Philosophic interpretation of abstractedness as a basis for linguistic analysis of abstract nouns and nominalisations in the Old Germanic Languages
The object of research in the present article is a specific thematic group of lexical units - nouns that are traditionally defined as abstract ones in linguistics. A complex analysis of the old Germanic nouns classified, in terms of modern perception, as abstract ones requires, among other things, cognitive interpretation of their derivational types and the whole range of derivational means so it highlighted the urgency to work out some reliable criteria to be used to sort those nouns out. Thus, the mission is doomed without considering the concepts of abstract and concrete in philosophy. Abstract nouns representing one of the subsystems of the lexicon are organized in a hierarchy in which all lexical units are sorted out in accordance with some patterns of cognitive processing and categorizing. The philosophic theory of levels and types of abstractedness explains the existence of the polar classes of nouns - abstract and concrete, as well as of the two types of images - primary, sensory, rational images and secondary mental images on the other hand. Unlike the concrete nouns that have some primary images in the lexical system, the abstract nouns bear the secondary images that help reflect the content of a concept from the mental sphere in an indirect and associative way. However, the salient feature of abstract nouns is their thing connotation which enables abstract nouns to acquire some perceptional characteristics. The hierarchical approach to the lexicon allows singling out not only the polar types of nouns (abstract and concrete) but also some units of the intermediate level. The latter are termed nominalizations in linguistics and are argued to have some common features with both of the above-mentioned subclasses. In the old Germanic languages the lexical-grammatical class of undifferentiated abstract nouns and nominalizations consists of lexical units that denote concepts from the mental sphere alone, that do not have their own primary images but that are provided with some perceptional images due to the thing connotation. In the old Germanic languages an abstract notion is realized by means of the inner form of a word that is derivationally marked and shaped. Thus, primary selection of abstract nouns on the basis of their semantics should be mandatory accompanied by a subsequent analysis of their derivational design and paradigmatic attachment.