adj.
Gaw loghe; Pe lowe, superl. lowest; Cl loʒ, loue; Erk loghe; WA law, lawe, low, laʒe, laghe, comp. lawere, superl. lawest
'low, low lying, below, short; in lowly condition, humble' (Modern English low)
PGmc Ancestor
*lēga-
Proposed ON Etymon (OIcel representative)
lágr ‘low’
(ONP lágr (adj.))
Other Scandinavian Reflexes
Far lágur, Icel lágur, Norw låg, Dan lav, Sw låg
OE Cognate
lǣg- ‘fallow, uncultivated’
Phonological and morphological markers
ON /ɑ:/ < PGmc */e:/ (1)
absence of palatalization of */ɡ/
Summary category
A1*
Widespread from early ME (from c1175), commonplace as an affix on place-names, but note that as a specific it is recorded by EPNE in only two names, from Yks. and Cum.
Occurrences in the Gersum Corpus
Gaw 302, 1040, 1170 etc., Pe 547, 1001; Cl 28, 798, 1761; Erk 147, 334; WA 199, 788*, 728 etc.
The reading of the word at Cl 28 is disputed: Morris (followed by Menner and Moorman) read bone, which GollCl and AW emend to leue (which Gollancz 28n suggests 'was evidently read as "loue"'). Anderson, reading loue, takes it as a variant of loʒ and compares DT 1778 (see further Anderson and Vantuono 28n). GollErk prints on-loghe at Erk 147 as a compound adv. McGee observes that its use in this phrase is 'probably on analogy of on lofte'. TPD cite an additional instance at WA 369 (see 369n), where they argue that the form <loue> was misunderstood by the scribe as a v., 'otherwise he would have altered it to lawe'.