I have attempted to translate one of my favourite dialogue from the Lord of the Rings into Old English. It is quite literal and not really polished but I've tried to make it so that there are no grammatical errors at least. Still my knowledge of Old English is not very strong and consequently there probably are some grammatical errors and many more awkward turns of phrases. I would be grateful if the ūþwitan here could point out mistakes (or anything else) in my effort. Thank you.

The Original

‘I am sorry,’ said Frodo. ‘But I am frightened; and I do not feel any pity for Gollum.’

‘You have not seen him,’ Gandalf broke in.

‘No, and I don’t want to,’ said Frodo. ‘I can’t understand you. Do you mean to say that you, and the Elves, have let him live on after all those horrible deeds? Now at any rate he is as bad as an Orc, and just an enemy. He deserves death.’

‘Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.

My Attempt at Translation

"Forgief mē", Frod maþelode, "ac eom iċ afǣred and næbbe iċ nǣnne miltse for Gollum."

"Næfst þū ġesewen hine", cwæþ Gandælf on betweoxāworpennesse.

"Nese and nylle ēac ġesēon hine," maþelode Frod,"Ne understande iċ þē. Hwæt mǣnst þū þæt-þe þū and þā ælfe lēton hine libban æfter þǣm þe hē dyde ealle þā wælhrēowan dǣde? Nū ǣġhwǣġe hē is swā yfel swā þā orcnēas, nis hē nān þing būtan ūrum fēonde. Wierþe hē þæs dēaþes."

"Wierþe hē þæs? Iċ dearr secġan þæt hē dēþ. Moniġe menn þe libbaþ wierþe þæs dēaþes. And sume menn þā þe bēoþ ġeswolten wierþe þæs līfes. Meaht þū þǣm sellan līf eft? þonne ne bēo þū tō ġeorn tō dēmanne on dēaþe for þǣm þe nān þāra wīsra ne mæġe ġesēon ealle endas."

What I'm Trying to Convey

"Forgive me", said Frodo, "but I am afraid and I have no mercy for Gollum."

"You have not seen him", said Gandalf in interjection.

"No and I don't even want to see him", said Frodo, "I don't understand you. What do you mean that you and the elves let him live after he did all those cruel deeds? No in any case he is as evil as the orcs and nothing except our enemy. He deserves death."

"He deserves it? I dare to say that he does. Many men who live deserve death. And some men who are dead deserve life. Can you give them life again? Then do not be too ready to judge in death for not even one of the wise ones are able to see all ends."

Evenfall (n.)

The beginning of evening; the fall of dusk

Yestreen (adv.)

The evening of yesterday

I just read this in Colin Gorrie's Ōsweald Bera. Which I think is superb.

"And ƿū wilt þæt iċ feohte wiþ þā Dene?"

"Ġēa, ac þū wilt feohtan mid him ēac, oþþe swā sæġdest þū þære cwēne.

Ōsweald Bera, Chapter 15, ll 96-7

I'm thinking of the sense of this as the first speaker saying, you want me to fight against the Danes. And the second speaker replying, yes but you want to fight against them too, according to what you told the queen.

But why the switch from wiþ to mid?

Can mid mean against in this context? I can't see it in Bosworth Toller online. All help gratefully received.

Hardly needs to be said, but I'm learning Old English as a beginner. And very grateful for this excellent sub.

"If I drink Gasoline*, will I go 'vroom vroom'?"

*stānele is from a dictionary made by a user of the OE discord for new old english words.

Is there some orthographic problem that would make writing "iy" difficult or ambiguous?

Want to carve an Anglo-Saxon blessing into my hearthstone can anyone confirm that this is accurate?

Hi everyone!! I have a question. Im writing a history and I want to make it as close as posible as the real world, with made-up words that could acctually exist. One of the first words that i made up mean "Objects with a soul on it" and i came up with these:

• Sares (From the old english word sawol, meaning soul and the latin word Res, meaning object)
• Sābiectus (sawol and obiectus, meaning something in front)
• Rewol (Res + Sawol)
• Obiwol (Obiectus + sawol)

Im not good at writing yet, if I could get assistance it would be helpfull, thanks!!

Hello, all! I am looking for the best way to translate a Latin phrase into Old English. My family has a coat of arms and the motto reads, “mea dos virtus,” and the modern English translation is, “my dowry is virtue.”

I have been able to translate the easier parts on my own, but I want to both ensure accuracy and gauge what more knowledgeable people on the subject might suggest be best!

So far, I have:

mīn ġift sy mægon

Is “mægon” appropriate here, or is there an Old English word that better translates from the word “virtue?” Further, is there anything else you have noticed that I could improve upon?

Thank you, in advance, for any help given and any advice offered!

I wonder whether Old English has a community involved in neology, or making new words for everyday concepts. For example, Old English had no word for computer or car. Take car, for example—would Old English need a new word for this concept or just reuse a word like wæġn “wagon” à la German Wagen?

Plus, a few compounds would lend themselves well into Old English, like lipstick. Both lip and stick come from Old English, so I assume matching them to Old English words and making the compound would just involve giving the words their necessary inflections.

I hope you're all well. I'm currently reading Vilém Mathesius' A Functional Analysis of Present Day English on a General Linguistic Basis. Mathesius was a founding member of the Prague Circle, which has had an enormous influence on multiple strains of contemporary linguistics. The grammar must have been written between 1935 (the latest citation in the body of the text) & 1945 (the year of Mathesius' death); it was published posthumously in 1975. Mathesius begins the grammar with a survey of linguistic theory in the nineteenth century. He criticises the Neogrammarians for their dependence on literary texts. In this regard:

This point can be illustrated by nominal clauses in English. In Old English, nominal clauses must have existed, but they are not found in the preserved literary texts since the style of these texts did not admit them; in Middle English they abound, especially in the drama; in the 18th century they do not occur in essays, but are often used in the drama and the realistic novel. (10)

I'm not sure what Mathesius means by nominal clause. I don't know Old English, so I don't know what might be missing here. Unfortunately, he doesn't appear to use the phrase elsewhere in his grammar.† I have two guesses:

1. What linguists today call small clauses, like: 'Mathesius considered the Neogrammarians quite naïve.' The small clause is 'the Neogrammarians to be naïve'.
2. Clauses that serve as noun phrases like: 'That Mathesius considered the Neogrammarians quite naïve is obvious.' The part in bold contains a clause, but it serves as the subject of the sentence.

Is it obvious to you who know Old English what Mathesius may have been talking about here? Much thanks for any thoughts!

† I haven't finished reading the grammar yet, but I searched an OCR-ed PDF.

After some research, I'm fairly confident this reads "yeh-MET" with the stress on the latter syllable. But had seen something mentioning the opposite. The former seems more supported, but wanted to see if anyone can confirm!

Hello,

I’m curious as to which was the most common verb used to express one’s own thoughts as in “I think that …” in Old English. From what I understand, þyncan and wenan were both used often in similar ways, but I wasn’t sure if either of these was better for directly communicating this. I appreciate any insight on this!

I'm fascinated by the semantics of the word āglǣċa in Beowulf. I would like to know the hypothetical reflex of the adjective in Modern English if you can make one.

Note: Reposting this because I accidentally deleted the original while trying to edit it and being distracted with other things. I made some edits, because it's always easier to notice mistakes after you publish them 😂😂

[u/Adam_Barrow](u/Adam_Barrow) asked for this one on my last post with Gandalf's speech. Here is Thēoden's speech to the Riders of Rohan. I've included both the one from the books and the one from the movies since they're a bit different. The one from the movie takes some lines from Ēomer and combines it with a shortened version of Thēoden's speech.

Book version:

Ārīsaþ nū, ārīsaþ, Þēodnes Riddan!

Frēcna dǣda āwacaþ: þīestru eastweardum is.

Ġebridlod sīe nū mearh, clynede sīe horn!

Forþ, Eorlingas!

Ārīsaþ, ārīsaþ, Þēodnes Riddan!

Bealwa dǣda āwacaþ: Fȳr and wæl!

Spere biþ sċæcen, sċield tōcnysed biþ,

Sweorddæġ, rēad dæġ, ǣr þǣre sunnan rīst!

Rīdaþ nū, rīdaþ nū! Rīdaþ tō Gondore!

Movie version:

Ārīsaþ, ārisaþ, Þēodnes Riddan!

Spere biþ sċæcen, sċield tōcnysed biþ,

Sweorddæġ, rēad dæġ, ǣr þǣre sunnan rīst!

Rīdaþ nū, rīdaþ nū, rīdaþ!

Rīdaþ tō spilde and þǣre weorolde ġeendung!

Dēaþ! Dēaþ! Dēaþ!

Forþ, Eorlingas!

Apologies if its the wrong place or if its against the rules.

I am trying to get the correct translation for 'be proud' or 'have pride' or some variant

Unfortunately AI is ruining any semblance of progress my friend and myself are trying to make in this endeavour. Would it be as simple as 'Habbiað prȳde'..? Apologies again if this is the wrong place and for the silly question

I was reading Alfred's prose psalms and I realized something that connects to Tolkien. Here Alfred uses
"weorolda weorold" often to mean "forever." Weorold can be used to mean world and lifetime or age. Thus when Gandalf refers to the moments before he was sent back as each being like a "life-age of the Earth" I think he means "forever." Every moment was like forever. There has always been some discussion about whether or not he meant the literal ages, ie the First Age but I think Tolkien was doing more of a literal translation of this OE phrase, as he modernizes many OE sayings and word usages throughout his writing (like "not all tears are an evil").

Edit: Sorry about the typo in the title, I added a word for clarification and didn't change the article.

Basically, are any of the archaic Germanic words in Modern English words that were archaic in Old English, or were they mostly regular words then? Words like shall, behold, before (in front of), hue, for (meaning because), those kinds of words.

These are my draft solutions to exercises in the Anglo-Saxon Grammar and Exercise Book by C. Alphonso Smith (copyright 1896). I welcome corrections and alternative analyses.

This is for the eleventh set of exercises in the book, which comes from Chapter XX, §121 of the Grammar. https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/31277/pg31277-images.html#page81

Reddit posts for previous sets of exercises are found here:

• Chapter VI §30
• Chapter VII §36
• Chapter VIII §42
• Chapter IX §55
• Chapter X §62
• Chapter XI §66
• Chapter XII §71
• Chapter XIV §87
• Chapter XVII §100
• Chapter XIX §113

I try to stick with vocabulary introduced earlier in the book. Also, be aware that Smith, in Chapter I, says, "It is the object of this book to give an elementary knowledge of Early West Saxon, that is, the language of King Alfred."

Part I: OE to PDE

1. Æfter ðǣm sōðlīce (indeed) ealle męn sprǣcon āne (one) sprǣce.

After that, indeed, all men spoke one language.

2. Ǫnd hē cwæð: "Ðis is ān folc, ǫnd ealle hīe sprecað āne sprǣce."

And he said: "This is one people, and they all speak one language."
And he said: "This is one nation, and they all speak one language."

3. On sumum stōwum wīngeardas grōwað.

In some places, vineyards grow.

4. Hē hēt ðā nǣdran ofslēan.
(See §107 (1) on the use of the infinitive with hātan. An overly literal translation might be "He ordered to kill the snake," but this is not idiomatic English because the verb "to order" requires a direct object when used with an infinitive.)

He ordered that the snake be killed.
He ordered that the snakes be killed.

5. Ðā Ęngle ābrǣcon ðone lǫngan weall, ǫnd sige nōmon.

The Angles broke down the long wall and won the victory.
The Angles broke down the long wall and took victory. (more literal but less idiomatic)

6. Ǫnd ðæt sǣd grēow ǫnd wēox.
(We saw a similar use of grōwan and weaxan in Chapter X (exercise Part I #6). As Smith noted there, he is taking this usage from Mark 4:27 of the West Saxon Gospels, which you can find here: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Bright%27s_Anglo-Saxon_Reader/From_the_Gospels:_St._Mark,_Chap._IV. The translator for the West Saxon Gospels translated the Latin Vulgate's germinet (from which we get "germinate") to OE grewe. Growan, which is cognate with "green", was closer in meaning to "sprout" or "become green" than today's typical use of the word "grow". Consequently, what sounds redundant in Modern English ("grew and waxed") was not redundant in Old English grēow ond wēox.)

And the seed grew and waxed.
And the seed sprouted and grew.

7. Ic ne geseah ðone mǫn sē ðe ðæs cnapan adesan stæl.

I did not see the man who stole the boy's hatchet.

8. Hē wæs swȳðe spēdig man on ðǣm ǣhtum ðe hiera spēda on bēoð, ðæt is, on wildrum.
(From "Ohthere's First Voyage", page 105 lines 1-2. See also §94 (5).)

He was a very rich man in those possessions in which their wealth consists, that is, in wild beasts.
He was a very rich man in those possessions which their riches in be, that is, in wild beasts. (more literal but less idiomatic)

9. Ǫnd ðǣr wearð (was) micel wælsliht on gehwæðre hǫnd.
(From "The Battle of Ashdown", page 100 lines 26-27. The on gehwæðre hǫnd idiom also appears on line 5 of that same page. Note that we see gehwæþre on line 5 and gehwæþere on line 27.)

And there was much slaughter on both sides.
And there was much slaughter on each hand. (more literal but less idiomatic)

10. Ǫnd æfter ðissum gefeohte cōm Ælfred cyning mid his fierde, ǫnd gefeaht wið ealne ðone hęre, ǫnd sige nōm.

And after this fight, King Alfred came with his army, and fought against the entire Danish army, and won the victory.

(Smith defines here as "Danish army" although, more broadly, it means "army" and often refers to an enemy army.)

11. Ðēos burg hātte Æscesdūn (Ashdown).

This city is called Ashdown.
(See Note 2 on page 80 regarding the passive forms of hātan.)

12. Ðǣre cwēne līc læg on ðǣm hūse.

The queen's body lies in the house.

13. Ǫnd sē dǣl ðe ðǣr aweg cōm wæs swȳðe lȳtel.

And the part that came away there was very small.

14. Ǫnd ðæs ðrēotīene dagas Æðered tō rīce fēng.

And thirteen days after that, Ethelred came to the throne.

(See §93 (3) regarding the use of ðæs to mean "from that time", as well as the comment for Part II #9, below; the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle typically would have had ðæs ymb ðrēotīene dagas.

Also, see the tō rīce fōn translation to "to come to the throne" along with the associated Note 1 on page 82.)

Part II: PDE to OE

1. The men stood in the ships and fought against the Danes.

Ðā men stōdon on ðǣm scipum ond gefuhton wið ðǣm Denum.

2. Before the thanes came, the king rode away.

Ǣr ðǣm ðe ðā ðegnas cōmen, sē cyning rād aweg.
Ǣr ðā ðegnas cōmen, sē cyning rād aweg.

3. They said (sǣdon) that all the men spoke one language.

Hīe sǣdon ðæt ealle ðā men sprǣcon ān sprǣc.

4. They bore the queen’s body to Wilton.

Hīe bǣron ðǣre cwēne līc tō Wiltūne.

5. Alfred gave many gifts to his army (dat. without tō) before he went away.

Ælfred geaf moniga giefa his fierde ǣr ðǣm ðe hē aweg ēode.
(See §20 (3) regarding transposed word order for dependent clauses.)

Ælfred geaf moniga giefa his fierde ǣr hē aweg ēode.

6. These men are called earls.

Ðās men hātton eorlas.

(See Note 2 on page 80 regarding the passive forms of hātan. Smith does not provide the plural form; for hātton reference, see the first note for the Old English hatan entry in Wiktionary.)

7. God sees all things.

God gesiehð eall ðing. (Early West Saxon)
God gesihð eall ðing. (Late West Saxon)
God siehð eall ðing. (More rare. Usually has "ge-" prefix.)

(Hogg (Phonology §2.37) notes that <ie> is used as a digraph only in EWS.)

8. The boy held the reindeer with (mid) his hands.

Sē cnapa hēold ðone hrān mid his hondum.
Sē cnapa hēold ðæt wildor mid his hondum. (wildor is actually more general, but Smith gives "reindeer" as a translation.)

9. About six months afterwards, Alfred gained the victory, and came to the throne.

Ðæs ymbe siex mōnað, Ælfred sige nam ond tō rīce fēng.

(See Part I #14, above, regarding the use of ðæs to mean "from that time". This þæs ymb construction, specifically, appears six times in the "The Battle of Ashdown", the Chronicle entry that Smith includes in his text starting on page 99. Although many scholars in the 19th century would read the ymb(e) here as "about", the more common current reading of ðæs ymbe siex mōnað would be "six months after that". I am leaving this Old English translation as I think Smith would have it.)

10. He said that there was very great slaughter on both sides.

Hē sǣde ðæt ðǣr wǣre swīðe micel wælsliht on gehwæðre hond.

(See §105 (3) regarding the use of the subjunctive in an indirect quote.)

Sorry if this is off-topic. I've been watching the World Cup matches, and when Norway prevailed over Brazil, I couldn't help but think of "þā Deniscan āhton wælstōwe geweald", a phrase that I remembered from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

for context i'm thinking of making a homebrew monster for D&D that would essentially be a dragon infected with the curse of lycanthropy and I need a proper name for it. I know "werewolf" essentially means "man wolf" and I think the "were" bit is old english? (please correct me if I'm wrong). so by that logic I want this thing to be called a (dragon in old english)wolf. from my very cursory knowledge I think the term I'm looking for is "wyrm" but I might be misremembering because that word is already used as a term for stuff related to dragons in official D&D like a baby dragon being called a wyrmling and the oldest, almost godlike dragons being refered to as greatwyrms. thanks for any help! ^_^ <3

Let me know if I made mistakes

The 3rd contains sus lyrics, so be careful with that one

https://youtu.be/4XeRWJtnJR0

https://youtu.be/7licKGbGGBE

https://youtu.be/tIP8Ft9apSk

Just for fun, I've created a few crossword puzzles in Old English. They're aimed at students (i.e. at people like me, haha).

I'm still working out how to publish these. I have two approaches — if you have a Google account, you can click the GDoc link and it prompts you to create your own copy of the puzzle. Otherwise, you can use a (sadly, non-interactive) PDF version.

• #1: "Saga hwā ic eom" Google Doc, PDF
• #2: "Dēorcynn" Google Doc, PDF
• #3: "Heregeatwa" Google Doc, PDF

Various disclaimers: again, they're just for fun and mostly for beginners. There might be grammatical or other errors in the clues — lmk and I'll correct.