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Booster prefixes in Old English – an alternative view of the roots of ME forsooth1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2008

URSULA LENKER
URSULA LENKER*
Affiliation:
Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Englische Sprachwissenschaft, Universitätsallee, 85072 Eichstätt, [email protected]
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Abstract

Prefixes attached to adjectives/adverbs which are functionally equivalent to booster adverbs, i.e. booster prefixes, are frequent in both Present-day German and Old English. Among the Old English booster prefixes, whose inventory is here discussed in a first survey, for- is by far the most frequent, with respect to both types and tokens. In a more detailed analysis, the study investigates the Old English roots of ME forsooth(e), an emphasizer which became highly frequent at the beginning of Middle English. Forsooth is commonly considered to be a univerbated and lexicalized form of an Old English prepositional phrase for soþ ‘for truth’ (comparable to PDE indeed (< ‘in the deed’) or in fact). Yet analyses of the inventory of booster prefixes in Old English and the booster prefix for- in particular show that an alternative etymology may be suggested: Old English for soþ can also be analysed as the (endingless) accusative singular neuter of the adjective forsoþ ‘very true’.

Type
Research Article
Information
English Language & Linguistics , Volume 12 , Issue 2 , July 2008 , pp. 245 - 265
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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