-hede

See also: hede and hedé

Middle English

Alternative forms

-had, -hade, -hod, -hode, -hood, -hoode, -hoþ, -hot, -hote, -ood, -wood (from -hād)
-ed, -ede, -hed, -heed, -hiede, -hyede (from *-hǣd/*-hǣdu)

Etymology

From Old English *-hǣd/*-hǣdu, -hād, from Proto-West Germanic *-haidu, *-haidi, from Proto-Germanic *haiduz. Compare hod.

If the reconstruction *-hǣd rather than *-hǣdu is adopted for the ancestor of forms with /ɛ̝ː/, the final vowel in their reflexes would have to be levelled from the Old English oblique cases. Since dative -hāde would probably form an insufficient basis for levelling, this vowel was presumably extended to forms descending from -hād. The 15th-century presence of /oː/ rather than expected /ɔ̝ː/ in such forms is perhaps due to low stress;^[1] compare a similar change in two and who due to the influence of preceding /w/.

Pronunciation

(from *-hǣd) IPA^(key): /-hɛ̝ːd(ə)/
(from -hād) IPA^(key): /-hɔ̝ːd(ə)/, (Early Middle English) /-hɑːd(ə)/, (Northern) /-haːd/, (Late Middle English) /-hoːd/

Suffix

-hede

Affixed to nouns and adjectives to form nouns denoting position, quality, state, condition or collectivity.^[2]

Derived terms

Descendants

English: -hood, -head
Scots: -heid

References

^ Jordan, Richard (1974), Eugene Crook, transl., Handbook of the Middle English Grammar: Phonology (Janua Linguarum. Series Practica; 218)‎^[1], The Hague: Mouton & Co. N.V., →DOI, § 45, page 75.
^ “-hed(e, suf.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 22 June 2018.

[1] Jordan, Richard (1974), Eugene Crook, transl., Handbook of the Middle English Grammar: Phonology (Janua Linguarum. Series Practica; 218)‎^[1], The Hague: Mouton & Co. N.V., →DOI, § 45, page 75.

[2] “-hed(e, suf.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 22 June 2018.

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