Re: OT: German reputation

On Thu, 16 Dec 2004 14:42:35 +0100, Andreas Johansson <andjo@...> wrote:

>Quoting "J. 'Mach' Wust" <j_mach_wust@...>:
>
>> The local pronunciation is often coloured by the standard orthography
>> itself. I live in a region where the local dialects really distinguish
>> /e/ and /æ/, and some apply this to the pronunciation of the standard as
>> well. But they will pronounce a word like _Städte_ (cities) with /æ/ even
>> though historically, it had an /e/ (_stete_ in Middle High German; the
>> original umlaut of /a/ was /e/, not /æ/!), and even though this /e/ is
>> still preserved in the dialect word _Stedt_ (though the standard
>> orthography even begins to influences the local dialect pronunciation, so
>> that some say _Städt_ instead of _Stedt_).
>
>Where did /æ/ come from?
Gotta look it up... There it is: German has two kinds of umlaut: The primary
umlaut already found in Old High German where stressed /a/ became /e/ if in
the following syllable there was any of /i, i:, j/, except if the consonants
/ht, hs, rw/ or /l/ + any consonant were inbetween, e.g. OHG gesti ('Gäste'
guests), zellen ('zählen' tell), ferit ('fährt' fares), lembir ('Lämmer'
lambs), MHG stete ('Städte' cities), edel ('edel' noble).

In the secondary umlaut, all vowels (except /i, i:/) if an /i, i:, j/
followed, no matter which consonant inbetween, and in the secondary umlaut,
e.g. /a, a:/ to /æ, æ:/ as in MHG mächtec ('mächtig' mighty), mære ('Mär'
story), genædec ('gnädig' clement), wænen ('wähnen' imagine).

kry@s:
j. 'mach' wust