculiarities. This view has been by now convincingly disproved by N. N. Amosova.

    2. Latin borrowings

   The Latin influence on English as on the other Germanic languages begins so early and is of such a continuous nature that it merits a separate treatment.                                                 It is at first the influence of a living language, dating from old times, it persists as the influence of a dead language down to the present days. Lexicographers have estimated that approximately a quarter of the latin vocabulary has been taken over by English. In modern times latin has been adopted for scientific nomenclature.

  However words of latin origin cannot all be considered together as one homogeneous layer: we must distinguish between those borrowed through immediate contact, that is orally, at the early stages of language development and those later acquisitios that came through writing. The first are monosyllabic and denote things of everyday importance. The followings are among them: pear (OE pere, L. pirum), pea (OE pise, L. pisum), pepper (OE pipor, L. piper), cheese (OE ciese, L. caseus), plum (OE plume, L. prunus), butter (OE butere, L. butyrum), wine (OE win, L. vinum), kettle (OE cytel, L. catillus), cup (OE cuppe, L. cuppa), dish (OE disc, L. discus), line (OE line – rope, L. linum – flax) mortar (OE mortere, L. mortarium – pestle), mule ( OE mul, L. mulus). [2]

  A number of words adopted at that distant time pertain to trade, e. g. cheap (OE ceap – price, bargain, L. caupona – wine trade), pound (OE pund, L. pondus – weight).

  Through contacts with the romanized celtic population in the 5th century, already in britain, the same sort of borrowings was effected. Some of the words had a military flavor about them, for the romans built fortification, military camps and roads. To give examples: port ( OE port, L.portus), street (OE strat, L. via strata – paved road), wall (OE weall, L. vallum – fortification).

  Besides, all the loan-words of this group have become head words of whole groups of dervatives, compounds and set expressions (winebag, winebowl, wine-cellar, wine-cooler, wineglass, winery, Adam’s wine). Many latin borrowings of this period did not survive in Modern English. They are sometimes retained in English place-names like Chester, Colchester, Manchester, Lancaster (OE ceaster, L. castra – camp).

  In analyzing the early latin loans we see their specific character. This first and smallest instalment came through the military occupation of Britain by the Romans, during the four centuries which preceded the invasion of Angles, Saxon and Frisians. Taking together, these two periods form the first stratum of latin borrowings.

  The second great stratum of latin words came into English at the end of the 6th –in the 7th century when the people of England were converted  to Christianity. Since Latin was the language of church, many latin words denoting religious concepts came into English. They are such as abbot (Gr. abbas  - father), angel (Gr. angelos – herald), apostle (Gr. apostolos – sent forth), bishop (Gr. episcopos – overseer), devil (Gr. diabolos – slanderer), temple ( Lat. tempulum – church).

  Some words changed their meaning. Thus the verb to offer (OE offrian – to cacrifice, L. present – offer).

  Many Latin words borrowed at that period reffered to other spheres of life, such things of every day life: cap (Lat. cappa – headgear), chest (lat. cista – box), mat (L. matta), silk (OE seole, L. sericum). Names of many vegetables and plants introduced into culinary and medical practice by Roman monks, such as beet  (L. bete),  fennel (L. feoniculum), lily (L.lilium), plant (L.planta). Since monasteries were also cultural centers were books written and translations made, such words were borrowed as school (lat. scola, Gr. schola – leisure, later – school), verse (lat. versus – turn, line). Names of aninals (e.g. lion, tiger) were also borrowed at that time.

  Another great influx of latin words came through French after the Norman Conquest (1066). They are generally referred to as the third stratum of latin borrowings. In addition to the great stock of latin words that have entered English through French, or under its influence, there are a great many words taken directly from Latin without changes, e.g. animal, radius, datum, formula, index, radix, series, alibi, item, minimum, senior, junior. [6]

  The latest stratum of latin loans embraces abstract and scientific words. To this stratum of latin loans belongs the main part of the international element of the English vocabulary.

  A great many Latin abbreviations usually suggest English equivalents, for instance: e.g. (example gratia) – for example, i.e. (id est) – that is, a.m. (ante meridiem) – before noon, p.m. (post meridium) – after noon, etc. (et cetera) and so on. [5]

3.              Greek borrowings

  A great many Greeck words introduced into English came in chiefly through the medium of latin, for the latin language itself  was largely indebted to Greek. Greek words are recognized by their specific spelling ( ch, ph, pn, rh, as in character, philosophy, phenomenon, rhetoric, rhythmic); by the suffixes –ist, -ics, -ism, -id, -ize, -oid, -osis (e.g. theorist, acoustic, Leonid, asteroid, asterisk, communism, socialist).[6]

   Some proper names of Greek origin got to be quite popular in England, such as Catherine, George, Margaret, Theodore, Sophia. Many Greek words came to English in a very complicated manner. Such words as catalogue, chair, chronicle, police, policy travelled from Greek to Latin, then to French, and from French to English; and such as baritone, grotto, buffalo came through Italian, after being modified in form.

  After the Renaissance Greek words were introduced into English in great numbers. They mostly came as terms for various fields of science, such as

1)  Literature and art – poet, rhythm, tragedy, comedy, drama, lexicon, hexametre, antithesis, hyperbole;

2)  Lexicology – lexicology, antonym, etymology, idiom, neologism, archaism, homophone, syncope, synonym, aphaeresis, apocope, dialect, euphemism, morpheme, semanteme;

3)  Philosophy and mathematics – basis, category, diagram, enthusiasm, ethics, hypotenuse, octagon, theory, thesis;

4)  Botany – balsam, bulb, cactus, organism, parasite;

5)  Physics – dynamo, hydraulic, pneumatic, thermometer, thermostat;

6)  Medicine – diagnosis, diaphragm, homeopathy, neuralgia, rheumatism. [2]

  Greek words keep on enriching the English vocabulary just because they are always handy for scientific wishing to give names to their names to their discoveries, scientific process of materials, for out the new terms can be formed.

  A lot of English term in rhetoric and grammar originated in Creece. The punctuation  mark comma originates from the Greek word komma, which meant “a piece cut off’’ and then “the mark that sets off a phrase”.

  There are also Greek prefixes that helps to identify a word of Greek origin, such as: a-, an-, (e.g. aseptic, anarchy); anti-, ant- (e.g. antidote, antarctic); di-, dis- (e.g. dilemma, dissylabic) and others. 

  The contribution of Greek to the English vocabulary can be quantified in two ways, type and token frequencies: type frequency is the proportion of distinct words; tope frequency is the proportion of words in actual texts.

  Since most words of Creek origin are specialized technical and scientific coinages, the type frequency is considerably higher than the token frequency. And the type frequency ina large word list will be larger than that in a small word list. In a typical English dictionary of 80,000 words, which corresponds very roughly to the vocabulary of an educated English speaker, about 5% of the words are borrowed from Greek directly, and about 25% indirectly.  

Reference Literature:

1.  Арнольд И. В. Лексикология современного английского языка: Учеб. Для ин-тов и фак. иностр. яз. – 3-е изд., пререраб. и доп. – М.: Высш. шк., 1986. – 259с., ил. – На англ. яз.

2.  Кузнецова В. С. Лексикология современного английского языка (на английском языке) – К.: Радянська школа, 1966. – 135с.

3.  Лексикология английского языка: Учебник для ин-тов и фак. иностр. яз. / Р.З. Гинзбург, С. С. Хидекель, Г. Ю. Князева и А. А. Санкин. – 2-е изд., испр. и доп. – М.: Высш. Школа, 1979. – 269с.

4.  Мостовий М. І. Лексикологія англійської мови: (Підручник для ін-тів і фак. інозем. мови). – Х.: Основа, 1993. – 256с.

5.  Ніколаєнко А. Г. Лексикологія англ. мови – теорія і практика. – Вінниця: Нова Книга, 2007. – 528с.

6.  Раєвська Н. М. Лексикологія англійської мови. – К.: Вища школа, 1979. – 303с. 

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