Kuhn (1933) proposed that the evolution of Germanic syntax began with a need to restore acceptable sentence rhythm after a shift to fixed initial stress. Kuhn found support for his hypothesis in ‘laws’ for word placement that applied in alliterative poetry but not in prose. Kuhn assumed that his laws were syntactic rules of Proto-Germanic maintained by conservative poets. Here I argue that Kuhn's Laws were rules of poetic meter that obscured basic word order. Adopting the universalist approach in Russom (2017), I integrate Kuhn's Laws with the metrical constraints observed by Sievers (1893) and explore the interaction between meter and syntax. When there are no adverse metrical consequences, subject-object-verb order is employed with remarkable consistency in Beowulf, our most valuable source of poetic evidence. My analysis receives independent support from Smith (1971), a study of the earliest Germanic texts that focuses primarily on prose.

Kuhn (1933) 提出，日耳曼句法的演变始于在转变为固定的初始重音之后需要恢复可接受的句子节奏。库恩在适用于头韵诗但不适用于散文的单词放置“法则”中找到了对他的假设的支持。库恩假定他的法律是由保守派诗人维护的原始日耳曼语的句法规则。在这里，我认为库恩定律是模糊基本词序的诗歌韵律规则。采用 Russom (2017) 中的普遍主义方法，我将库恩定律与 Sievers (1893) 观察到的格律约束相结合，并探索格律与句法之间的相互作用。当没有不利的格律后果时，在Beowulf中采用了具有显着一致性的主宾动词顺序，我们最有价值的诗歌证据来源。我的分析得到了 Smith (1971) 的独立支持，该研究主要关注散文，对最早的日耳曼文本进行了研究。