E. Strong and weak verbs

Gothic

D. Adjective Dualism in Germanic

In older Germanic languages adjectives could be ‘strong’ (indefinite) or ‘weak’ (definite), a difference in inflection justified by the adjective occurring in an indefinite or definite context. Adjectives evolved into strong and weak declensions, originally with indefinite and definite meaning, respectively. As a result of its definite meaning, the weak form came to be used in the daughter languages in conjunction with demonstratives and definite articles.

STRONG Sg.Dat.Neut. god-amma waurstwa ‘good work’

WEAK Sg.Dat.Neut. þamma god-in andahaita ‘that/the good profession’

No satisfactory explanation has ever been proposed to explain the origin of this system. Hypothesis: in Proto-Germanic every attributive adjective form must have been preceded by an artroid (a kind of fake article), which has been preserved in the form of a demonstrative pronoun with definite adjectives (Gothic Sg.Dat.Neut. þamma god-in andahaita ‘that/the good profession’). In indefinite adjectives, the artroid has survived in the shape of a pronominal suffix (Sg.Dat.Neut. god-amma waurstwa ‘good work’).

Adjectives agree with the noun they qualify in case, number, and gender. The terms "strong" and "weak" are based on the later development of these declensions in languages such as German and Old English, where the strong declensions have more distinct endings. In the proto-language, as in Gothic, such terms have no relevance. The strong declension was based on a combination of the nominal /a/ and /ō/ stems with the PIE pronominal endings; the weak declension was based on the nominal /n/ declension.

Thus the adjective in Germanic derives from the Indo-European nominal (no distinction having been made between adjectives and nouns in the Indo-European proto-language); the pre-posed determiner with weak adjectives is to be seen as a factor which polarised the nominal thus turning it into a modifier and so played a role in the development of the adjective as a lexical class in Germanic.

An example verb: *nemanan "to take" (class IV strong verb).

	Indicative	Subjunctive	Imperative
Active	Passive	Active	Passive	Active
Present	1st sing	nemō	nemôi? nemai?	nema-uN	???	–
2nd sing	nimizi	nemazai	nemaiz	nemaizau?	nem
3rd sing	nimidi	nemadai	nemai	nemaidau?	nemadau
1st dual	nemōz (?)	nemandai	nemaiw	nemaindau?	–
2nd dual	nemadiz (?)	nemandai	nemaidiz (?)	nemaindau?	nemadiz?
1st plur	nemamaz	nemandai	nemaim	nemaindau?	–
2nd plur	nimid	nemandai	nemaid	nemaindau?	nimid
3rd plur	nemandi	nemandai	nemain	nemaindau?	nemandau
Past	1st sing	nam	–	nēmijuN (?; or nēmīN??)	–	–
2nd sing	namt	nēmīz
3rd sing	nam	nēmī
1st dual	nēmū (?)	nēmīw
2nd dual	nēmudiz (?)	nēmīdiz (?)
1st plur	nēmum	nēmīm
2nd plur	nēmud	nēmīd
3rd plur	nēmun	nēmīn
Infinitive	nemanaN
Present Participle	nemandaz
Past Participle	numanaz

The terms strong and weak verbs were proposed by J. Grimm; he called the verbs strong because they had preserved the richness of form since the age of the parent-language and in this sense could be contrasted to weak verbs lacking such variety of form. From the verbs the terms were extended to noun and adjective declensions. The difference between these groups lies in the means of building the principal forms: the Present tense, The Past tense and Participle II. The strong verbs built their principal forms with the help of root vowel interchanges plus certain grammatical endings; they made use of IE ablaut with certain modifications due to phonetic changes and environment. The weak verbs are a specifically Germanic innovation, for the device used in building their principal forms is not found outside the Germanic group. They built the Past tense and Participle II by inserting a special suffix between the root and the ending. Strong verbs were divided into seven main classes while weak verbs were divided into five main classes.

Proto-Germanic verbs have three moods: indicative, subjunctive and imperative. Indicative and subjunctive moods are fully conjugated throughout the present and past, while the imperative mood existed only in the present tense and lacked first-person forms. Proto-Germanic verbs have two voices, active and passive.

As in other Indo-European languages, a verb in Proto-Germanic could have a preverb attached to it, modifying its meaning (cf. e.g. *fra-werþanan "to perish", derived from *werþanan "to become").

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