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Semantic Shift in Old English and Old Saxon Identity Terms Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 5-7-2019 1:00 PM Semantic Shift in Old English and Old Saxon Identity Terms David A. Carlton The University of Western Ontario Supervisor Toswell, M. J. The University of Western Ontario Graduate Program in English A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree in Doctor of Philosophy © David A. Carlton 2019 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Medieval Studies Commons Recommended Citation Carlton, David A., "Semantic Shift in Old English and Old Saxon Identity Terms" (2019). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 6183. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/6183 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract Christianity substantially altered Germanic life during the early Middle Ages. However, no large-scale studies have attempted to visualize Christianization through macroscopic semantic trends, nor have any studies used Old Saxon as a control group to illustrate the role of Christianity in less obvious semantic contexts. The core question of this project, then, revolves around semantic corpora and their role in clarifying sociocultural phenomena: how can a cross-section of Old Saxon and Old English semantics help clarify Christianity's role in re-shaping early medieval Germanic identity? This study uses corpus linguistics, post-colonial/historical theory, and Digital Humanities approaches to schematize the processes underlying the semantic shift of eight Old English/Old Saxon lexeme pairs— ambiht/ambaht, facen/fekan, gædeling/gaduling, hosp–hosc/hosk, geneat/ginot, scyldig/skuldig, þegn/thegan, and wlanc/wlank—that illustrate how the Anglo-Saxons and Continental Saxons re- interpreted their social and moral “Self” between ca. 600 CE and ca. 1100 CE. This study obtained quantitative and qualitative sample data primarily from the Dictionary of Old English Electronic Corpus (DOEEC) and TITUS Texts. To establish a semantic baseline, data collection began with Latin/vernacular glosses and ended with larger works of early Germanic literature, including the Old English Beowulf and Old Saxon Heliand. To systematize semantic observations, the sample lexemes were organized into two groups: “Social Roles” and “Personal Qualities.” The Old English and Old Saxon conclusions yielded three key observations: first, in the “Social Roles,” the transition from reciprocal exchange to autocratic kingship correlated to the naturalization of Christian hierarchy; second, in the “Personal Qualities,” new Christian moral concepts like the sin of superbia introduced semantic gaps that necessitated the reassignment of preexisting lexemes, resulting in semantic hybridization, specialization, and the subversion of Germanic pride; third, Christianity's preference for the unseen occasioned a shift from material to spiritual i representations of salvation. These findings have significance for future research on Old English/Old Saxon semantic shift, the relative and absolute dating of Old English/Old Saxon literature, and hybrid digital/analog approaches to philology. Keywords Anglo-Saxons, Beowulf, Christianity, Continental Saxons, corpus linguistics, Dictionary of Old English, Digital Humanities, Germanic, Heliand, medieval, Middle Ages, Old English, Old Saxon, philology, post-colonial theory, semantic hybridization, semantic shift, TITUS Texts ii Acknowledgements Numerous people helped this study come to fruition, but to list them all would defy space requirements. First, I would like to thank my parents, Marlisle Carlton and Bob Carlton, and my grandparents, Laurel Reitlo and Donald Reitlo, for their unwavering support. I want to thank my partner, Natasha Tuskovich, for her patience and encouragement over the past five years, the editors at the Dictionary of Old English, for opening their collections to me, and Dr. Richard Moll, for providing years of satisfying bibliographical and linguistic conversation and offering insightful feedback on this dissertation as one of my departmental examiners. Also, thanks to Dr. Larry Swain for giving me the space and editorial guidance to develop my concept of semantic hybridity. I want to acknowledge Dr. Jeremy Colangelo, Kevin Goodwin, Phillip Luckhardt, Ian Hynd, and Davis Hoye for helping me connect my research to modern contexts and keeping me grounded when afflicted with intellectual wanderlust. I would also like to thank Dr. Michael Treschow, who has supported and encouraged me since my undergraduate days, and whose passion for Old English sparked my own fascination with early medieval Germanic peoples. Thanks to my university examiner, Dr. Regna Darnell, and my external examiner, Dr. Geoffrey R. Russom, whose generous comments and suggestions—both large and small—helped refine the present study. Last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Jane Toswell, for her years of intellectual and professional guidance, and my second reader, Dr. Michael Fox, for helping me finish my final edits. This project would never have seen completion without their wise and generous input. Funding for this project was provided by an Ontario Graduate Scholarship and a Canada Graduate Scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. iii Table of Contents Abstract.......................................................................................................................................................i Acknowledgements...................................................................................................................................iii Table of Contents......................................................................................................................................iv Abbreviations...........................................................................................................................................vii Chapter 1. Introduction and Methodology.................................................................................................1 1.1 History and Scholarship..................................................................................................................1 1.2 Methodology...................................................................................................................................5 1.2.1 Preliminary Word-Selection ...................................................................................................5 1.2.2 Lexeme Categorization..........................................................................................................11 1.2.3 Schematizing Semantic Development...................................................................................13 1.2.4 Reduction of Sample Group and Final Word List.................................................................17 1.2.5 Systems of Analysis and Aims...............................................................................................19 1.3 Texts, Manuscripts, and Editions...................................................................................................24 1.3.1 Old English Texts...................................................................................................................25 1.3.2 Old Saxon Texts.....................................................................................................................45 Chapter 2. Social Roles: ambiht/ambaht and gædeling/gaduling............................................................53 2.1 ambiht and ambaht........................................................................................................................53 2.1.1 Current Definitions................................................................................................................53 2.1.2 Word Studies..........................................................................................................................53 2.1.3 Etymology.............................................................................................................................54 2.1.4 Frequency in Old English and Old Saxon.............................................................................55 2.1.5 Old English Semantic Timeline.............................................................................................56 2.1.6 Old English Conclusions.......................................................................................................62 2.1.7 Old Saxon Semantic Timeline...............................................................................................69 2.1.8 Old Saxon Conclusions.........................................................................................................72 2.1.9 Old English and Old Saxon Observations.............................................................................75 2.2 gædeling and gaduling...................................................................................................................77 2.2.1 Current Definitions................................................................................................................77 2.2.2 Word Studies..........................................................................................................................77
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