Mercian was a dialect spoken in the Anglian kingdom of

Mercia Mercia (, was one of the principal kingdoms founded at the end of Sub-Roman Britain; the area was settled by Anglo-Saxons in an era called the Heptarchy. It was centred on the River Trent and its tributaries, in a region now known as the Midlan ...

(roughly speaking the Midlands of England, an area in which four kingdoms had been united under one monarchy). Together with Northumbrian, it was one of the two Anglian dialects. The other two dialects of

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

were Kentish and West Saxon. Each of those dialects was associated with an independent kingdom on the island. Of these, all of

Northumbria Northumbria () was an early medieval Heptarchy, kingdom in what is now Northern England and Scottish Lowlands, South Scotland. The name derives from the Old English meaning "the people or province north of the Humber", as opposed to the Sout ...

and most of Mercia were overrun by the

Vikings Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

during the 9th century. Part of Mercia and all of

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

were successfully defended but were then integrated into the

Kingdom of Wessex The Kingdom of the West Saxons, also known as the Kingdom of Wessex, was an Anglo-Saxon kingdom in the south of Great Britain, from around 519 until Alfred the Great declared himself as King of the Anglo-Saxons in 886. The Anglo-Saxons beli ...

. Because of the centralisation of power and the Viking invasions, there is little to no salvaged written evidence for the development of non-Wessex dialects after

Alfred the Great Alfred the Great ( ; – 26 October 899) was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who both died when Alfr ...

's unification, until the Middle English period.

History

The Mercian dialect was spoken as far east as the border of the

Kingdom of East Anglia The Kingdom of the East Angles (; ), informally known as the Kingdom of East Anglia, was a small independent Monarchy, kingdom of the Angles (tribe), Angles during the History of Anglo-Saxon England, Anglo-Saxon period comprising what are now t ...

and as far west as Offa's Dyke, bordering Wales. It was spoken in an area that extended as far north as

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

, bordering

, and as far south as South

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire ( ; abbreviated ''Oxon'') is a ceremonial county in South East England. The county is bordered by Northamptonshire and Warwickshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the east, Berkshire to the south, and Wiltshire and Glouceste ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

, where it bordered on the

. The

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

language also filtered in on a few occasions after the foundation of the Danelaw. This describes the situation before the unification of Mercia. The Old English Martyrology is a collection of over 230 hagiographies, probably compiled in

, or by someone who wrote in the Mercian dialect of Old English, in the second half of the 9th century. Six Mercian hymns are included in the Anglo-Saxon glosses to the Vespasian Psalter; they include the Benedictus and the Magnificat. In later Anglo-Saxon England, the dialect remained in use in speech but rarely in written documents. Some time after the

Norman conquest of England The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Normans, Norman, French people, French, Flemish people, Flemish, and Bretons, Breton troops, all led by the Du ...

, Middle English dialects emerged and were later found in such works as the '' Ormulum'' and the writings of the Gawain poet. In the later Middle Ages, a Mercian or East Midland dialect seems to have predominated in the

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

area, producing such forms as ''are'' (from Mercian arun). Mercian was used by the writer and

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also defined as the study of ...

J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlinson ...

to signify his fictional Rohirric language.

Alphabet

Modern Old English orthography adds additional diacritics above certain letters to show specific phonological features. These distinctions largely were not shown in Old English. Such diacritics include macrons for vowel length and overdots for palatalization. Sound approximations from various European languages have been given, but it is best to learn by the

International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standard written representation ...

transcriptions for more precise pronunciation. *''a'' for /ɑ/; General American English ''cot'' *''ā'' for /ɑː/; Norwegian ''ta'' *''b'' for /b/; English ''boy'' *''c'' for /k/; English ''cold'' *''ċ'' for /tʃ/; English ''cheese'' *''d'' for /d/; English ''did *e for /e/; Spanish ''me'' *''ē'' for /eː/; German ''See'' *''f'' for /f/; English ''fun''; realised as between voiced sounds (English ''thrive)'' *''g'' for /g/; realised as �(Dutch ''getrouw)'' *''ġ'' for /j/; English ''yes'' *''ġġ'' or ''ċġ'' for /dʒ/; English ''wedge'' *''h'' for /h/; realised as (English ''hunt'') syllable-initially, as after back vowels (German ''Nacht''), and as �after front vowels (German ''Sicht''); ''h'' also represented devoicing before certain voiced consonants *i for /i/; Spanish ''mí'' *ī for /iː/; English ''three'' *''k'' for /k/; English ''kind''; ''k'' was used rarely *''l'' for /l/; English ''light'' *''m'' for /m/; English ''mom'' *''n'' for /n/; English ''nine''; realized as �before ''c'' or ''g'' (English ''think'') *''o'' for /o/; Spanish ''yo'' *''ō'' for /oː/; German ''froh'' *''p'' for /p/; English ''pip'' *''r'' for /r/; likely (a "rolled" ''r''), which is present in Scottish English *''s'' for /s/; English ''sit''; voiced to when between voiced sounds (English ''wise'') *''sċ'' for /ʃ/; English ''ship'' *''t'' for /t/; English ''tart'' *''u'' for /u/; Spanish ''tú'' *''ū'' for /u/; German ''Hut'' *''x'' for /ks/; English ''fox'' *''y'' for /y/; equivalent to /i/ with rounded lips; Finnish ''mykkä'' *''ȳ'' for /yː/; equivalent to /iː/ with rounded lips; German ''früh'' *''ƿ'' for /w/; often replaced by modern ''w''; English ''win'' *''ð'' for /θ/, which realised as �(English ''think'') or �(English ''feather'') depending upon position; interchangeable with ''þ'' *''þ'' for /θ/, which realised as �(English ''think'') or �(English ''feather'') depending upon position; interchangeable with ''ð'' *''æ'' for /æ/; English ''bat'' *''ǣ'' for /æː/; Finnish ''ääni'' *''œ'' for /ø/; Hungarian ''jövő'' *''œ̄'' for /øː/; German ''schön'' or Hungarian ''jövő''

Grammar

Mercian grammar has the same structure as other West Germanic dialects.

Nouns

Nouns have three genders: masculine, feminine, neuter; and four cases:

nominative In grammar, the nominative case ( abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case, or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb, or (in Latin and formal variants of E ...

, accusative, dative and

genitive In grammar, the genitive case ( abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can ...

. These, in addition, all have

singular Singular may refer to: * Singular, the grammatical number that denotes a unit quantity, as opposed to the plural and other forms * Singular or sounder, a group of boar, see List of animal names * Singular (band), a Thai jazz pop duo *'' Singula ...

and

plural In many languages, a plural (sometimes list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated as pl., pl, , or ), is one of the values of the grammatical number, grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than ...

forms. They can also be strong or weak.

Examples

*Strong masculine noun ''stān'' (stone) **nominative (singular, plural): stān, stānes **accusative: stān, stānes **dative: stāne, stānen **genitive: stānes, stāne *Weak masculine noun ''name'' (name) **nominative: name, namen **accusative: namen/name, namen **dative: namen/name, namen **genitive: namen/name. namene/namen

Pronouns

Personal pronoun Personal pronouns are pronouns that are associated primarily with a particular grammatical person – first person (as ''I''), second person (as ''you''), or third person (as ''he'', ''she'', ''it''). Personal pronouns may also take different f ...

s (I/me, you, he, she, we, you (pl.) and they) come in all the above cases and come in three numbers: singular, dual ('you/we two'), plural. Demonstrative pronouns vary in the same way described below for the indefinite article, based on 'ðes' only for ''this''. ''That'' and ''Those'' are the same as the definite article.

Relative pronoun A relative pronoun is a pronoun that marks a relative clause. An example is the word ''which'' in the sentence "This is the house which Jack built." Here the relative pronoun ''which'' introduces the relative clause. The relative clause modifies th ...

s (who, which, that) are usually 'ðe' and 'ðet.'

Articles

The

definite article In grammar, an article is any member of a class of dedicated words that are used with noun phrases to mark the identifiability of the referents of the noun phrases. The category of articles constitutes a part of speech. In English, both "the" ...

is equally complex, with all genders changing in the singular in all cases, based on variations of 'ðe.' In the plural all genders take the same word. The

indefinite article In grammar, an article is any member of a class of dedicated words that are used with noun phrases to mark the identifiability of the referents of the noun phrases. The category of articles constitutes a part of speech. In English, both "the ...

was often omitted in Mercian.

Adjectives

Adjectives are always declined, even with some verbs (which means they can double up as

adverbs An adverb is a word or an expression that generally modifies a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a determiner, a clause, a preposition, or a sentence. Adverbs typically express manner, place, time, frequency, degree, or level of certainty by ans ...

), e.g. I am cold. Having split into weak and strong

declensions In linguistics, declension (verb: ''to wikt:decline#Verb, decline'') is the changing of the form of a word, generally to express its syntactic function in the sentence by way of an inflection. Declension may apply to nouns, pronouns, adjectives, ...

(depending on the strength of the noun), these split again into all four cases, both singular and plural. Comparative adjectives (e.g. ''bigger'') always add 're.' Example: Æðelen (noble), æðelenre (nobler).

Verbs

Verbs can be conjugated from the

infinitive Infinitive ( abbreviated ) is a linguistics term for certain verb forms existing in many languages, most often used as non-finite verbs that do not show a tense. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all ...

into the present tense, the past singular, the past plural and the

past participle In linguistics, a participle (; abbr. ) is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from a verb and used as an adject ...

. There exist strong and weak verbs in Mercian that too conjugate in their own ways. The future tense requires an

auxiliary verb An auxiliary verb ( abbreviated ) is a verb that adds functional or grammatical meaning to the clause in which it occurs, so as to express tense, aspect, modality, voice, emphasis, etc. Auxiliary verbs usually accompany an infinitive verb or ...

, like ''will'' (Mercian ''wyllen''). There are three moods:

indicative A realis mood ( abbreviated ) is a grammatical mood which is used principally to indicate that something is a statement of fact; in other words, to express what the speaker considers to be a known state of affairs, as in declarative sentence Dec ...

subjunctive The subjunctive (also known as the conjunctive in some languages) is a grammatical mood, a feature of an utterance that indicates the speaker's attitude toward it. Subjunctive forms of verbs are typically used to express various states of unrealit ...

and imperative. Like most inflected languages, Mercian has a few irregular verbs (such as 'to be' ''bēon'' and 'have' ''habben''). For basic understanding, the four principal parts must be known for each strong verb: weak verbs are easier and more numerous, they all form the past participle with ''-ed''.

Vocabulary

Mercian vocabulary is largely inherited from

Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic languages, Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from ...

, with

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

loanwords coming via the use of Latin as the language of the

Early Church Early Christianity, otherwise called the Early Church or Paleo-Christianity, describes the historical era of the Christian religion up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325. Christianity spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and bey ...

, and Norse loanwords that arrived as part of the Norse incursions and foundation of the Danelaw which covered much of the midlands and north of

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. Some morphological differences between the Mercian and West Saxon include: * Change of West Saxon final to , presumably alluding to its ultimate loss in Modern English. : () ↔ * The preservation of in Proto-Germanic in some pronouns, like ().

References

*Biddulph, Joseph (2004) ''The Mercian Language: Introduction to the English Midlands Dialect of Late Anglo-Saxon and Early Middle English''. 56 p. Pontypridd: Joseph Biddulph (Text in modern English, with examples in Old and Middle English)