Stem (linguistics)

“ In MHG. there are six such series, which appear most clearly in the stem-forms of strong verbs. Four stem-forms are to be distinguished in a MHG. strong verb which has vowel gradation as the characteristic mark of its different stems:— (1) the present stem, to which belong all the forms of the present, (2) the stem of the first or third person of the preterite singular, (3) the stem of the preterite plural, to which belong the second person of the preterite singular and the whole of the preterite subjunctive, (4) the stem of the past participle. ”

“ The old ja-stems, as lære (OHG. lāri) , infl. lærer, empty; dünne, thin, enge, narrow, grüene, green, niuwe, new, reine, pure, schœne, beautiful, senfte, soft, wilde, wild, and many others, including the present participles of strong and weak verbs. The ja-stems only differ from the a-stems in having -e in the uninflected form and umlaut in the stem-syllable when it is capable of it. ”

“ Stems in a, ma, va, parallel with those in an, man, van, and doubtless in many cases derived from those through transitional forms, are frequent in both the earlier and the later language, particularly as final members of compounds.
b. A number of an-stems are more or less defective, making a part of their forms from other stems. Thus:
430. a. The stem áhan n. day is in the later language used only in the strong and weakest cases, the middle (with the nom. sing., which usually follows their analogy) coming from áhar or áhas: namely, áhar nom.-acc. ”

“ The changes of form which roots and stems undergo in their combinations with these endings will be pointed out in detail below, under the various formations. Here may be simply mentioned in advance, as by far the most important among them, a distinction of stronger and weaker form of stem in large classes of verbs, standing in relation with the accent – the stem being of stronger form when the accent falls upon it, or before an accentless ending, and of weaker form when the accent is on the ending. ”

“ They are laboring, we kill, you announce.
↑ The stem is the body of a word to which the terminations are attached. It is often identical with the base (cf. § 58) . If, however, the stem ends in a vowel, the latter does not appear in the base, but is variously combined with the inflectional terminations. This point is further explained in § 230. ↑ The only new verbs in this list are the five of the second conjugation which are starred. Learn their meanings. ↑ Observe that in dō, dăre, the a is short, and that the present stem is dă- and not dā-. ”

“ The vocative (unless by accent: 314) is distinguished from the nominative only in the singular, and not quite always there. In a-stems, it is the unaltered stem, and so also in most consonant-stems; but neuters in an and in may drop the n; and the oldest language has sometimes a vocative in s from stems in nt and ṅs. Stems in ṛ change this to ar. In masc. and fem. i- and u-stems, the case ends respectively in e and o; in neuters, in the same or in i or u. Stems in ā change ā to e; derivative ī and ū are shortened; radical stems in long vowels use the nominative form. ”

“ What is from the merely phonetic point of view the ‘same’ suffix, in different languages may have the greatest variety of meaning, sometimes no discernible meaning at all, and it is in many cases utterly impossible to find out why in one particular language it can be used with one stem and not with another. ”

“ The final of a stem is combined with the initial of another stem in composition according to the general rules for external combination: they have been given, with their exceptions, in chap. III., above.
b. If a stem has a distinction of strong and weak forms, it regularly enters into composition as prior member in its weak form ”

“ Stems accented on the final (including monosyllables) are subject to variations of accent in declension chiefly in virtue of the fact that some of the endings have, while others have not, or have in less degree, a tendency themselves to take the accent. Thus:
a. The endings of nominative and accusative singular and dual and of the nominative plural (that is to say, of the strong cases: 311) have no tendency to take the accent away from the stem, and are therefore only accented when a final vowel of the stem and the vowel of the ending are blended together into single vowel or diphthong. ”

“ II. THE PERFECT SYSTEM. PERFECT INDICATIVE STEM.
854. There are two kinds of perfect stems: (A.) Some verbs have as perfect stem a root, generally with some modification, but without a suffix (858-866) . (B.) Some perfects are formed with a suffix, -s-, or -v- or -u- (867-875) .
855. Some perfects of primitives are formed not from a root, but from the present stem without the formative vowel, treated as a root: as, prehendī, seized, from prehend- (866) ; poposcī, asked, fefellī, deceived (858) ”

“ The occurrence of original adjectives in long final vowels, and of compounds having as final member a stem of the first division, has been sufficiently treated above, so far as masculine and feminine forms are concerned. To form a neuter stem in composition, the rule of the later language is that the final long vowel be shortened ”

“ For the first instinct of the stem,—unnamed by us yet—unthought of,—the instinct of seeking light, as of the root to seek darkness,—what words can enough speak the wonder of it.
Look. Here is the little thing, Line-study V. (A) , in its first birth to us: the stem of stems; the one of which we pray that it may bear our daily bread. The seed has fallen in the ground with the springing germ of it downwards; with heavenly cunning the taught stem curls round, and seeks the never-seen light. ”

“ With great lucidity he reduces the intricate forms of the language into a consistent system, and his penetrating insight into the essence of language is seen when he explains the vowel changes, which we now comprise under the name of mutation or umlaut, as due to the approximation of the vowel of the stem to that of the ending, at that time a totally new point of view. ”

“ By adding u (in case of some Consonant Stems) ; as,—
3. By adding s (in case of most Consonant Stems) ; as,—
a. Note that before the ending -sī a Dental Mute (t, d) is lost; a Guttural Mute (c, g) unites with s to form x; while the Labial b is changed to p.
4. Without addition. Of this formation there are three types:—
a) The Verb Stem is reduplicated by prefixing the initial consonant with the following vowel or e; as,—
NOTE 1.—Compounds, with the exception of dō, stō, sistō, discō, poscō, omit the reduplication. ”

“ Stamm, masculine, ‘stem, trunk, stock, tribe,’ from Middle High German and Old High German stam (mm) , masculine, ‘trunk, pedigree, race, reason, cause’; corresponding to Dutch stam, Anglo-Saxon stemn (stœfn) , English stem (see Steven) , Old Icelandic stafn. ”

“ In the nominative, the general masculine and feminine ending is as. The old language, however, often makes the case āsas instead of ās from a-stems, and in a few examples also from ā-stems. From derivative ī-stems, īs instead of yas is the regular and usual Vedic form. Pronominal a-stems make the mas. nom. in e.
b. The neuter ending (which is accusative also) is in general i; and before this the final of a stem is apt to be strengthened, by prolongation of a vowel, or by insertion of a nasal, or by both. ”

“ By the general law as to finals (150) , the s of the nom. sing, masc. and fem. is always lost; and irregularities of treatment of the final of the stem in this case are not infrequent.
b. The gen. and abl. sing. are never distinguished in form from one another — nor are, by ending, the nom. and accus. pl.: but these sometimes differ in stem-form, or in accent, or in both.
381. Change in the place of the accent is limited to monosyllabic stems and the participles in ánt (accented on the final) . ”

“ Traces of an old locative occur in what is called the uninflected dative singular of hūs, house, beside hūse, and in proper names like Engellant beside Engellande. The vocative is like the nominative.
In MHG., as in the older periods of the other Germanic languages, nouns are divided into two great classes, according as the stem originally ended in a vowel or a consonant, cp. the similar division of nouns in Latin and Greek. Nouns whose stems originally ended in a vowel belong to the vocalic or so-called strong declension. ”

“ The operation of stemming is performed by taking the leaf in one hand, and the end of the stem in the other, in such a way as to cleave it with the grain; and there is an expertness to be acquired by practice, which renders it as easy as to separate the bark of a willow, although those unaccustomed to it find it difficult to stem a single plant. ”

“ The other two stems are the perfect stem and the participial stem.
185. The Perfect Stem. The perfect stem of the verb is formed in various ways, but may always be found by dropping -ī from the first person singular of the perfect, the third of the principal parts. ”

“ Stem vowel change in 1st pers. sg.: 181, (1) . Third pers. pl. without r: 180. Types: -i, 178, (2) and 182; reduplicative, 178, (1) ; -si, 178, (3) and 183; -ui, 178, (4) and 184. —Strong and Weak: 172-177. Strong stems with weak endings, 177. —Weak: 174-177. Conjugations: 1st, 174, (1) and 175, (4) ; 2d, 174, (2) and 175, (1) ; 3d, 174, (3) and 175, (3) ; 4th, 174, (1) and 175, (2) . Ending -c: 176. preu: 65, G, 1. preveire: 78, 1. prever: 71, 1. proa: 35, 1. Proclitics: 19; 118, (1) ; 122; 123. profich: 28, 1. pron: 63, (5) , footnote. Pronominal Adjectives: see Pronouns. ”

“ When a stem, like that of the morning-glory, sweeps slowly and carefully through the air in search of something to lay hold of in its efforts to climb upward, and when, on finding this support, it makes such good use of it, we feel inclined to say, “Well done, little stem.” ”

“ Contrast between Stem and Root. Stems are ascending axes; roots are descending axes. Stems grow by the successive development of internodes (13) , one after another, each leaf-bearing at its summit (or node) ; so that it is of the essential nature of a stem to bear leaves. Roots bear no leaves, are not distinguishable into nodes and internodes, but grow on continuously from the lower end. They commonly branch freely, but not from any fixed points nor in definite order.
69. Although roots generally do not give rise to stems, and therefore do not propagate the plant, exceptions are not uncommon. ”

“ The roots which lengthen the vowel are decidedly the more numerous.
h. If a nasal is taken in any of the strong forms of a root, it usually appears in the causative stem: e. g. dambhaya, daṅçaya, indhaya, limpaya, rundhaya, çundhaya, kṛntaya, dṛṅhaya. From a number of roots, stems both with and without the nasal are made: thus (besides those mentioned above, g) , kuñcaya and kocaya, granthaya and grathaya, bṛṅhaya and barhaya, bhraṅçaya and bhrāçaya, çundhaya and çodhaya, sañjaya and sajjaya, siñcaya and secaya. ”

“ Masculine stems in -o- and some Greek stems with other endings have still another form used in addressing a person or thing, called the Vocative.
421. The stem of a noun is best seen in the genitive; in the genitive plural it is preserved without change, except that o of -o- stems is lengthened (123) . ”

“ In the later language they are quotable by hundreds, but from the vast majority of stems occur only an example or two; the only ones that have won any currency are those that have assumed the character of "cur-class" verbs.
1058. The denominative meaning is, as in other languages, of the greatest variety; some of the most frequent forms of it are: be like, act as, play the part of; regard or treat as; cause to be, make into; use, make application of; desire, wish for, crave — that which is signified by the noun-stem. ”

“ Before a final root-stem appears not very seldom a case-form: for example, pataṁgá, girāvṛ́dh, dhiyājúr, akṣṇayādrúh, hṛdispṛ́ç, divispṛ́ç, vanesáh, diviṣád, an̄geṣṭhā́, hṛsvás, pṛtsutúr, apsujá.
C. The root-stem has sometimes a middle or passive value: for example, manoyúj yoked (yoking themselves) by the will, hṛdayāvídh pierced to the heart, manuja born of Manu.
1270. Compounds made with verbal derivatives in a, both of action and of agency, are numerous, and take the accent usually on their final syllable (as in the case of compounds with verbal prefixes: 1148 m) . ”

“ Stem about two feet in height, generally erect, but, as the seeds approach maturity, often acquiring a drooping habit; stem-leaves more finely cut or divided than those proceeding directly from the root, and all possessed of a strong and somewhat disagreeable odor. ”

“ And the weak cases, again, are in some classes of words to be distinguished into cases of weakest stem, or weakest cases, and cases of middle stem, or middle cases: the former having endings beginning with a vowel (instr., dat., abl.-gen., and loc. sing.; gen.-loc. du.; gen. pl.) ; the latter, with a consonant (instr.-dat.-abl. du; instr., dat.-abl., and loc. pl.) .
b. The class of strong cases, as above defined, belongs only to masculine and feminine stems. In neuter inflection, the only strong cases are the nom.-acc. pl. ”

“ A Real Compound is a word whose stem is formed from two stems, or an inseparable prefix and a stem, fused into one stem; an Apparent Compound is formed by the juxtaposition of an inflected word with another inflected word, a preposition, or an adverb.
I. COMPOSITION OF NOUNS. (A.) REAL COMPOUNDS.
FORM OF COMPOUNDS.
379. If the first part is a noun, its stem is taken: as, Ahēno-barbus, Redbeard, Barbarossa; usually with weakening of a stem vowel (103-105) : as, aurifex, jeweller (auro-) . On other changes of the final vowel in the first member of compounds, see 174. ”

“ The third declension comprises three principal types: (1) nouns which in Latin had no difference of stem or of accent between the nominative and the accusative singular; (2) those which had a difference of stem but not of accent; (3) those which had a difference of accent.
(1) Nouns with no difference of stem or of accent:—
1. ”