Towards an analysis of Notker Labeo's Old High German

Abstract

Publisher Summary This chapter presents a project whose principal objective was to provide a basis for a detailed analysis of late Old High German (OHG). Such an analysis had been impeded by the lack of an extensive and readily accessible tabulation of the word material based on the manuscripts. With computer techniques, it was possible to undertake a survey of this large body of material, to construct a model of OHG in the early 11th century, and to begin to establish a precise hypothesis of its relation to Middle High German, which rose in the late 11th century. No analysis of OHG had previously been carried out on this scale and in this manner. It was anticipated that the project would help resolve in exact detail the long-debated question of what happened in late OHG to permit scholars to posit two historically distinct stages of language development in that pivotal century. Notker Labeo of St. Gall, who died in 1022, is not only the most important writer in late OHG but is also the most widely preserved writer of the entire OHG period.