Verner's law
- the statement by K. Verner of a regularity behind some apparent exceptions in the Germanic languages to Grimm's law, namely, that Proto-Germanic voiceless fricatives became voiced when between voiced sounds if the immediately preceding vowel was not accented in Proto-Indo-European.
Origin of Verner's law
First recorded in 1890–95
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Verner's law
- linguistics a modification of Grimm's Law accommodating some of its exceptions. It states that noninitial voiceless fricatives in Proto-Germanic occurring as a result of Grimm's law became voiced fricatives if the previous syllable had been unstressed in Proto-Indo-European
Word Origin
C19: named after Karl Adolph Verner (1846–96), Danish philologist, who formulated it
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