格林定律：
从1806年开始，格林兄弟就致力于民间童话和传说的搜集、整理和研究工作，出版了《儿童和家庭童话集》（两卷集）和《德国传说集》（两卷）。雅科布还出版了《德国神话》，威廉出版了《论德国古代民歌》和《德国英雄传说 》。1806～1826年间雅科布同时还研究语言学 ，编写了4卷巨著《德语语法》，是一部历史语法，后人称为日耳曼格语言的基本教程。在《德语语法》1822年的修订版中，他提出了印欧诸语言语音演变的规则，后人称之为格林定律。他指出 ，在印欧语系中日耳曼语族历史上，辅音分组演变，在英语和低地德语中变了一次，后来在高地德语中又再变一次。事实上，格林定律只是大体上正确，后来由K.A.维尔纳加以补充。1838年底格林兄弟开始编写《德语词典》，1854～1862 年共出版第一至三卷。这项浩大的工程兄弟俩生前未能完成 ，后来德国语言学家继续这项工作，至1961年才全部完成。
印欧语系含大部分欧洲语言和印度次大陆语言在内的约150种语言。英国语言学家Sir William Jones1786年指出梵语与希腊语和拉丁语可能来自同一个原始语，它们具有亲缘关系。杨贵妃画像1822年，Jacob Grimm发现了日耳曼语言中所发生的一系列的有规则的辅音变化。这些辅音的有规则变化后被称为格林定律：
a. 浊爆破音变为清爆破音: bàp
b. 清爆破音变为摩擦音: pàf
c. 浊送气音变为浊不送气音:bhàb
通过比较法重建了被称为原始印欧语系的具有同一来源的语法，包括欧洲语言和印度次大陆的语言的许多亚语系都是以该原始语演化发展来的。
Grimm's law (also known as the First Germanic Sound Shift or the Rask's-Grimm's rule), named for Jacob Grimm, is a t of statements describing the inherited Proto-Indo-European (PIE) stops as they developed in Proto-Germanic (PGmc, the common ancestor of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family) in the 1st millennium BC. It establishes a t of regular correspondences between early Germanic stops and fricatives and the stop consonants of certain other centum Indo-European languages (Grimm ud mostly Latin and Greek for illustration). As it is prently formulated, Grimm's Law consists of three parts, which must be thought of as three concutive phas in the n of a chain shift:[1]
Proto-Indo-European voiceless stops change into voiceless fricatives.
Proto-Indo-European voiced stops become voiceless stops.
Proto-Indo-European voiced aspirated stops become voiced fricatives; ultimately, in most Germanic languages the voiced fricatives become voiced stops.
The chain shift can be abstractly reprented as:
bʰ → b → p → f
dʰ → d → t → θ
gʰ → g → k → x
gʷʰ → gʷ → kʷ → xʷ
Here each sound moves one position to the right to take on its new sound value.
The voiced aspirated stops may have first become voiced fricatives before hardening to t
不负青春不负韶华
he voiced unaspirated stops "b", "d", and "g" under certain conditions; however, some linguists dispute this. See Proto-Germanic phonology.
Grimm's law was the first non-trivial systematic sound change to be discovered in linguistics; its formulation was a turning point in the development of linguistics, enabling the introduction of a rigorous methodology to historical linguistic rearch. The "law" was discovered by Friedrich von Schlegel in 1806 and Rasmus Christian Rask in 1818. It was elaborated (i.e. extended to include standard German) in 1822 by Jacob Grimm, the elder of the Brothers Grimm, in his book Deutsche Grammatik.
Further changes following Grimm's Law, as well as sound changes in other Indo-European languages, can sometimes obscure its effects. The most illustrative examples are ud here.
Change | Germanic (shifted) examples | Non-Germanic (unshifted) cognates |
*p→f | English: foot,, Dutch: voet, German: Fuß, Gothic: fōtus, Icelandic, Faroe: fótur, Danish: fod, Norwegian, Swedish: fot | Ancient Greek: πούς (pūs), Latin: pēs, pedis, Sanskrit: pāda, Russian: под (pod), Lithuanian: pėda, Latvian pēda | 音乐舞曲
*t→þ [θ] | English: third, Old High German: thritto, Gothic: þridja, Icelandic: þriðji | Ancient Greek: τρίτος (tritos), Latin: tertius, Gaelic treas, Irish: trí, Sanskrit: treta, Russian: третий (tretij), Lithuanian: trečias, Latvian trīs |
*k→h [x] | English: hound, Dutch: hond, German: Hund, Gothic: hunds, Icelandic, Faroe: hundur, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish: hund | Ancient Greek: κύων (kýōn), Latin: canis, Gaelic, Irish: cú, Welsh ci |
*kʷ→hw [xw] | English: what, Gothic: 安全事故个人反思ƕa ("hwa"), Danish hvad, Icelandic: hvað, Faroe hvat, Norwegian: hva | Latin: quod, Gaelic: ciod, Irish: cad, Sanskrit: ka-, kiṃ, Russian: ко- (ko-), Lithuanian: ką', Latvian kas |
*b→p | English: warp; Swedish: värpa; Dutch: werpen; Icelandic, Faroe: varpa, Gothic wairpan | Latin: verber |
*d→t | English: ten, Dutch: tien, Gothic: taíhun, Icelandic: tíu, Faroe: tíggju, Danish, Norwegian: ti, Swedish: tio | Latin: decem, Greek: δέκα (déka), Gaelic, Irish: deich, Sanskrit: daśan, Russian: десять (desyat'), Lithuanian: dešimt, Welsh deg, Latvian desmit |
*g→k | English: cold, Dutch: koud, German: kalt, Icelandic, Faroe: kaldur, Danish: kold, Norwegian: kald, Swedish: kall, | Latin: gelū |
*gʷ→kw | English: quick, Frisian: quick, queck, Dutch: kwiek, Gothic: qius, Old Nor: kvikr, Danish: kvik, Icelandic, Faroe: kvikur, Swedish: kvick, Norwegian kvikk | Lithuanian: gyvas |
*bʰ→b | English: brother, Dutch: broeder, German: Bruder, Gothic: broþar, Icelandic, Faroe: bróðir, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian: broder | Sanskrit: bhrātṛ, Russian: брат (brat), Lithuanian: brolis, Old Church Slavonic: братръ (bratr'), Latvian brālis |
*dʰ→d | English: door, Frisian: doar, Dutch: deur, Gothic: daúr, Icelandic, Faroe: dyr, Danish, Norwegian: dør, Swedish: dörr | Irish: doras, Sanskrit: dwār, Russian: дверь (dver'), Lithuanian: durys, Latvian durvis |
*gʰ→g | English: goo, Frisian: guos, Dutch: gans, German: Gans, Icelandic: gæs, Faroe: gás, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish: gås | Russian: гусь (gus') |
*ngʷʰ→ngw (→ng except in Gothic) | Gothic: tungwō, English: tongue | Archaic Latin: dingua |
*gʷʰ→gw→w | English: wife, Proto-Germanic: wiban (from former gwiban), Old Saxon, Old Frisian: wif, Dutch: wijf, Old High German: wib, German: Weib, Old Nor: vif, Icelandic: víf, Faroe: vív, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian: viv (although no longer understood in contemporary Swedish?). | Tocharian A: kip, B: kwípe (vulva) 贫困山区的孩子 |
| | |
Note: Some linguists dispute the origin of the word "wife". Calvert Watkins has assumed the root word is Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰíbʰ-. [1]
Note: Proto-Germanic *gw from Proto-Indo-Eropean *gʷʰ has undergone further changes of various sorts. After *n it was prerved as *gw, but later changed to *g except in Gothic. Elwhere, it became either *w or *g during late Proto-Germanic.
This is strikingly regular. Each pha involves one single change which applies equally to the labials (p, b, bʰ, f) and their equivalent dentals (t, d, d东汉建立时间ʰ, þ), velars (k, g, gʰ, h) and rounded velars (kʷ炖牛腩的家常做法, gʷ, gʷʰ, hw). The first pha left the phoneme repertoire of the language without voiceless stops, the cond pha filled this gap but created a new one, and so on until the chain had run its cour.
Note: Icelandic hv has actually reverted Grimm's Law in the last few generations, and is now pronounced [kʰv] or [kʰf]. Cf. also nynorsk kv-/k-.
The voiceless stops did not become fricatives if they were preceded by *s (itlf a fricative).
67年Change | Germanic examples | Non-Germanic examples |
*sp | English: spew, Gothic: speiwan, Dutch: spuien, German: speien, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish: spy, Icelandic: spýja, Faroe: spýggja | Latin: spuere |
*st | English: stand, Dutch: staan, German: stehen, Icelandic, Faroe: standa, Danish, Swedish: stå | Latin: stāre, Irish: stad, Sanskrit: sta, Russian: стать (stat'), Lithuanian: stoti |
*sk | English: short, Old Nor and Icelandic: skorta, Old High German: scurz | Lithuanian: skurdus |
*skʷ | English: scold, Old Nor: skäld, Icelandic: skáld, Dutch: schelden, Norwegian: skald | Irish: scioll |
| | |
Note:
Some linguists dispute the origin of the word "scold", but Julius Pokorny among others propod *skwetlo as the assumed root.
Dutch has *k → *h (ch) even after *s, though this is a parate development.
Furthermore, the voiceless stop *t also did not become a fricative if preceded by *p, *k, or *kʷ (themlves voiceless stops). The voiceless stop it was preceded by did fricativize, however. This is sometimes treated parately under the heading Germanic spirant law:
