The suffix -en indicates a number of things in English. It appears at the end of past participles of many strong verbs (eaten, written etc); it ends many verbs formed from adjectives with the sense 'to make ... or to become ...' (deepen, brighten etc); it can indicate a diminutive, eg chicken, kitten (maiden is also in this group); and it can form an adjective from a noun, particularly a noun denoting a material (woollen, wooden etc).
In Old English -en also denoted the feminine form of some masculine nouns. So, gyden was the Old English goddess, mynecen was nun (from munuc, monk) and wylfen was a she-wolf (from wulf). The only surviving word in modern English of this type is vixen; the Old English was fyxen.
In Middle English -en replaced the -an of some Old English plurals. The only surviving member of this group is oxen, the plural of ox; in Old English oxa was one ox, and oxan the plural. A thousand years ago there were others: name, naman; tunge, tungan, eg. Children and brethren do not belong in this group, although these are plurals ending in -en. Childer was once a variant form of child, and brether was a variant form of brother, and an -en was later added to these words to form the plural.
I recall being told in my youth that childer was itself an obsolete plural, which was repluralised into children. Don't tell me — is that yet another of those antique myths with which my poor old brain is littered?
Posted by: Picky | January 29, 2013 at 09:27 AM
Sorry, Picky, you are right. Childer was one old plural, used in Middle English, particularly in the North and the Midlands. In the South, the plural was made childeren, then children. The OED has several different spellings for the word 'child', then there are even more plural variants. Then there are accusative, genitive and dative forms, too, making it all very confusing!
Posted by: Virtual Linguist | January 29, 2013 at 09:53 AM