stāne Weak masculine noun name (name) nominative: name, namen accusative: namen/name, namen dative: namen/name, namen genitive: namen/name. namene/namen Pronouns Personal pronouns (I/me, you, he, she, we, you (pl.) and they) come in all the above cases and come in three numbers: singular, dual ('you/we two'), plural. Demonstrative pronouns vary in the same way described below for the indefinite article, based on 'ðes' only for this. That and Those are the same as the definite article. Relative pronouns (who, which, that) are usually 'ðe' and 'ðet.' Articles The definite article is equally complex, with all genders changing in the singular in all cases, based on variations of 'ðe.' In the plural all genders take the same word. The indefinite article was often omitted in Mercian. Adjectives Adjectives are always declined, even with some verbs (which means they can double up as adverbs), e.g. I am cold. Having split into weak and strong declensions (depending on the strength of the noun), these split again into all four cases, both singular and plural. Comparative adjectives (e.g. bigger) always add 're.' Example: Æðelen (noble), æðelenre (nobler). Verbs Verbs can be conjugated from the infinitive into the present tense, the past singular, the past plural and the past participle. There exist strong and weak verbs in Mercian that too conjugate in their own ways. The future tense requires an auxiliary verb, like will (Mercian wyllen). There are three moods: indicative, subjunctive and imperative. Like most inflected languages, Mercian has a few irregular verbs (such as 'to be' bēon and 'have' habben). For basic understanding, the four principal parts must be known for each strong verb: weak verbs are easier and more numerous, they all form the past participle with -ed. Vocabulary Mercian vocabulary is largely inherited from Proto-Germanic, with Latin loanwords coming via the use of Latin as the language of the Early Church, and Norse loanwords that arrived as part of the Norse incursions and foundation of the Danelaw which covered much of the midlands and north of England. Some morphological differences between the Mercian and West Saxon include: Change of West Saxon final to , presumably alluding to its ultimate loss in Modern English. () ↔ The preservation of in Proto-Germanic in some pronouns, like (). See also AB language (a written Middle English dialect) Mercia (disambiguation) Wiktionary's coverage of Mercian terms References Biddulph, Joseph (2004) The Mercian Language: Introduction to the English