The taking off and catching on of etymological spellings in Early Modern English Evidence from the EEBO Corpus

Ryuichi Hotta, Yoko Iyeiri

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter

Abstract

This chapter examines the path that orthographic etymologisation, as in doubt and verdict, followed mainly in the course of the sixteenth century. Few corpus-based studies have been undertaken on etymological spellings, but the recent availability of the large-sized EEBO Corpus must be of great help in making it clear when and how etymological spellings took off and caught on in the Early Modern English period. Besides giving a close description of the process of the orthographic shift, we discuss some methodological problems in the use of the corpus, stressing at the same time that it is an excellent tool, when carefully used, for studies in the history of English.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationENGLISH HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS HISTORICAL ENGLISH IN CONTACT PAPERS FROM THE XXTH ICEHL
EditorsBettelou Los, Chris Cummins, Lisa Gotthard, Alpo Honkapohja, Benjamin Molineaux
PublisherJohn Benjamins Publishing Company
Pages143-163
Number of pages21
ISBN (Electronic)9789027258199
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022

Publication series

NameCurrent Issues in Linguistic Theory
Volume359
ISSN (Print)0304-0763

Keywords

  • EEBO Corpus
  • Etymological spelling
  • Renaissance
  • The sixteenth century

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Linguistics and Language
  • Language and Linguistics

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