Seaxan

Old English[edit]

Seaxan m pl

the Saxons
- Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Manuscript E, year 605
  Augustīnus cwæþ, "Ġif Wēalas nyllaþ sibbe wiþ ūs, hīe sċulon æt Seaxna handa forweorðan."
  Augustine said, "If the Celts don't want peace with us, they'll have to perish at the hands [lit. "hand"] of the Saxons."

The genitive plural is Seaxna, not regular Seaxena. Syncopated -na was apparently the inherited gen. pl. ending in weak nouns; but *a was then inserted by analogy with the nom.-acc. pl., subsequently dissimilating to *e.^[1] By the literary period, the syncopated form is uncommon except in poetry and in some weak names of peoples. The syncope is preserved consistently in Seaxan, often in Francan (“the French”) and Frīsan (“Frisians”), and never in Gotan (“Goths”) and Siġelhearwan (“Ethiopians”), though for the last two few examples survive.

Declension of Seaxan (weak)

^ Ringe, Donald, Taylor, Ann (2014) The Development of Old English (A Linguistic History of English; 2), Oxford: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 154