adj. (comp.)
'less'
(Modern English )Always derived from ON, cp. OIcel minni ‘lesser, smaller’ (adj.), which shows regular assimilation of /nn/ < /nnʀ/ in *minnʀi < PGmc *minnizan- (perhaps from an earlier *minwizan-); cp. Go minniza, OFris minnera, minra, OS minnera, OHG minniro, MDu minre, minder, mender. The assimilation in ON minni cannot be regarded as a secure test of loan, since the equivalent adv. in WGmc regularly loses its final -r (thus OFris min, OHG min, MDu min, men, cp. Go mins, OIcel minnr, < PGmc *minniz), and a native adv. (OE *min) could in theory have influenced the form of the compar. adj. There is no reliable record of an OE simplex min (either the adv. or a hypothetical adj. in positive form); The root *min- does, however, occur in the OE v. minsian ‘to become smaller’, probably a WGmc derivation on the root of the adj. (or adv.) with the verb-forming s-affix (cp. OS minson, OLF (gi)minson).
PGmc Ancestor
*minnizan-
Proposed ON Etymon (OIcel representative)
minni ‘lesser, smaller’
(ONP minni (3) (adj. compar.))
Other Scandinavian Reflexes
Far minni, Icel minni, Norw mindre, Dan mindre, Sw mindre
OE Cognate
cp. minsian ‘to become smaller’
Phonological and morphological markers
[ON consonant cluster assimilation] (possibly diagnostic)
Summary category
C1ac
Preponderantly N and E (from the early 14c. on), and only recorded in alliterative collocation with more.
Occurrences in the Gersum Corpus
Gaw 1881
The alliterative phrase at Gaw 1881, ‘þe more and þe mynne’, may itself be modelled on the Norse collocation seen in OIcel meiri ok minni; see TGD 1881n, Olszewska 1933: 80, 83, 1937: 51.