THE PAST PARTICIPLE.
§ 346. A. _The participle in_ -EN.--In the Anglo-Saxon this participle was
declined like the adjectives. Like the adjectives, it is, in the present
English, undeclined.
In Anglo-Saxon it always ended in -en, as _sungen_, _funden_, _bunden_. In
English this -en is often wanting, as _found_, _bound_; the word _bounden_
being antiquated.
Words where the -en is wanting may be viewed in two lights; 1, they may be
looked upon as participles that have lost their termination; 2, they may be
considered as præterites with a participial sense.
§ 347. _Drank_, _drunk_, _drunken_.--With all words wherein the vowel of
the plural differs from that of the singular, the participle takes the
plural form. To say _I have drunk_, is to use an ambiguous expression;
since _drunk_ may be either a participle _minus_ its termination, or a
præterite with a participial sense. To say _I have drank_, is to use a
præterite for a participle. To say _I have drunken_, is to use an
unexceptional form.
In all words with a double form, as _spake_ and _spoke_, _brake_ and
_broke_, _clave_ and _clove_, the participle follows the form in o, as
_spoken_, _broken_, _cloven_. _Spaken_, _braken_, _claven_ are impossible
forms. There are degrees in laxity of language, and to say _the spear is
broke_ is better than to say _the spear is brake_.
§ 348. As a general rule, we find the participle in -en wherever the
præterite is strong; indeed, the participle in -en may be called the strong
participle, or the participle of the strong conjugation. Still the two
forms do not always coincide. In _mow_, _mowed_, _mown_, _sow_, _sowed_,
_sown_; and several other words, we find the participle strong, and the
præterite weak. I remember no instances of the converse. This is only
another way of saying that the præterite has a greater tendency to pass
from strong to weak than the participle.
§ 349. In the Latin language the change from s to r, and _vice versâ_, is
very common. We have the double forms _arbor_ and _arbos_, _honor_ and
_honos_, &c. Of this change we have a few specimens in English. The words
_rear_ and _raise_, as compared with each other, are examples. In
Anglo-Saxon a few words undergo a similar change in the plural number of
the strong præterites.
Ceóse, _I choose_; ceâs, _I chose_; curon, _we chose_; gecoren, _chosen_.
Forleóse, _I lose_; forleás, _I lost_; forluron, _we lost_; forloren,
_lost_.
Hreose, _I rush_; hreás, _I rushed_; hruron, _we rushed_; gehroren,
_rushed_.
This accounts for the participial form _forlorn_, or _lost_, in New High
German _verloren_. In Milton's lines,
---- the piercing air
Burns _frore_, and cold performs the effect of fire,
_Paradise Lost_, b. ii.,
we have a form from the Anglo-Saxon participle _gefroren_ = _frozen_.
§ 350. B. The _participle_ in -D, -T, or -ED.--In the Anglo-Saxon this
participle was declined like the adjective. Like the adjective, it is, in
the present English, undeclined.
In Anglo-Saxon it differed in form from the præterite, inasmuch as it ended
in -ed, or -t, whereas the præterite ended in -ode, -de, or -te: as,
_lufode_, _bærnde_, _dypte_, præterites; _gelufod_, _bærned_, _dypt_,
participles.
As the ejection of the e (in one case final in the other not) reduces words
like _bærned_ and _bærnde_ to the same form, it is easy to account for the
present identity of form between the weak præterites and the participles in
-d: e.g., _I moved_, _I have moved_, &c.
§ 351. _The prefix_ Y.--In the older writers, and in works written, like
Thomson's "Castle of Indolence," in imitation of them, we find prefixed to
the præterite participle the letter y-, as, _yclept_ = _called_: _yclad_ =
_clothed_: _ydrad_ = _dreaded_.
The following are the chief facts and the current opinion concerning this
prefix:--
1. It has grown out of the fuller forms ge-: Anglo-Saxon, ge-: Old Saxon,
gi-: Moeso-Gothic, ga-: Old High German, ka-, cha-, ga-, ki-, gi-.
2. It occurs in each and all of the Germanic languages of the Gothic stock.
3. It occurs, with a few fragmentary exceptions, in none of the
Scandinavian languages of the Gothic stock.
4. In Anglo-Saxon it occasionally indicates a difference of sense; as,
_hâten_ = _called_, _ge-hâten_ = _promised_; _boren_ = _borne_, _ge-boren_
= _born_.
5. It occurs in nouns as well as verbs.
6. Its power, in the case of nouns, is generally some idea of
_association_, or _collection_.--Moeso-Gothic, _sinþs_ = _a journey_,
_ga-sinþa_ = _a companion_; Old High German, _perc_ = _hill_; _ki-perki_
(_gebirge_) = _a range of hills_.
7. But it has also a _frequentative_ power; a frequentative power, which
is, in all probability, secondary to its collective power; since things
which recur frequently recur with a tendency to collection or association;
Middle High German, _ge-rassel_ = _rustling_; _ge-rumpel_ = _c-rumple_.
8. And it has also the power of expressing the possession of a quality.
_Anglo-Saxon._ _English._ _Anglo-Saxon._ _Latin._
Feax _Hair_ _Ge-feax_ _Comatus._
Heorte _Heart_ _Ge-heort_ _Cordatus._
Stence _Odour_ _Ge-stence_ _Odorus._
This power is also a collective, since every quality is associated with the
object that possesses it; _a sea with waves_ = _a wavy sea_.
9. Hence it is probable that the ga-, ki-, or gi-, Gothic, is the _cum_ of
Latin languages. Such, at least, is Grimm's view, as given in the "Deutsche
Grammatik," i. 1016.
Concerning this, it may be said that it is deficient in an essential point.
It does not show how the participle past is collective. Undoubtedly it may
be said that every such participle is in the condition of words like
_ge-feax_ and _ge-heort_; i.e., that they imply an association between the
object and the action or state. But this does not seem to be Grimm's view;
he rather suggests that the ge- may have been a prefix to verbs in general,
originally attached to all their forms, but finally abandoned everywhere
except in the case of the participle.
The theory of this prefix has yet to assume a satisfactory form.
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