Íslenzk tunga - 01.01.1961, Side 91

ICELANDIC dialectology: methods and results
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position with initial b, d, g instead of p, t, k.37 Recent, too, is the
merger of i and e, and of u and ö. There is no certain evidence of this
change—consisting of rhymes in poetry and spelling mistakes—
earlier than the last century.38 Of course, these changes may be a
little earlier than their earliest appearance in spelling or poetry, but
anyhow they are, on the whole, among the most recent phonologic
changes in Icelandic.
On the other hand, the lengthening or diphthongization before
[q] —the prerequisite for the present difference between langur and
lángur etc.—is very early, probably from the beginning of the four-
teenth century. At that time we find spellings such as leingi for
lengi.39 Early, too, is the diphthongization of original short vowels
before [j]—the basis of the present difference between dœinn and
daginn. The earliest examples of ei for e in this position are from
the beginning of the fourteenth century.40 The change of rl, rn to
[r] dl, (r)dn is from the same period. In the early fourteenth century
we find inverse spellings like Orný for Oddný (in 1332) presup-
posing this change.41
In some cases the chronology is uncertain or unknown. This is
true of voiced vs. voiceless ð, l,m,n, before p, t, k, and the differences
between [sag'ði] and [saqði], and between [hritjgla] and [hriqla].
37 See Guðfinnsson, Mállýzkur, p. 234, n. 2.
38 See Guðfinnsson, tíreytingar, p. 25. See also Böðvarsson, “Þáttur ...,” pp.
161f.
3B See Þórólfsson, Um íslenskar orðmyndir, p. xii.
40 lbid., pp. xiif. The earliest evidence showing the corresponding change a
> rai] is a little later, from the end of the fourteenth century (ibid., p. xviii).
This chronological difference is due to the circumstance that the change a >
[ai] could not appear in writing until this diphthong had merged with [ai]
coming from old long œ, a merger which, then, problably did not take place un-
til about half a century after the diphthongization of the short vowels before [j]
began.
41 See A. Jóhannesson, íslenzk tunga í fornöld (Reykjavík 1923—24), p. 137.
See, however, also Þórólfsson, Um íslenskar orðmyndir, pp. xxxif., who cxplains
this early evidence differently, and thinks tliat this change did not take place
until the fifteenth century.