8 Adjectives
8.1. Quick Start
Surely the oddest grammatical feature belonging to the Germanic languages is that they can inflect almost any adjective in either of two very different ways. If the adjective follows a demonstrative pronoun, possessive adjective, or genitive noun or noun phrase, one of the so-called "weak" endings is added to it; otherwise it is given a "strong" ending.
In Old English it is difficult to discern a distinction in meaning between the strong and weak adjectives, though there must originally have been one. But the distinction is widespread (all the early Germanic languages have it) and surprisingly durable: strong and weak adjectives were still distinguished in Chaucer's English, and they are distinguished even now in German.
At this point you may be grumbling that we have arbitrarily doubled the amount of memorization required to learn the adjectives. If so, calm down: adjectives are really quite easy. The weak adjectives are almost exactly the same as the weak nouns. Most of the strong adjective endings resemble those of either the strong nouns or the demonstrative pronouns. In this chapter you will see almost no endings that you have not seen before.
Indeed (though some Old English teachers may not approve of our telling you so), you may find it possible to read Old English prose pretty well without having put in a lot of work on adjectives. In a noun phrase like þæs æðelan bōceres 'the noble scholar's', you can get the information that the phrase is genitive singular from either the demonstrative pronoun or the noun. The weak adjective æðelan doesn't tell you much. In a phrase like ġeonge prēostas 'young priests', the strong ending of the adjective ġeonge is less ambiguous, but it is also redundant: you can get all the information you need from the noun. It becomes important to recognize the adjective's ending when it gets separated from its noun:
hē lēt him þā of handon lēofne flēogan
hafoc wið þæs holtes[The Battle of Maldon, ll. 7-8.]
[he then let his beloved hawk fly from his
hands towards the woods]
Here hafoc hawk' is the accusative direct object of lēt 'let'. The adjective lēofne 'beloved' is separated from this noun by the infinitive flēogan 'fly', and so it is helpful that lēofne has the masculine accusative singular ending -ne so that you can associate it correctly with its noun. You will run into this kind of situation more often in poetry than in prose.
Table 8.1 summarizes the adjective endings.
| masculine | neuter | feminine | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strong | ||||
| singular | nominative | -- | -- | -u / -- |
| accusative | -ne | -- | -e | |
| genitive | -es | -es | -re | |
| dative | -um | -um | -re | |
| instrumental | -e | -e | ||
| plural | nominative | -e | -u / -- / -e | -a / -e |
| accusative | ||||
| genitive | -ra | -ra | -ra | |
| dative | -um | -um | -um | |
| Weak | ||||
| singular | nominative | -a | -e | -e |
| accusative | -an | -e | -an | |
| genitive | -an | -an | -an | |
| dative | -an | -an | -an | |
| plural | nominative | -an | -an | -an |
| accusative | ||||
| genitive | -ra / -ena | -ra / -ena | -ra / -ena | |
| dative | -um | -um | -um | |
8.2. Strong adjectives
Table 8.2 shows the strong endings attached to an adjective with a long stem. (Forms in bold type should be compared with the demonstrative pronouns, others with the strong nouns.)
| masculine | neuter | feminine | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| singular | nominative | gōd 'good' | gōd | gōd |
| accusative | gōdne | gōde | ||
| genitive | gōdes | gōdre | ||
| dative | gōdum | |||
| instrumental | gōde | |||
| plural | nominative | gōde | gōd, gōde | gōda, -e |
| accusative | ||||
| genitive | gōdra | |||
| dative | gōdum | |||
The adjectives are subject to the same kinds of transformations that affect the nouns. Those with long stems differ from those with short stems (table 8.3) in that the feminine nominative singular and the neuter nominative/accusative plural end in -u (see 6.1.1 for an explanation).
| masculine | neuter | feminine | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| singular | nominative | hwæt 'vigorous' | hwæt | hwatu |
| accusative | hwætne | hwate | ||
| genitive | hwætes | hwætre | ||
| dative | hwatum | |||
| instrumental | hwate | |||
| plural | nominative | hwate | hwatu, -e | hwata, -e |
| accusative | ||||
| genitive | hwatra | |||
| dative | hwatum | |||
Table 8.3 also shows that when the vowel of an adjective with a short stem is æ or ea, it alternates with a, as has already been discussed in connection with nouns. In some other adjectives, h is dropped between voiced sounds, so, for example, the masculine accusative singular of hēah 'high' is hēane and the feminine nominative singular is hēa.
The masculine/neuter dative singular ending -um may cause confusion, for this is also the ending of the dative plural nouns and adjectives, and you may already have come to think of it as plural. Remember it this way: -um is always dative, and in nouns it is always plural.
- The second syllable of a two-syllable adjective, like that of a two-syllable noun, may be syncopated, so the dative plural of hāliġ 'holy' is hālgum but the masculine accusative singular is hāliġne.
- The nominative and accusative plural ending -e is very frequent for both feminines and neuters in late Old English, when -e becomes the dominant ending for all genders. You will also see occasional -a in nominative and accusative plural neuters.
- Possessive adjectives are always declined strong, and so is ōðer 'other, second', regardless of context.
8.3. Weak adjectives
The weak adjectives (table 8.4) are almost exactly like the weak nouns. The difference is that the ending of the genitive plural of a weak adjective is usually the same as that of a strong adjective.
| masculine | neuter | feminine | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| singular | nominative | gōda 'good' | gōde | gōde |
| accusative | gōdan | gōdan | ||
| genitive | gōdan | |||
| dative | ||||
| plural | nominative | gōdan | ||
| accusative | ||||
| genitive | gōdra, -ena | |||
| dative | gōdum | |||
There is no distinction between long and short stems, except that æ or ea in a short root syllable always becomes a, so the weak masculine nominative singular of hwæt 'vigorous' is hwata. Because all weak endings begin with vowels, h is always dropped at the end of a root syllable (as with some nouns), so the weak nominative/accusative plural of hēah 'high' is hēan. As with nouns and strong adjectives, the second syllable of a two-syllable adjective can be syncopated, so the weak nominative/accusative plural of hāliġ 'holy' is hālgan.
Comparative adjectives and ordinal numbers (except for ōðer 'second') are always declined weak.
8.4. Comparison of adjectives
The comparative adjective is made by adding -r- between the root syllable and the inflectional ending, which is always weak regardless of context. The superlative is made by adding -ost, which may be followed by either a weak or a strong inflection. Examples:
| heard 'hard, fierce' | heardra | heardost |
| milde 'kind' | mildra | mildost |
| hāliġ 'holy' | hāliġra | hālgost |
| sweotol 'clear' | sweotolra | sweotolost |
Some adjectives have i-mutation in the comparative and superlative forms, and in these cases the superlative element is usually -est. For example:
| eald 'old' | ieldra | ieldest |
| ġeong 'young' | ġinġra | ġinġest |
| hēah 'high' | hīera | hīehst |
| lang 'long' | lenġra | lenġest |
| strang 'strong' | strenġra | strenġest |
You may occasionally encounter unmutated forms, e.g. strangost 'strongest'.
A few adjectives have anomalous comparative and superlative forms; these are still anomalous in Modern English, though sometimes in different ways:
| gōd 'good' | betera | betst |
| sēlra | sēlest | |
| lȳtel 'small' | lǣssa | lǣst |
| miċel 'large' | māra | mǣst |
| yfel 'bad' | wiersa | wierrest, wierst |
Modern English has lost the alternative comparative and superlative sēlra 'better' and sēlest 'best'.
Comparative adjectives sometimes cause problems for students who are not on the lookout for them, or who confuse comparative -r- with the -r- of the feminine genitive/dative singular ending -re or the genitive plural -ra. The Old English comparative -r- may not look enough like the Modern English comparative -er to be easy for you to detect. The only solution to the problem is to be alert when you read.
8.5. On-line exercises
Old English Aerobics has a session on the adjective, using easy to intermediate Old English sentences. The minitext "Letter to Brother Edward" is also on line, accompanied by exercises on the adjectives it contains.
© Copyright 2003 by Peter S. Baker. All Rights Reserved.