On some French elements in Early Middle English word derivation

Abstract

Middle English texts. The addition of the texts has been dictated by the fact that linguistic corpora are by and large inadequate for diachronic word-formation research.

The problem of the productivity of linguistic elements in the distant past has been analysed by a number of linguists and numerous criteria of productivity have been proposed. The treatment of the issue has not been free from controversies. Both Dalton-Puffer (1996) and Miller (1997) propose that French derivational suffixes became productive in Late Middle English. My investigations allow me to conclude that some suffixes must have been productive already in Early Middle English. The number of loanwords with transparent bi-morphemic structure, i.e. analysable French suffixes, seems to be sufficiently large at that time to warrant analysability.