Borrowing, incomplete lexical diffusion and the High German tenues shift

Abstract

Building on Callender 2012, this paper argues that residue from the High German tenues shift may be the result of incomplete lexical diffusion (as opposed to later northern borrowing). Although unshifted forms rarely appear in OHG texts (see Braune 2004 [1886]), an examination of the TITUS corpus and Schützeichel 1995 revealed that their shifted counterparts were also largely absent. This suggests that these forms were simply not the types of words written in OHG texts. Incomplete lexical diffusion thus remains a plausible explanation. I also argue that affrication and spirantization may have been phonologically (perceptually) abrupt. Furthermore, there was little distinction between the two post-vocalically for old short stops, a position where affricates do not survive today.