Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/-an

From Proto-Germanic *-aną, from Proto-Indo-European *-onom.

*-an

1. The infinitive suffix of strong verbs and preterite-present verbs.

• Old English: -an (merged with Proto-West Germanic *-jan)
  • Middle English: -en, -e, -yn (especially Norfolk), -n (after vowels)
    • English: -en (obsolete)
    • → Middle Scots: -en, -in (literary, under Chaucerian influence)
• Old Frisian: -a
  • North Frisian: -e
  • Saterland Frisian: -e
  • West Frisian: -e
• Old Saxon: -an
  • Middle Low German: -en
    • Low German: -en
• Old Dutch: -an
  • Middle Dutch: -en (merged with all other verbs)
    • Dutch: -en
• Old High German: -an
  • Middle High German: -en
    • Alemannic German: -e

      Walser German: -ä, -n, -u

    • Bavarian: -n

      Cimbrian: -en

    • German: -en (merged with all other verbs)
    • Central Franconian: -e

      Hunsrik: -e

    • East Central German: -en, -n

      Vilamovian: -a, -n

    • Luxembourgish: -en
    • Rhine Franconian: -e

      Pennsylvania German: -e

    • Yiddish: ־ן (-n)

From a conflation of several Proto-Germanic an-stem suffixes: *-anų (accusative singular), *-aniz (nominative/vocative plural) and *-anunz (accusative plural).

*-an

1. Forms the accusative singular and nominative/accusative plural of masculine an-stem nouns.

   ‎*bogō (“bow”) + ‎-an → ‎*bogan (“bows”)

2. (North Sea Germanic) Forms the dative/genitive/instrumental singular of an-stem nouns.

   ‎*bogō (“bow”) + ‎-an → ‎*bogan (“bow's”)

   Synonym: -ini (Continental Germanic)

• All later West Germanic languages either level *-ōn into the masculine an-stems (Old English, Old Frisian) or -an into the neuter an-stems or ōn-stems (Old Dutch, Old High German); Old Saxon shows a combination of both developments; this process probably already began in the period of West Germanic unity.

• *-īn, *-ōn

• Old English: -an
  • Middle English: -en
    • English: -en (mostly unproductive)
    • Middle Scots: -n, -en, -in (unproductive, in e.g. ene and owsyn)
      • Scots: -n, -en (unproductive, in e.g. een and ousen)
• Old Frisian: -a
• Old Saxon: -an
  • Middle Low German: -en
    • German Low German: -en
    • Plautdietsch: -e

• Fulk, R[obert] D. (September 2018), “Nouns”, in A Comparative Grammar of the Early Germanic Languages (Studies in Germanic Linguistics; 3)‎^[1], Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, →DOI, →ISBN, →LCCN, § 7.31, page 170.
• Ringe, Donald; Taylor, Ann (2014), The Development of Old English (A Linguistic History of English; 2), Oxford: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, pages 62-63, 163-164