The axes of time: spatiotemporal relations in Old English vocabulary

Abstract

This article analyzes Old English vocabulary of time to shed light on the historical, sociocultural dimensions of space–time metaphorical mappings in English. First, we offer an overview of the most significant theoretical and experimental findings on the metaphorical conceptualization of time in Modern English. Then we analyze the sense of time in Old English and describe how native cultural conventions and cross-cultural contact might have contributed to shaping the perception of time in the Old English period. Finally, through corpus and dictionary searches, we explore how space and time were intertwined to convey time notions in the earliest attestations of English. Results show a persistent metaphorical link between space and time in Old English vocabulary and provide evidence for a circular and linear conceptualization of time that flexibly recruited the vertical and sagittal (front–back) axes, and that allowed for time-based and ego-based metaphorical construals, including the time-moving and ego-moving subcases. These data suggest that a baseline conceptualization of time grounded in spatial relations and sensitive to sociocultural factors has existed through time surviving to the present day.