Download Old English for Reading

Old English for Reading
 by Carin Ruff
Department of English
John Carroll University
2002
OEFR, p. 2
Table of Contents
page
3
Foreword
6
Unit 1: the case system; pronouns; weak nouns
19
Unit 2: the kernel
24
Unit 3: adjectives; adjectival modification; the verb beon-wesan “to be”;
the linking kernel
36
Unit 4: strong nouns; weak verbs
56
Unit 5: adverbial modification; nouns in oblique cases as adverbial
modifiers; prepositional phrases as adverbial modifiers; dative as
indirect object
65
Unit 6: connectors; the gap; participles; passive constructions
71
Unit 7: strong verbs; anomalous and preterite-present verbs; negation;
infinitives
84
Unit 8: subordination; correlation; clause markers; clauses as adverbial
modifiers
89
Unit 9: clauses as adjectival modifiers: relative clauses; clauses as kernel
items: noun clauses
94
Unit 10: mood; the subjunctive; the imperative
96
Unit 11: more adverbial clauses: causal clauses, purpose clauses, result
clauses; conditional clauses
98
Vocabulary for The Poet Cædmon
105
Collected unit vocabulary
OEFR, p. 3
Foreword
This book is deeply indebted to the work of the late Glenn Knudsvig and his
colleagues at the University of Michigan in the teaching of Classical languages. My
approach to teaching Old English is modeled, in particular, on the presentation of Latin
in Glenn M. Knudsvig, Gerda M. Seligson, Ruth S. Craig, Latin for Reading (University
of Michigan Press, 1986).
Like Latin for Reading, Old English for Reading is aimed in the first instance at the
university-level student who wants to move quickly to a level of reading fluency that will
enable him or her to engage with texts in the original language. Swiftness of acquisition
is, if anything, of even more importance for Old English than for Latin. The student
who takes even one semester of Old English in college is rare enough; the student who is
granted a second semester to study Old English literature in the original language is
exceedingly rare. It has therefore seemed to me crucial to present a series of lessons that
will have the student reading continuous Old English texts before the end of one
semester. This book is therefore arranged in eleven units, with readings from continuous
Old English texts beginning in Unit 5. The vocabulary presented in the lessons is
designed to provide a basis from which to move either to narrative prose or to Old
English verse. The readings from the story of Cædmon in the Old English Bede support
this dual preparation.
The following are key features of my presentation of the language:
Economy of Description
I have followed the "Michigan Latin" approach in seeking to avoid imposing
grammatical categories derived from the traditional description of Latin which are not
salient for Old English (and, in many cases, are not salient for Latin, either.) The
categories and concepts taught here privilege distinctions that are of high value to the
beginning reader learning to negotiate continuous texts in the target language.
More syntax/less phonology
The emphasis throughout is on teaching students to negotiate differences between
the syntax of OE and that of MnE, and on helping them to understand the implications
of the morphological information they are learning. The memorization load in learning
OE morphology is unavoidably heavy. In choosing what paradigms to emphasize, I have
OEFR, p. 4
tried to keep in view the goal of enabling students to recognize forms quickly and to find
dictionary headwords without excessive page-flipping. The presentation of the soundchanges of OE has been radically stripped down, on the following assumptions:
1) that students ought to be given just enough phonological information to see that
changes within paradigms are not – as they might otherwise appear – random;
2) that most college-level OE students are not going on to graduate-level study of
OE or of Germanic linguistics; and
3) that, for those students who do go on to further study, students grasp the nature
and relevance of phonological developments better when they have assimilated
characteristic patterns and variations through substantial exposure to a range of OE
texts.
In the same spirit, I have de-emphasized the memorization of vowel length. In half
a semester, students will be reading texts in which vowel length is not marked, so adding
vowel quantity to their memorization-load in the early weeks has virtually no payoff.
Vowel quantities are marked only in the model verbs for the strong verb classes; this is to
help students see the reasons for the grouping of verbs into classes and to facilitate the
finding of oblique verb forms in glossaries. Here and there, I have noted vowel quantity
when introducing high-frequency vocabulary that is distinguished from near-homophones
only by quantity, as with gòd–god. Nevertheless, I expect that students will devote more of
their energy to learning to exploit the information that is present in their texts, with
techniques of identification that depend on morphological signals and syntactical patterns.
Traditional and new terminology
Instructors and students familiar with traditional grammatical categories or other
inflected languages will find that all the basic terminology commonly used to describe
these languages is taught here. Students who have used this textbook will have a solid
foundation from which to go on to more advanced grammars of OE, to study the classical
languages, and to engage with scholarship that uses the vocabulary of traditional grammar
and philology. At the same time, OEFR follows Michigan Latin in introducing a small
number of terms from more recent linguistics. These are chosen for their pedagogical
utility and are explained fully in the lessons.
OEFR, p. 5
A level playing-field
OEFR presumes no prior acquaintance with inflected languages and no more
grammatical knowledge than a reasonable grasp of what the parts of speech are. On the
other hand, notes are occasionally given for students who have studied Latin and who may
be interested or puzzled by differences between Latin and OE.
Note for users familiar with Michigan Latin
Those familiar with Latin for Reading will note a few divergences in approach:
No metaphrasing; no charts
LFR teaches metaphrasing as a systematic technique for converting Latin
sentence-patterns into idiomatic English sentence-patterns. I have not used metaphrasing
in this book, mainly because of OE sentence structure is both significantly simpler than
that of Latin and significantly closer to that of MnE. My experience suggests that OE
learners move quickly from kernel analysis to accurate translation without being drilled in
a mechanism of conversion. Instructors familiar with metaphrasing may wish to introduce
its techniques at appropriate points. Similarly, I have not included charts for kernel and
modifier analysis. My experience teaching from LFR is that older undergraduates – the
target audience for this book – quickly become bored and annoyed by filling in charts and
can learn to carry out the same kind of analysis without so much rote work.
Whole paradigms presented together
LFR parcels out morphological information, introducing certain cases and certain
persons of the verb earlier than others. Because of the condensed time-frame of onesemester OE courses and the simpler morphology of OE, I have presented paradigms
whole.
English-to-Old English exercises
Departing from LFR's strict exclusion of composition exercises, I have included
English-to-Old English exercises in several units. These are designed to consolidate
students' grasp of the morphology and syntactical concepts and are meant to support the
book's fundamentally reading-oriented approach.
OEFR, p. 6
Unit 1
The Case System
Pronouns
Weak Nouns
______________________________________________________________________
Old English: An Inflected Language
Old English (OE) is an inflected language, meaning that much of the work of showing
what roles words play in sentences is done by endings added to those words. Endings that
signal the functions of words in a sentence are called inflections or inflectional endings.
Nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and verbs are inflected in OE.
In Modern English (MnE), this work is almost all done by word order. As a result, word
order is quite inflexible. For example,
Man bites dog
Dog bites man
mean completely different things because word order alone shows who is doing the biting
and who is the object of the biting.
But if we construct a similar sentence using pronouns instead of nouns, we see that the
forms of the pronouns make it absolutely clear who is doing what:
She bit him
He bit her.
She and he, the nominative forms of these pronouns, signal that these words are serving
as the subjects of their respective sentences. Him and her are objective forms and show
that these words are the objects (in this case, direct objects) in their sentences. (The
form that signals the direct object in OE is called the accusative.)
Because these endings are present, we can still make sense of these sentences even if we
change the word order:
Him she bit.
Bit he her.
These may not be the normal or idiomatic word orders for MnE, but there is no
ambiguity about who’s left with tooth-marks.
OEFR, p. 7
In addition to showing subject and direct object, MnE pronouns can also indicate
possession:
He took her book.
She took his book.
The form that shows to whom something belongs is called the genitive.
______________________________________________________________________
The OE Case System
Forms of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives that show the roles these words play in
sentences (their syntactical function) are called cases. OE has more cases than MnE
preserves and so can indicate more functional distinctions through endings than can
MnE. Moreover, OE uses case endings on nouns and adjectives as well as pronouns. As a
result, OE word order is somewhat more flexible than that of MnE. (If you have studied
Latin or Greek, you will find that the OE case system is somewhat limited and that as a
result the word order is less free than in those languages.)
The cases used in OE and their most common functions are:
nominative
subject, subject complement
accusative
direct object, object complement, object of some prepositions
genitive
possessive, “of ____”
dative
indirect object, object of many prepositions and some verbs
instrumental
means by which something is done (this case is on its way out
in historical OE and is a distinctive form only in pronouns)
Note: If you have had Latin or Greek, you are probably used to seeing these cases listed in a different order.The
rationales for listing them this way are that 1) in most classes of OE nouns, the nominative and accusative are
identical, and 2) unlike in Greek and Latin, in OE you cannot rely on the genitive to distinguish gender and
noun class, so it is not conventionally listed after the nominative in dictionary entries.
OEFR, p. 8
_____________________________________________________________________
Grammatical gender
Every noun in OE is classified as either masculine or neuter or feminine. These
categories determine what set of inflectional forms these nouns can choose from to
indicate syntactical function. Demonstrative pronouns come with three sets of forms, one
for each gender. When a pronoun is used to modify a noun or to refer to a noun
previously mentioned, it adopts the gender of that noun. Adjectives also adopt the
genders of the nouns they modify, and so they, too, have three sets of endings, one for
each gender.
_____________________________________________________________________
Number
Every noun, adjective, and pronoun in OE has a set of forms indicating singular number
and another set indicating plural number. A noun is singular if it refers to one person or
thing and plural if it refers to many. As with gender, adjectives and pronouns take their
number from the nouns they modify or refer to. In addition to singular and plural, the
personal pronouns also have forms indicating dual number, which are used only to refer
to pairs of things.
_____________________________________________________________________
The demonstrative pronoun se-†æt-seo "the"
In OE, the easiest way to identify the case of a noun is by the definite article (really a
demonstrative pronoun) that accompanies it. Soon you will learn all the case forms for
nouns of every class, but for the moment the most important task is to memorize the
forms of the demonstrative pronoun se-†æt-seo.
Learn the forms of se:
masculine
singular
neuter
feminine
plural
all genders
nominative
se
†æt
seo
†a
accusative
†one
†æt
†a
†a
genitive
†æs
†æs
†ære
†ara
dative
†æm
†æm
†ære
†æm
instrumental
†y
OEFR, p. 9
(Note: You will encounter variant spellings of these forms as you read, but, for the time being,
concentrate on learning the forms presented here.)
Now that you know the forms of se, you can use them to distinguish what case a noun is.
Let's look at the “man bites dog” scenario in Old English:
All of these sentences mean the same thing:
Se mann bite† †one hund.
Se mann †one hund bite†.
ˇone hund se mann bite†.
Bite† †one hund se mann.
etc.
In each sentence, we know that se mann is the subject because se is nominative, and †one
hund is the direct object, because †one is accusative.
Likewise, in all the following sentences, the dog does the biting:
Se hund bite† †one mann.
Se hund †one mann bite†.
ˇone mann se hund bite†.
Bite† †one mann se hund.
______________________________________________________________________
The demonstrative pronoun †es "this"
Learn the forms of †es:
masculine
singular
neuter
feminine
plural
all genders
nominative
†es
†is
†eos
†as
accusative
†isne
†is
†as
†as
genitive
†isses
†isses
†isse
†issa
dative
†issum
†issum
†isse
†issum
instrumental
†ys
OEFR, p. 10
Compare the forms of †es to the forms of se. This will help with your memorization and
also help you get used to some features of OE case marking that recur with many nouns
and pronouns.
What similarities do you note about the way the forms organize themselves through the
paradigm? Here are some specific things to look for:
How does the feminine differ from the masculine and neuter forms?
How are the feminine forms similar to the plural forms?
Are there characteristic letter combinations that signal the genitive singular?
What about the genitive plural? the dative singular and plural?
______________________________________________________________________
Interrogative pronouns
Interrogative pronouns ask the question "who?" about animate persons and "what?" about
inanimate things.
animate ("who")
inanimate ("what")
nominative
hwa
hwæt
accusative
hwone
hwæt
genitive
hwæs
hwæs
dative
hwæm
hwæm
instrumental
hwy
hwy
You'll recognize that the hw- in these words corresponds to the wh- beginning of
interrogatives in English. Many of the characteristic case signals that you noted in the last
exercise show up here, too. Note that the genitive hwæs is the equivalent of MnE
"whose". (But note also that, unlike the wh- words, hw- words are not used as relative
pronouns. We'll learn about the OE relative pronoun system later.)
OEFR, p. 11
Exercise 1.1
Give the MnE equivalents for these OE forms:
a. hwa _____________
c. hwæs _____________
b. hwæt _____________
d. hwone _____________
Exercise 1.2
Translate the following sentences:
a. Hwæt is †æt?
____________________________________________
b. Hwone bite† se hund?
____________________________________________
c. Hwæs hund is †es?
____________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Personal pronouns
The personal pronouns are divided into First, Second, and Third Person. In MnE, first
person pronouns are I, we. The second person is pronoun is you. The third person
pronouns are he, she, and it.
Note that for the first- and second-person personal pronouns, OE preserves a dual
number, used uniquely for pairs of persons.
First person
singular
dual
plural
nominative
ic
wit
wè
accusative
mec
unc
ùs
genitive
mìn
uncer
ùre
dative
mè
unc
ùs
OEFR, p. 12
Second person
singular
dual
plural
nominative
†ù
git
gè
accusative
†è
inc
èow
genitive
†ìn
incer
èower
dative
†è
inc
èow
Third person
singular
plural
masculine
neuter
feminine
all genders
nominative
hè
hit
hèo
hì(e)
accusative
hine
†is
hì(e)
hì(e)
genitive
his
his
hire
hira
dative
him
him
hire
him
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 1.3
Practice using personal pronouns: translate the following sentences.
a. Hi bita† hira hund.
____________________________________________
b. He bite† hire hund.
____________________________________________
c. Uncer hund bite† eow.
____________________________________________
d. Eower hund bite† mec.
____________________________________________
OEFR, p. 13
____________________________________________________________________
Weak Nouns
Learn the forms of the weak masculine noun nama "name":
singular
plural
nominative
nama
naman
accusative
naman
naman
genitive
naman
namena
dative
naman
namum
Learn the forms of the weak feminine noun sunne "sun":
singular
plural
nominative
sunne
sunnan
accusative
sunnan
sunnan
genitive
sunnan
sunnena
dative
sunnan
sunnum
Learn the forms of the weak masculine noun eage "eye":
singular
plural
nominative
eage
eagan
accusative
eage
eagan
genitive
eagan
eagena
dative
eagan
eagum
Look over the paradigms of the weak nouns and note which forms are distinctive and
which are liable to confusion with one another. How will you recognize the cases when
you see them?
OEFR, p. 14
Memorize the meanings and genders of the weak nouns listed below. (You should
memorize them with the appropriate demonstrative pronouns as an aid to remembering
their genders, as you would with a modern European language.)
______________________________________________________________________
Note: Guidelines for recognizing the gender of weak nouns
All nouns ending in –a in the nom. sg. are weak masculines; all feminine nouns ending in
–e are weak; the only weak neuter nouns in OE are those listed below.
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Weak Nouns
weak masculine
definition
se aglæca
combatant, belligerent, monster
se anwealda
lord, ruler ("one" + "ruler")
se bana
slayer
se boda
messenger
se boga
bow
se gefera
companion
se fe∂a
foot-troop, infantry
se frea
lord, master, The Lord
se geleafa
belief, faith
se Gota
Goth
se guma
man, warrior
se lichama
body
se mona
moon
se nama
name
se oxa
ox
se papa
Pope
se scima
light, radiance
se sefa
heart, mind
OEFR, p. 15
se wræcca
wanderer, exile
weak neuter
†æt eage
eye
†æt eare
ear
†æt wange
cheek, jaw
weak feminine
seo byrne
corselet, mail coat
seo cirice
church
seo eor∂e
earth
seo heorte
heart
seo hlæfdige
lady
seo sunne
sun
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 1.4: Complete the paradigms for the following pronoun-noun pairs.
(A paradigm is a list of all the possible forms of a given word. It is called a paradigm
because it can serve as a model for predicting the forms of other words in the same class.)
Note: There is no separate instrumental form for nouns. The instrumental is denoted by the
instrumental form of the demonstrative plus the dative form of the noun. You do not need to
write out the instrumental forms here, but remember what the instrumental demonstrative looks
like so you will recognize it when you are reading.
We will learn more about uses of the genitive, dative, and instrumental later.
a.
singular
plural
nom.
†es mona
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
OEFR, p. 16
b.
singular
plural
nom.
†is eare
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
c.
singular
plural
nom.
†eos sunne
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
d.
singular
plural
nom.
se mona
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
e.
singular
plural
nom.
†æt eage
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
f.
singular
plural
nom.
seo byrne
______________
acc.
______________
______________
gen.
______________
______________
dat.
______________
______________
OEFR, p. 17
Exercise 1.5: Using the paradigms you have just learned and the explanation of case uses
on pp. 5-6, above, complete the Old English translations of these sentences using the
appropriate forms of the nouns and pronouns you know. Verbs are supplied for you.
a. The warrior carries the corselet.
______________ bere† ______________.
b. The moon hides the sun.
______________ deage† ______________.
c. Who chose this pope?
______________ geceas ______________?
d. The wanderer leads the ox.
______________ læde† ______________.
e. The eye misled the mind.
______________ dwælde ______________.
f. The slayer drew the bow.
______________ drog ______________.
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 1.6: Now practice working with genitives. The genitive indicates to what noun
another noun belongs, and is translated in MnE by the possessive or “of” + noun.
Examples:
†æs guman: the man’s, of the man
†isses lichaman: this body’s, of this body
†ara gumena: the men’s, of the men
†issa lichamena: these bodies’, of these
bodies
Using the sentences you constructed in Ex. 2 as starting points, translate these sentences
into OE:
a. The warrior carries the lord’s corselet.
________________________________________________________________
b. The moon hides the sun’s radiance.
________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 18
c. Who chose this pope’s faith?
________________________________________________________________
d. The wanderer leads the Goths’ oxen.
________________________________________________________________
e. The mind’s eye misled that messenger.
________________________________________________________________
f. The lord’s slayer drew the bow.
________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms
inflected
case:
nominative
genitive
dative
accusative
instrumental
gender
number
paradigm
Forms
demonstrative pronouns se and †es
personal pronoun
interrogative pronoun
personal pronoun
weak noun declension:
se nama, †æt eage, seo sunne
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 19
Unit 2
The Kernel
______________________________________________________________________
The Kernel
Every sentence has elements that are essential to the meaning of the statement – at a
minimum, a subject and verb. These essential elements of the sentence are called the
kernel.
Sentences can have additional elements, including modifiers and connectors (also known
as conjunctions). A crucial part of learning to read a new language fluently is learning to
distinguish kernel elements and non-kernel elements. We will discuss non-kernel
elements a little later on.
If you can recognize the kernel elements in a sentence as you read, you can tell when the
sentence is complete, and you can also tell whether there are essential elements that you
haven’t met yet but that you should be on the lookout for.
Every language has a certain number of kernel types. A knowledge of what kernel types
you may expect to meet in a language helps you navigate the unfamiliar terrain of the
sentences of the language you are learning, and, as you become a more sophisticated
reader, helps you cope with longer and more complex sentences.
In OE as in MnE, the most important kernel types are the intransitive active kernel and
the transitive active kernel. As these names suggest, what type of kernel a sentence has
depends on two features of the verb, its voice and its transitivity.
Voice means whether a verb is active or passive. A verb is active if the subject does the
action of the verb and passive if the subject undergoes the action of the verb. (We will
look later at kernels that contain passive verbs.)
Active: The bug flies.
Passive: The bug is squashed.
Transitivity indicates whether the verb describes an action that is transferred from the
subject to some other noun – that is, whether the verb needs a direct object.
Intransitive: The bug flies.
Transitive: The bug bit me.
OEFR, p. 20
Since every kernel needs a subject and verb, and since the transitivity of the verb
determines whether we should expect a direct object to be present, we can predict what
elements will be present in intransitive active and transitive active kernels:
Intransitive active kernel:
Transitive active kernel:
subject
subject
intransitive verb
transitive verb
direct object
Note: In OE as in MnE, many if not most verbs may be transitive or intransitive:
she sings/she sings songs
the bird flies/the child flies a kite
Hint: How do you know whether a verb is transitive or intransitive?
• because of its meaning
• because its entry in a dictionary tells you so
• because when you learned the verb you learned that it normally takes an accusative
object or an object in another oblique case (we will learn later about verbs that take
genitive or dative objects)
• because you have already found a direct object in a clause and are looking for a verb to
govern it
This last hint is not as flippant as it sounds. If you know the required elements of a
kernel, you can make very well-educated guesses about the function of elements about
which you have some uncertainty from what you know for sure about other elements.
Furthermore, these kinds of well-educated guesses help you navigate a language with an
unfamiliar word order and unfamiliar syntactical cues in a systematic, linear order.
______________________________________________________________________
Note: Identifying nouns as kernel elements
A noun and the article or demonstrative pronoun that accompanies it are technically a
noun phrase; the article is technically a modifier of the noun. However, since (as we saw
earlier) in OE the article is the most reliable signal of the case of the noun, we will for the
time being treat the article+noun together as a single kernel element. The case (and
therefore the function) of the noun will be signaled by a combination of the form of the
article and the form of the noun itself. Pronouns, of course, can stand by themselves in
noun-roles in the kernel, and pronouns usually have well-defined case markings.
OEFR, p. 21
______________________________________________________________________
Using kernel types to form expectations: Every kernel element creates the strong
likelihood of another kernel element appearing soon. Therefore, even if words come at
you in an unfamiliar order, you can make pretty educated guesses about what kind of
kernel you are in and how close you are to having a complete clause.
These are the basic rules for expectations in intransitive active and transitive active
kernels:
• A subject creates the expectation of a verb.
• A verb creates the expectation of a subject, and possibly of a direct object.
• A direct object creates the expectation of a transitive verb.
With these guidelines in mind, you can move from left to right through an unfamiliar
sentence, asking yourself the following three questions for each element you encounter:
• What do I see?
(that is, what are the morphological signals on this word?)
• What do I have?
(that is, what does that tell me about the function of this word?)
• Therefore, what do I expect?
(that is, of what other elements does this word
create an expectation?)
Take as an example one of the sentences from p. 4:
ˇone mann se hund bite†.
How would we process this left-to-right, using expectations?
ˇone mann
What do I see?
What do I have?
The form ˇone signals that this is accusative.
The accusative signals that a noun is serving as
direct object.
What do I expect? A direct object creates the expectation of a
transitive active verb, and a verb creates the
expectation of a subject – so I will be on the
lookout for both of these things.
OEFR, p. 22
The next element we get is se hund.
se hund
What do I see?
The form se signals that mann is a nominative
noun.
What do I have? The nominative signals that a noun is serving as
subject.
What do I expect? A subject creates the expectation of a
verb. I was already looking for a verb, and I will
keep looking for one.
As we move to the second and later elements of the sentence, we can add two further
questions:
4. Does this fulfill an expectation raised earlier?
5. Is this kernel complete yet?
If you can answer question 4 in the affirmative, you can confirm the educated guess you
made earlier, and resolve some of your uncertainty about the structure of the sentence.
If you can answer question 5 in the affirmative, you can breathe a sigh of relief and prepare
to attack the next kernel.
Now we encounter the third element:
bite†
What do I see?
The ending on bite† signals that it is a verb.
(Later we will learn to identify verb endings more
specifically)
What do I have?
A verb fulfills the role of a verb. The meaning of
this verb suggests that it will be transitive.
What do I expect? A verb creates the expectation of a subject
and I already have one. A transitive verb creates
the expectation of a direct object and I already
have one. I have no further expectations.
Does this fulfill an expectation raised earlier? Yes, two!
Is this kernel complete yet? Yes: I have all three required elements of
a transitive active kernel.
Wasn’t that satisfying?
OEFR, p. 23
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 2.1:
Now practice doing the same kind of analysis on the variant forms of this sentence we saw
earlier:
Bite† †one mann se hund.
Se hund bite† †one mann.
Se hund †one mann bite†.
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 2.2:
Now explain how you would do the same kind of expectation-analysis on this sentence:
Se gu∂rinc swæte†
The warrior bleeds.
What if you met the elements in this order?
Swæte† se gu∂rinc
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms
kernel
transitivity
transitive
intransitive
voice
active
passive
Kernel types
intransitive active
transitive active
Techniques
identify forms
ask questions
form expectations
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 24
Unit 3
Adjectives
Adjectival Modification
The Verb beon-wesan “to be”
The Linking Kernel
______________________________________________________________________
Adjectives
In an inflected language like Old English, adjectives change their genders, number, and
case to match those of the nouns they are modifying.
In Old English, every adjective has two complete sets of declensional endings from
which to choose forms. These are conventionally called “strong” and “weak”
declensions. Which declension an adjective chooses its forms from depends on how the
adjective is used in a given syntactical context.
The terms “strong” and “weak”:
Weak nouns are a class of nouns that share certain characteristic declensional
forms. Strong nouns, which we will meet later, likewise have certain characteristics in
common. Every noun is either strong or weak and does not switch category.
When applied to adjectives, however, these unfortunate terms have a different
meaning. Every adjective has a set of weak forms and also a set of strong forms. Which
forms you use depends on the context of the adjective in the sentence. If the adjective is
preceded by a definite article/demonstrative pronoun (such as se or †es) or a possessive
pronoun (such as min, ure), it takes its forms from the weak declension. If the adjective is
not preceded by a definite article, it takes its forms from the strong declension. One way
to remember this is to think of the strong adjective as strong enough to stand on its own
without an article, but the weak one as needing the support of an article.
Therefore you need to be prepared to recognize adjectives with endings taken from
either set, and to understand why one ending is chosen instead of another. Authors
sometime violate the basic rule of usage stated above, so be prepared to be surprised.
OEFR, p. 25
______________________________________________________________________
Learn the weak and strong declension of tila “good”.
Weak forms
singular
plural
masculine
neuter
feminine
all genders
nominative
tila
tile
tile
tilan
accusative
tilan
tile
tilan
tilan
genitive
tilan
tilan
tilan
tilra, tilrena
dative
tilan
tilan
tilan
tilum
Strong forms
singular
masculine
neuter
feminine
nominative
til
til
tilu
accusative
tilne
til
tile
genitive
tiles
tiles
tilre
dative
tilum
tilum
tilre
plural
masculine
neuter
feminine
nominative
tile
tilu
tile, tila
accusative
tile
tilu
tile, tila
genitive
tilra
tilra
tilra
dative
tilum
tilum
tilum
OEFR, p. 26
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 3.1: To practice using strong and weak forms of the adjective and to practice
noun-adjective agreement, translate the underlined parts of the following phrases and
sentences into OE:
______________________________________________________________________
Reminder: noun-adjective agreement
An adjective agrees with the noun it modifies in gender, number, and case.
______________________________________________________________________
1. This Goth is good. ___________________________________
2. The church is good. ____________________________________
3. They love the good church. ____________________________
4. Good ladies love cookies. ____________________________
5. The good lady loves cookies. ____________________________
6. Good lords need good eyes. ___________________
_______________________
7. Good companions’ company never wears out. ____________________________
8. These good companions’ company never wears out. ___________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Adjectives
Memorize the meanings of these adjectives:
definition
æ∂ele
noble
an
one
ana
alone
anræd
singleminded, resolute
begen
both
bli∂e
happy, cheerful, friendly
blodig
bloody
OEFR, p. 27
brad
broad, wide, spacious
eadig
blessed
eadmod
humble
earm
poor, wretched
eald
old, ancient
ece
eternal
fæst
firm, fixed ("hold fast"
forma
first
god
good
{Note: the adjective gòd has a long ò;
the noun god "God" has a short o.}
hlud
loud
hold
loyal
lang
long, tall
lytel
little
micel
big, great, large, much
mihtig
mighty, powerful
o†er
second
re†e
fierce, cruel, harsh
snotor
wise
so†
true
swi†
mighty
twegen
two
wid
broad, wide
yfel
evil
ylca
same
OEFR, p. 28
______________________________________________________________________
Comparison of adjectives
Adjectives form the comparative and superlative (the "more" and "most" forms) by adding
-ra and -(o)st. Often there is a change in the vowel of the stem, but these will rarely
prevent you from recognizing the adjective if you pronounce it to yourself.
lang - lengra - lengest
long - longer - longest
eald - ieldra - ieldest
old - older - oldest
Most adjectives that have irregular comparisons in OE are recognizable from their MnE
counterparts:
god - betera - betst
good - better - best
yfel - wiersa - wierst
bad - worse - worst
micel - mara - mæst
much - more - most / great - greater - greatest
______________________________________________________________________
A note on numbers
You will not have any trouble recognizing most OE numbers, since their forms are so
similar to the MnE ones. Here are just a couple of peculiarities:
• an means "one" when it is declined strong, but "alone" when it is declined weak (ana)
• the word for "first" is forma.
• the word for "second" is o†er.
• twegen means "two" and begen means "both".
______________________________________________________________________
Adjectival modification
Adjectives as adjectival modifiers – Nouns in the genitive as adjectival modifiers
Adjectives modify nouns – that is, an adjective gives more information about the noun it
agrees with, or describes it, or specifies it so it can be identified more completely.
The noun that is modified by an adjective is called its noun-head.
OEFR, p. 29
Modifiers contribute to the full meaning of a sentence, but they are not indispensable to
the syntactic core of the sentence. Therefore they are not kernel items and do not affect
kernel type.
Adjectives are the most basic form of adjectival modifier, but other words or clauses can
serve as adjectival modifiers, too. Nouns in the genitive are also adjectival modifiers.
Compare these sentences:
adjectives
nouns in the genitive
Give me the green book.
Give me Tim’s book.
The English people are brave.
The people of England are brave.
Note that although a noun in the genitive and an adjective fulfill the same syntactic
function, they are marked by different endings. Adjectives agree with their noun-heads in
gender, number, and case. Nouns in the genitive are distinguished by their genitive
endings.
______________________________________________________________________
Expectations and adjectival modifiers
An adjectival modifier creates the expectation of a noun-head.
Not only that, but an adjective gives you a very good idea of what sort of noun-head to
expect, since an adjective agrees with its noun-head in gender, number, and case.
On the other hand, not all the adjectival forms are distinctive, so an adjective may not
leave you 100 percent sure what kind of noun is coming up.
OEFR, p. 30
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 3.2: For each of the following adjective forms, list the possible genders,
numbers, and cases of noun-head the adjective could modify. (I have used only strong
forms of the adjective, since weak forms would follow an article or demonstrative which
would specify the gender, number, and case of the noun-head with very little ambiguity.)
tilra
___________________________________________________________
tile
___________________________________________________________
tilum
___________________________________________________________
tilu
___________________________________________________________
tilne
___________________________________________________________
tiles
___________________________________________________________
til
___________________________________________________________
tilre
___________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Adjectives as substantives
The rule about adjectival expectations sounds like a very firm and reliable rule, but often
the expectation of a noun-head is defeated. If you fail to find a noun-head for an
adjective, consider the possibility that the adjective is being used as a substantive – that is,
as a noun substitute.
Consider these modern English examples:
A good man is hard to find.
Only the good die young.
In the first example, good modifies man, but in the second example, there is nothing for
good to modify. Therefore, we conclude that it stands for “good people”.
OEFR, p. 31
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 3.3: For each of the following sentences, decide whether each adjective is being
used as an adjectival modifier or as a substantive. If it is being used as an adjectival
modifier, identify its noun head. If it is being used as a substantive, identify its number
and case and tell what role it is playing in the sentence. Then translate the sentence.
(Hint: in one of these sentences, it is being used both as a substantive and as an adjectival
modifier.)
a. ˇa earman and †a blodigan seca† lytel.
seca†: “seek”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
b. Se frea ah gumena godu.
ah: “owns, possesses”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
c. Se deofol †a tilra heortan dwælde.
dwælde: “misled, deceived”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
d. Se papa †a yfelan ne sieh†.
ne sieh†: “does not see”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
e. Yfele heortan nabba† se anwealda.
nabba†: “does not have”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
f. ˇone yfelan banan se frea sloh.
sloh: “slew”
translation: ____________________________________________________________
g. ˇone frean se yfel sloh.
translation: ____________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 32
______________________________________________________________________
The verb beon/wesan, “to be”
The verb “to be” in OE has forms from two different verbs in the present tense, beon
and wesan. The present forms of beon serve as a future tense; the present forms of wesan
are the ordinary present of the verb "to be"; and wesan provides forms for the past tense.
wesan: present
Singular
Plural
First person
eom
sind(on), sint
Second person
eart
sind(on), sint
Third person
is
sind(on), sint
Singular
Plural
First person
wæs
wæron
Second person
wære
wæron
Third person
wæs
wæron
Singular
Plural
First person
beo
beo†
Second person
bist
beo†
Third person
bi†
beo†
wesan: preterite
beon: present (future)
(We will encounter uses of beon as we read; for the time being, use the forms
eom/eart/is/sind and wæs/wære/wæs/wæron in the exercises that follow.)
OEFR, p. 33
______________________________________________________________________
Subject-verb agreement: A verb agrees with its subject in number and person. The
persons of the verb are 1st (I or we), 2nd (you), and 3rd (he/she/it/they or a noun as
subject).
Verb tense: Verbs in OE are marked by inflection as either present tense or preterite (i.e.
past) tense.
(Verbs also have mood, but for the moment we will deal only with the indicative mood.)
Every verb form can be identified by person, number, tense, and mood.
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 3.4: Practice matching subjects with forms of wesan by filling in the appropriate
verb form for each of these subjects. Be prepared to translate the resulting sentences.
subject
present
preterite
we
_____________
_____________
ge
_____________
_____________
hit
_____________
_____________
hie
_____________
_____________
†a guman
_____________
_____________
ic
_____________
_____________
he
_____________
_____________
†u
_____________
_____________
OEFR, p. 34
______________________________________________________________________
The Linking Kernel
As you may have learned in elementary school, the verb “to be” is a “linking verb”. It acts
like an equals sign:
Kermit is a frog:
Kermit = frog.
Several other semantic groups of verbs can also act like linking verbs:
Kermit is called a frog.
Kermit becomes a frog.
Kermit is considered a frog.
The noun that is being equated to the subject in these sentences is called a subject
complement (other terms: nominative complement, predicate nominative). The subject
complement is one of the three required elements of a linking kernel:
subject
linking verb
subject complement
A subject complement may be a noun or noun-equivalent (pronoun, substantive
adjective). The subject complement's place in a linking kernel may also be an adjective
that is really acting as an adjective:
Kermit is green.
An adjective serving this function is called a predicate adjective.
Expectation: a linking verb creates the expectation of a subject complememt or a
predicate adjective.
Form: In OE, the subject complement goes in the same case as the subject – i.e., the
nominative.
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 3.5:
Using nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and forms of wesan you know, make up five OE
sentences with linking kernels. Include some sentences with predicate nouns and some
with predicate adjectives. Try using different forms of adjectival modification. Bring your
sentences to class and be prepared to challenge your classmates to translate them.
OEFR, p. 35
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
weak
strong
noun-adjective agreement
adjectival modification
noun-head
nouns in the genitive as adjectival modifiers
adjectives as substantives
subject-verb agreement
person
number
tense
active
passive
subject complement
Kernel types
linking
Forms
strong and weak declension of tila
present and preterite indicative of
beon/wesan
review declension of personal
pronoun
OEFR, p. 36
Unit 4
Strong Nouns
Weak Verbs
______________________________________________________________________
Forms: Strong Nouns
The basic paradigms
Learn the paradigms of the strong nouns stan "stone" (masculine), scip "ship" and word
"word" (neuter), and giefu "gift" and lar "teaching" (feminine).
______________________________________________________________________
Strong masculine noun
singular
plural
nominative
stan
stanas
accusative
stan
stanas
genitive
stanes
stana
dative
stane
stanum
______________________________________________________________________
Strong neuter noun with -u plural
singular
plural
nominative
scip
scipu
accusative
scip
scipu
genitive
scipes
scipa
dative
scipe
scipum
OEFR, p. 37
______________________________________________________________________
Strong neuter noun with unmarked plural
singular
plural
nominative
word
word
accusative
word
word
genitive
wordes
worda
dative
worde
wordum
______________________________________________________________________
Strong feminine nouns
singular
plural
nominative
giefu
giefa, giefe
accusative
giefe
giefa, giefe
genitive
giefe
giefa, giefena
dative
giefe
giefum
singular
plural
nominative
lar
lara, lare
accusative
lare
lara, lare
genitive
lare
larena
dative
lare
larum
______________________________________________________________________
Note which endings are consistent among strong nouns of the three genders and where
differences occur.
Note whether there are differences among the genders as to which cases are distinctive
and which cases look alike.
OEFR, p. 38
______________________________________________________________________
About the divergences from these basic patterns:
As we are about to see, there are many minor variations on these basic paradigms, but the
most important thing is that you be able to recognize what case a noun is when you see
one in a sentence. Therefore, you should have these basic paradigms in memory, and be
alert to variations that can occur.
The most common ways in which nouns can diverge from the basic pattern are
• the vowel of the stem changes in some cases because of sound changes internal to the
history of OE
• the end of the stem looks slightly different in some cases because the inflectional
ending and the stem interact with one another. This usually entails the loss of one
consonant or one vowel from the end of the stem.
It is helpful to know what kinds of changes can happen so that, when you see an oblique
form of a noun (i.e., not the nominative singular) as you are reading, you can make an
intelligent guess about what form you’re going to look the word up under in the
dictionary.
Oblique forms are hardest to recognize if they contain mutated vowels, so we will
memorize paradigms of some of the most frequently-occurring mutated-stem nouns.
Oblique forms are fairly easy to recognize and look up if there has been a change only at
the end of the stem. Therefore we will not memorize paradigms for all the possible
variants. We will practice recognizing these as we read.
______________________________________________________________________
Strong nouns with vowel changes in their stems
The nouns dæg "day" (masc.) and fæt "vessel" (neut.), mann "man" (masc.) and boc
"book" (fem.) show vowel changes in their stems caused by the influence of second
syllables on their root syllables.
In the case of dæg and fæt, the root vowel changes to -a- when there is a second syllable
with a back vowel (an -a- or a -u-). The back vowel in the second syllable "drags" the
root syllable backwards in the mouth. The upshot is that -a- appears instead of -æ- in the
root syllable in the plural forms of these words. Otherwise, dæg is declined just like stan
and fæt is declined just like scip.
OEFR, p. 39
singular
plural
nominative
dæg
dagas
accusative
dæg
dagas
genitive
dæges
daga
dative
dæge
dagum
______________________________________________________________________
singular
plural
nominative
fæt
fatu
accusative
fæt
fatu
genitive
fætes
fata
dative
fæte
fatum
______________________________________________________________________
In the case of mann and boc, some forms had prehistoric endings – lost by the time of
written OE – with high, front vowels in them. These endings dragged the root vowels of
those forms forward and up, changing -a- and -o- to -e-. By the time we get records of
OE, those endings have dropped off, but the mutated root vowels remain. Note that
these nouns basically follow the pattern of other strong nouns, but in the forms with
mutated vowels, the changed vowel does the work of the lost endings.
singular
plural
nominative
mann
menn
accusative
mann
menn
genitive
mannes
manna
dative
menn
mannum
OEFR, p. 40
______________________________________________________________________
singular
plural
nominative
boc
bec
accusative
boc
bec
genitive
bec
boca
dative
bec
bocum
______________________________________________________________________
U-nouns
Learn the paradigms of sunu (masc.) and hand (fem.). Note the differences and possible
points of confusion between these paradigms and weak masc. nouns like nama, strong
neuter nouns like scip, and strong feminine nouns like giefu.
singular
plural
nominative
sunu
suna
accusative
sunu
suna
genitive
suna
suna
dative
suna
sunum
______________________________________________________________________
singular
plural
nominative
hand
handa
accusative
hand
handa
genitive
handa
handa
dative
handa
handum
OEFR, p. 41
______________________________________________________________________
Congratulations and noun summary
Now you know enough basic patterns and variants for major noun types to recognize
noun forms when you encounter them in reading. Remember that you will often have
help from an article or demonstrative pronoun in identifying the cases of nouns. As you
review noun forms, notice that in the majority of nouns, the nominative and accusative
look alike, but the genitive and dative have distinctive forms. This should suggest what
the most important distinctions are that a reader of OE will need to make based in
inflectional information. Noun inflections generally allow you to tell:
• kernel items (nominatives, accusatives) from non-kernel items (genitives, datives)
• singular from plural
Other kinds of information in the sentence will help you make distinctions and decisions
when noun forms are ambiguous, and we will practice recognizing these symbols as we
read.
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 4.1: Practice using the strong nouns you have just learned with articles and the
weak adjective declension. Translate each of the following noun phrases into OE and give
the phrase in all cases, singular and plural.
a. the good ship
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
OEFR, p. 42
b. the good man
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
c. the good book
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
d. the good vessel
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
e. the good day
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
OEFR, p. 43
f. the good word
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
g. the good stone
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
h. the good son
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
OEFR, p. 44
Now practice using the strong adjective declension:
i. good teaching
singular
plural
nom.
_____________________
_____________________
acc.
_____________________
_____________________
gen.
_____________________
_____________________
dat.
_____________________
_____________________
inst.
_____________________
_____________________
______________________________________________________________________
Hint: As you learn more and more vocabulary and encounter new nouns in your reading,
you can annotate your vocabulary list to remind you which model noun the new noun
resembles.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Strong Nouns
Memorize the meanings and genders of these strong nouns.
strong masculine
definition
se a†
oath
se bearo
grove
se cyning
king
se dæg
day
se deofol
devil
se dom
judgement, glory, reputation
se ende
end
se engel
angel
OEFR, p. 45
se eoh
horse
se feoh
money
se fugol
bird
se God
(Christian) God
se hæle†
hero, warrior
se here
army
se mann
man
se mearh
horse
se meotod
creator
se mona†
month
se munuc
monk
se scoh
shoe
se sige
victory
se stan
stone
se stede
place
se wealh
foreigner, stranger, slave, Welshman
se wer
man
se wine
friend
strong neuter
†æt cild
child
†æt fæt
vessel
†æt god
(pagan) god
†æt gear
year
†æt heafod
head
†æt rice
kingdom
OEFR, p. 46
†æt scip
ship
†æt spere
spear
†æt wæter
water
†æt werod
troop
†æt wite
punishment, torment
strong feminine
seo boc
book
seo giefu
gift
seo lar
teaching, doctrine
†a leode (plural only)
people
seo spræce
speech
seo stow
place
______________________________________________________________________
Forms: Weak Verbs
There are three classes of weak verbs in OE, 1, 2, and 3. There are slight differences
among the classes in their inflectional endings. All weak verbs have in common that they
form their past tenses by adding a dental suffix – a –d or –t sound at the end of the stem
but before any personal ending. Strong verbs, which we will learn shortly, instead mark
the preterite by changing the vowel of the stem. (As you will see, there are a few weak
verbs that also have a stem-vowel change. Many of these survive into MnE.)
We can exemplify the basic types of verbs from MnE:
Strong: run-ran
Weak: love-loved
Weak w/ vowel change: think-thought
OEFR, p. 47
______________________________________________________________________
Learn the present and preterite indicative of the Class 1 weak verbs fremman.
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
fremme
fremma†
Second person
fremest
fremma†
Third person
freme†
fremma†
______________________________________________________________________
Note: Variations on these endings in other weak verbs include:
• the -e- before the -st and -† of the 2nd and 3rd person singular may be left out.
• not all verbs change back and forth between a double and single root consonant the way
fremman does.
Neither of these should cause much of a problem in identifying verbs or their personal
endings.
______________________________________________________________________
The preterite has a different set of personal endings and it adds a -d- as a marker of tense
between the root and the personal endings:
Preterite
Singular
Plural
First person
fremede
fremedon
Second person
fremedest
fremedon
Third person
fremede
fremedon
OEFR, p. 48
______________________________________________________________________
Class 1 weak verbs with vowel change have the same endings as fremman, but the preterite
endings are added to a different base form. Here are the present and preterite base forms of
the most common verbs of this type. Learn the present and preterite base forms for these
verbs:
brengan - brohte "bring"
sellan - sealde "give"
bycgan - bohte "buy"
†encan - †ohte "think"
cwellan - cwealde "kill"
†yncan - †uhte "seem"
secan - sohte "seek"
wyrcan - worhte "work"
______________________________________________________________________
Class 2 weak verbs differ from Class 1 verbs in that they have -a- in the present and -o- in
the preterite where Class 1 verbs have -e-. Learn the present and preterite indicative of the
Class 2 weak verb lufian:
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
lufie
lufia†
Second person
lufast
lufia†
Third person
lufa†
lufia†
Singular
Plural
First person
lufode
lufodon
Second person
lufodest
lufodon
Third person
lufode
lufodon
Preterite
OEFR, p. 49
______________________________________________________________________
Class 3 has only four verbs in it, but these are of very high frequency. Learn the present and
preterite indicative of the Class 3 weak verb habban, libban, secgan, hycgan.
______________________________________________________________________
habban "have"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
hæbbe
habba†
Second person
hæfst/hafast
habba†
Third person
hæf†/hafa†
habba†
Singular
Plural
hæfde
hæfdon
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
libban "live"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
libbe
libba†/leofa†
Second person
leofast/lifast
libba†/leofa†
Third person
leofa†/lifa†
libba†/leofa†
Singular
Plural
lifde/leofode
lifdon/leofodon
Preterite
all persons
OEFR, p. 50
______________________________________________________________________
secgan "say"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
secge
secga†
Second person
sægst/segest
secga†
Third person
sæg†/sege†
secga†
Singular
Plural
sægde
sægdon
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
hycgan "think"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
hycge
hycga†
Second person
hygst/hogast
hycga†
Third person
hyg†/hoga†
hycga†
Singular
Plural
hogode
hogodon
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
Now look over the forms of all the weak verb classes and note consistencies and differences
among them.
______________________________________________________________________
Dictionary/glossary hint: OE verbs are listed in the dictionary under their infinitives, the
“to” form of the verb. This form always ends in –an. We will learn more about infinitives
soon.
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 51
______________________________________________________________________
Dictionary/glossary hint: It is conventional to designate the class to which a weak verb
belongs by a small Arabic numeral (1, 2, 3) and the class to which a strong verb belongs
with a large Roman numeral (I, II, III, etc.) As you meet new verbs in your reading and
look them up in the glossary, you should look for this information and note it in your
own vocabulary lists.
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Weak Verbs
Learn the meanings of these verbs:
Class 1
definition
awendan
translate
deman
judge
feran
set out, proceed, go
fremman
do, accomplish
hieran
hear, obey
geliefan
believe
læran
teach
nerian
save, protect
rædan
read, instruct, give counsel
ræran
lift up, offer up
sendan
send
settan
put, establish, set, appoint
tæcan
teach, show, direct
tæcnan
point out, signify, direct
wenan
think, expect
wendan
go, turn, wend one's way
werian
defend, protect
OEFR, p. 52
Class 1 w/vowel change
definition
brengan
bring
bycgan
buy
cwellan
kill
reccan
care about, explain, relate
secan
seek
sellan
give, sell
†encan
think, intend
†yncan
seem
wyrcan
make, form, produce
Class 2
definition
(Note that several of these are formed from nouns or adjectives you already know. See if you can
identify which ones.)
clypian
call
fæstnian
make fast, establish
halgian
hallow, consecrate
halian
heal
hergian
harry, devastate
lufian
love
locian
look
namian
name
ricsian
reign
si∂ian
travel
†rowian
suffer
weor†ian
honor, respect, worship
OEFR, p. 53
wunian
dwell
wundrian
wonder, marvel at
Class 3
definition
habban
have
hycgan
think
libban
live
secgan
say
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 4.2: Translate the following sentences into OE(a) and then change the verb into
the preterite tense (b):
1. Judgement is the end.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
2. God sends the angel.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
3. Birds love angels.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 54
4. The king reigns.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
5. God hallows the king’s kingdom.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
6. The children read books.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
7. The devil kills the people’s hero.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
8. These men sell horses.
a. ______________________________________________________________
b. ______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Verbal Prefixes
Learning these high-frequency prefixes will help you recognize new variants of familiar
verbs. These prefixes do not always affect the verbs they're added to in a predictable way,
so it's best to check your glossary if an educated guess about meaning doesn't make sense
in context.
OEFR, p. 55
a-
"away"
be-
"around" (be-ridan "ride around") or deprive (be-heafdian "behead")
ge-
a perfective prefix, that is, it sometimes denotes that the action of the verb
to which it's prefixed is completed. Compare winnan "fight", "struggle", and
gewinnan "get by winning". ge- is often, but not obligatorily, prefixed to the
past participle.
on-, an- negates, like MnE unwi†-
"against"
ymb-
"around"
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Forms
strong nouns
weak verbs
Word elements
verbal prefixes
OEFR, p. 56
Unit 5
Adverbial modification
Nouns in oblique cases as adverbial modifiers
Prepositional phrases as adverbial modifiers
Dative as indirect object
______________________________________________________________________
Adverbial modification
You probably learned in school that adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, and their fellow
adverbs. Another way to think about adverbs is that they answer certain kinds of
questions:
where?
when?
for how long?
why?
how?
in what manner?
to what extent?
for what purpose?
with what means?
Any element of a sentence that answers these or similar questions is an adverbial
modifier. The modifier’s head is a verb, adjective, or adverb. An adverbial modifier creates
the expectation of a verb, adjective, or adverb as head.
Adverbs
The simplest form of adverbial modifier is the adverb.
In OE, there are characteristic endings for adverbs, just as in MnE -ly usually signals an
adverb. OE adverb endings that are used to form adverbs from other words include:
-e "-ly"
-unga "-ly"
-lice "ly"
-an "from the direction of"
Many adverbs are "little words" that are not clearly formed from other words and that
may or may not have these endings. Many are recognizable from MnE. Some almost
invariably occur in pairs. Some of the most common adverbs in the vocabulary list on
the next page.
OEFR, p. 57
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Adverbs
Learn the following common adverbs.
hra†e
swiftly
wide and side
far and wide
a
forever
ær
earlier, previously
ea∂e
easily
innan
from within
neah
near
nu
now
oft
often
symble
always, unceasingly
†a
then
†ær
there
upp
up
utan
from without
wel
well
______________________________________________________________________
Nouns in the genitive as adverbial modifiers.
OE often uses a noun or noun phrase in the genitive as an adverbial modifier. Many of
these are high-frequency, idiomatic expressions and you will get used to seeing them.
Example:
dæges and nihtes: “day and night”
†æs: “therefore”
upweardes: “upward”
OEFR, p. 58
______________________________________________________________________
Nouns in the dative or instrumental as adverbial modifiers:
The dative can also be used to express adverbial ideas, and the instrumental is designed
for expressing the adverbial ideas of means, manner, instrument, accompaniment, and
time. If a noun in the instrumental is accompanied by an article, †y, you can tell it’s
instrumental; otherwise, remember, the dative and the instrumental are indistinguishable.
Therefore we’ll treat them together:
hwilum: “at times”
∂ære ilcan nihte: “on the same night”
lytle werode: “with a small troop”
†y ilcan geare: “in the same year
hlutre mode: “with pure heart”
______________________________________________________________________
Nouns in the accusative as adverbial modifiers
The accusative can be used to express the adverbial notion of duration of time:
ealne dæg: “all day”
______________________________________________________________________
Prepositional phrases as adverbial modifiers
In OE, prepositional phrases are usually adverbial, unlike in MnE, where they are
as likely to be adjectival. Compare:
He danced on the table.
The book on the table is mine.
You should assume OE prepositional phrases are of the former type unless there is good
reason to think otherwise. (But do be on the lookout for counterexamples!)
The object of a preposition in OE goes in a particular case, depending on what the
preposition is. We say that a preposition “takes" a certain case. Most prepositions take the
dative; some take the genitive or accusative. Some take the instrumental, but you will very
rarely be able to tell the instrumental from the dative. Some prepositions take different
cases at different times and have slightly different meanings depending on what case they
take. A rule of thumb about this is that prepositions take the accusative when they imply
movement towards, and the dative when they imply staying in one place. Compare:
in †æt wæter: “into the water”
in †æm wætere: “in the water”
OEFR, p. 59
_____________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Prepositions
Memorize the meanings of these prepositions and what cases they take.
These prepositions normally take the dative:
æfter
after, along, according to
ær
before
æt
at, from, by
be
by, along, alongside, about
beforan
before, in front of
betweox
between, among
butan
except, without
for
before, in front of, because of
fram
from, by
mid
with, among, by means of
of
from, of
ongean
against, towards
togeanes
against, towards
These prepositions normally take the accusative:
geond
throughout
o†
up to, until
†urh
through
ymb
around
OEFR, p. 60
These prepositions take different cases and, where noted, the meaning varies with the
case:
in
in (dat.); into (acc.)
on
in, on (dat.); into (acc.)
to
at, for (gen.); towards, to, at, near, as (dat.)
under
under, beneath (dat.); with sense of movement (acc.)
wi†
against (acc., gen., dat.)
_____________________________________________________________________
A note about prepositions
Most OE prepositions can also be used as verbal prefixes or as adverbs in verb phrases, so
memorizing those listed here will give you a lot of payoff in recognizing new words and
phrases as you read. Many prepositions also have a parallel life as clause markers; we will
learn about those in Unit 8.
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 5.1: Choose any three of the sentences you created in Ex. 4.2. Using any
vocabulary you know, add three different adverbial modifiers to each sentence: one adverb
(a), one noun phrase in an oblique case without preposition (b), and one prepositional
phrase (c).
1. a. _______________________________________________________________
b. _______________________________________________________________
c. _______________________________________________________________
2. a. _______________________________________________________________
b. _______________________________________________________________
c. _______________________________________________________________
3. a. _______________________________________________________________
b. _______________________________________________________________
c. _______________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 61
______________________________________________________________________
The dative as indirect object
Besides being used for all these adverbial purposes, the most common and most familiar
use of the dative is as an indirect object.
1. He gave the book to me.
2. He gave me the book.
3. God made his kingdom for men.
In OE, all these indirect object uses would normally be expressed by nouns or pronouns
in the dative without a preposition. 1 and 2 would be identical:
He sælde me †a boc.
3 would be:
God wrohte mannum his rice
______________________________________________________________________
Other uses of the dative
Some verbs take dative objects. The dative is also used after comparative adjectives (stane
heardra: “harder than stone”) and after some other adjectives implying comparison (ise
gelicost: “most like to ice”). We will encounter these and similar uses as we read.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
Forms
adverbial modification
major types of strong nouns
types of adverbial modification
all classes of weak verbs
adverbs
adverbial suffixes
prepositional phrases
nouns in oblique cases without preposition
dative as indirect object
other uses of dative
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 62
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Creation (Genesis 1.1-10)
______________________________________________________________________
This is from a translation of Genesis into Old English by the monk and teacher
Ælfric, who worked around the year 1000. Vocabulary that you don't know already (and
that you can't easily figure out yourself) is given at below the text. You should learn these
words and the new vocabulary presented in future readings.
______________________________________________________________________
On anginne gesceop God heofonan and eor∂an. Seo eor∂e so†lice wæs idlu and
æmtigu, and †ystru wæron ofer ∂ære neowolnesse bradnesse; and Godes gast wæs gefered
ofer wæteru. God cwæ∂ ∂a*, "Geweor∂e leoht" and leoht wear∂ geworht. God geseah ∂a*
∂æt hit god wæs, and he gedålde †æt leoht fram ∂æm †ystrum. And het ∂æt leoht dæg
5
and ∂a †¥stru niht. Îa* wæs geworden æfen and morgen, an dæg.
God cwæ∂ †a* eft, "Geweor∂e nu fæstnes tomiddes †æm wæterum, and totwæme †a
wæteru from †æm wæterum. And God geworhte †a fæstnesse, and totwæmde †a wæteru
∂e wæron under †a fæstnesse from †a †e wæron bufan †ære fæstnesse; hit wæs swa gedon.
And God het †a fæstnesse heofonan. And wæs †a geworden æfen and morgen, o∂er dæg.
10
God ∂a* so†lice cwæ∂, "Beon gegaderode ∂a wæteru ∂e sind under ∂åre heofonan,
and æteowie drygnes; hit wæs ∂a* swa gedon. And God geciegde †a drygnesse eor∂an, and
†æra wætera gegaderunga he het sæs. God geseah †a* †æt hit god wæs.
OEFR, p. 63
Reading vocabulary (in order of appearance)
anginn
beginning
gesceop (from scyppan)
shaped, made
so†lice
truly
idel
void
neowolnes
abyss
†ystru
shadows, darkness (always plural)
gefered (from geferian)
carried
∂a*
then
geweor∂e (from weor∂an)
"Let ____ come to be," "let there be ____ "
geworht (from wyrcan)
made
geseah (from seon)
saw
gedælan
divide
het (from hatan)
called
geworden (from weor†an); wæs geworden
"happened"
tomiddes
amid
totwæme (from totwæman, lit. "to-two")
"let ___ be divided"
fæstnes
firmament
bufan
above
swa
so
æteowie
"let ___ appear"
∂e
that, which
geciegde
called
gegaderunga
gatherings (acc. pl.)
OEFR, p. 64
Questions on the reading
Identify the kernel types and kernel elements of the clauses in line 1.
Find all the nouns that have demonstratives (articles) with them. Can you tell what gender,
number, and case they are?
Compare the occurrences of ∂a marked with an asterisk* with those used as articles. How will
you tell the two apart when you meet them in your reading?
OEFR, p. 65
Unit 6
Connectors
The Gap
Participles
Passive constructions
______________________________________________________________________
Connectors
So far, we have dealt with sentences that contain only one item fulfilling each syntactical
function: one subject, one verb, one direct object, one adverb, and so on.
Connectors are used to join two or more elements that are alike in function:
two subjects:
Menn and englas lufia† God.
two verbs:
Menn lufia† and lofia† God.
two direct objects:
God wrohte heofon and eor∂an
two indirect objects:
God wrohte heofon mannum and englum.
two adjectives:
Heofon is heah and beorht.
two whole kernels:
Heofon is beorht and hell is swærtu.
The most important connectors to be able to recognize are the coordinating conjunctions: and
(also spelled ond or 7): “and”, and ac: “but”.
The connectors can also be unexpressed (asyndeton: lack of conjunctions). In modern
punctuation, a comma is often used to designate a join where there is no expressed connector.
The three modes of connection can be exemplified with versions of the last sentence above:
Heofon is beorht and hell is swærtu.
Heofon is beorht ac hell is swærtu.
Heofon is beorht, hell is swærtu.
Ac, “but”, in the second example joins two units that are alike syntactically but opposed to each
other in meaning. The comma serves much the same function in the third example.
OEFR, p. 66
As you read and encounter connectors, it is important to ask yourself what two things are being
joined by the connector. A good rule of thumb for expectations and connectors is that a
connector raises the expectation of another thing like something you just saw.
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 6.1: Look back at the reading from the last unit. Find all the ands and underline
them. Identify what two "sames" each one connects.
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 6.2: Practice recognizing what two like elements are connected by connectors.
In the following sentences, circle the connectors and underline the two elements they join. Be
prepared to name what kind of element you have underlined.
1. God is god ac se deofol is yfel.
2. He sloh †one mann †y stane and †y spere.
3. God wrohte mannum his rice ac deofola werodum his dom.
4. Ic sprece †æm tungum manna and engla.
5. ˇæt scip is lang and brad.
_____________________________________________________________________
The Gap
When a sentence contains two or more kernels, it is very common (in all languages) for one or
more kernel items to be left out, with the understanding that it will be supplied from the
preceding or following kernel. We do this without thinking about it in MnE, but recognizing
what has been left out can be tricky in a new language. (In traditional grammar, this
phenomenon is called ellipsis and is classified as a figure of rhetoric. Linguists often refer to the
phenomenon as “gapping”.)
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 6.3: Practice recognizing what has been left out. Mark the place where something is
missing and circle the place where you are going to find the item to supply in the gap.
1. God is god ac se deofol yfel.
2. Heofon is beorht and hell swærtu.
3. ˇæt scip is lang and brad and seo sæ eac.
_____________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 67
As you read texts, especially poetic texts, and track expectations looking for kernel items, be
alert for items that may have been gapped.
_____________________________________________________________________
Participles
A participle is a verbal adjective. That means that it functions as an adjectival modifier, but it
has several attributes of a verb, including voice (active or passive) and tense (present or
preterite).
There are two participles in OE, the present and the past. These correspond closely in use to
the MnE participles. The present participle is active, and the past participle is passive.
Consider these MnE examples:
present active:
past passive:
running water
squashed squirrel
In MnE, the participles can be combined with forms of “to be” to forms compound verb tenses;
e.g.:
present progressive:
past perfect:
the water is running
the squirrel was squashed
These forms are under development during the OE period. You will encounter similar
constructions in your OE reading and usually their interpretations will be clear from their MnE
counterparts.
_____________________________________________________________________
Participles: forms
The OE particples are formed from verbs as follows:
• The present participle is formed by adding -ende to the root of the verb. Example: lufiende
"loving"
• For weak verbs, the past participle looks like the preterite (with appropriate dental ending)
but with personal endings dropped off. The prefix ge- may be added. Examples: (ge)lufod
"loved", (ge)nered "saved"
OEFR, p. 68
• For strong verbs, the past participle is the fourth principal part. We will learn about strong
verbs in the next unit.
• The participles are declined like adjectives, strong or weak as context requires.
_____________________________________________________________________
Exercise 6.4: Translate the following participle+noun phrases into OE.
Nota bene: Because a participle is an adjective, it takes adjectival endings and follows the rules
for noun-adjective agreement.
Hint: To decide whether a participle should be active or passive, think about the relationship
between the participle and its noun-head. If the participle describes what its noun-head is
doing, it should be active; if it describes what happened to the noun-head, it should be passive.
1. the reigning king
_________________________________
2. the loving God
_________________________________
3. the living God
_________________________________
4. the slain man
_________________________________
5. the traveling exile
_________________________________
6. the suffering heart
_________________________________
7. the healed heart
_________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
Note that any of the phrases you just translated can appear in any case, as called for by the
function of the noun-head in the sentence.
_____________________________________________________________________
Note also that participles, like adjectives, can and very often do serve as substantives, without
noun-heads – just like in MnE:
the living...the wounded...the annoying...the blessed
etc. etc.
OEFR, p. 69
_____________________________________________________________________
Passive constructions
Like MnE, OE has no inflected passive and so must express passive forms with a combination
of the verb "to be" and the past participle.
seo eor†e wæs nerede
"the earth was saved"
(The one exception is the only verb in OE that, on its own, has a passive meaning: hatan, “to
be called”.)
A kernel with a passive verb is its own kernel type, the passive kernel. A passive kernel’s only
obligatory constituents are a subject and a passive verb.
______________________________________________________________________
Note: Even though the past participle is basically passive in meaning, it can be used with the
verb "to have" to form active past-tense contructions. This works the same way in MnE.
Example: ic habbe lufode "I have loved". As usual, when you are diagnosing whether a
construction is active or passive, think about the relationship of the subject to the action of the
verb.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
connectors
coordinating conjunctions
gapping
participles as adjectival modifiers
voice of participles
compound verb forms involving participles
Forms
present and past participles of
all weak verbs you know
Kernel type
passive
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 70
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Poet Cædmon
______________________________________________________________________
Cædmon was a lay brother (not a monk, not trained in Latin and Scripture) in the 660s in the
monastery of Whitby, which was governed by the Abbess Hild. Bede tells of Cædmon’s
miraculous gift as part of the story of Hild in his Church History of the English People, which
was written in the 730s and translated into Old English early in the tenth century.
______________________________________________________________________
Note: Use the glossary that follows Unit 12.
______________________________________________________________________
Wæs he se mon in weoruldhade geseted o∂ †a tide †e he wæs gelyfdre ylde, ond næfre
nænig leo∂ geleornade. Ond he for†on oft in gebeorscipe, †onne †ær wæs blisse intinga
gedemed, †æt heo ealle sceolden †urh endebyrdnesse be hearpan singan, †onne he geseah †a
hearpan him nealecan, †onne aras he for scome from †æm symble ond ham eode to his huse.
5
ˇa he †æt †a sumre tide dyde, †æt he forlet †æt hus †æs gebeorscipes, ond ut wæs
gongende to neata scipene, †ara heord him wæs †ære neahte beboden †a he ∂a †ær in
gelimplicre tide his leomu on reste gesette ond onslepte, †a stod him sum mon æt †urh swefn
ond hine halette ond grette ond hine be his noman nemnde: "Cedmon, sing me hwæthwugu."
ˇa ondswarede he ond cwæ∂: "Ne con ic noht singan; ond ic for†on of †eossum gebeorscipe ut
10
eode, ond hider gewat, for†on ic naht singan ne cu∂e."
Eft he cwæ∂, se ∂e mid hine sprecende wæs: "Hwæ∂re †u meaht singan."
ˇa cwæ∂ he: "Hwæt sceal ic singan?" Cwæ∂ he: "Sing me frumsceaft."
OEFR, p. 71
Unit 7
Strong Verbs
Anomalous and preterite-present verbs
Negation
Infinitives
______________________________________________________________________
Strong verbs
Strong verbs are the ancestors of the MnE so-called "irregular" verbs, like sing-sang-sung. They
mark tense not by adding a dental suffix, like the weak verbs (or their MnE descendents, like
love-loved), but by changing the vowels inside their stems.
While we call these verbs "irregular" today, they were originally - before historic OE - quite
regular, in the sense that the series of vowels appearing in the various stems was predictable for
each class of verb. In the development from OE to MnE, many strong verbs have been
simplified, undergone internal changes, or changed class. Still, you intuitively know enough
common strong verb patterns to recognize that there is still a lot of regularity in the system.
In OE, there are fairly regular, recognizable classes of strong verbs. But many sound changes
took place just before recorded OE and during the history of OE that affected the vowels
appearing in these verbs. Because of this, some verb classes seem to have an unreasonably large
number of exceptions, and the appearance of vowels in verb stems can appear quite random to
the beginner.
The way to tackle this apparent chaos is to memorize about a dozen model verbs (seven main
classes and a few recurring exceptions caused by sound changes), so that you have in mind the
range of patterns to which strong verbs may conform. Then, as you learn new verbs, you can
associate them with the vowel-pattern of your model verb.
When you learn OE strong verbs, you need to learn
• principal parts of model verbs for each of the classes of strong verbs and a few sub-classes.
Knowing the principal parts of strong verbs is crucial because it will allow you to recognize
what dictionary form you should look up when you meet an unfamiliar form of an
unfamiliar verb.
• personal endings for the present and preterite tenses of strong verbs, which are somewhat
simpler than those for weak verbs
OEFR, p. 72
______________________________________________________________________
Principal Parts
In MnE, most verbs of this type have three principal parts (different stems on which the
various verb forms are based). These are:
1. Present stem
2. Preterite stem
3. Past participle stem
sing
sang
sung
examples  I sing, you sing, he/she/it sings, etc.
examples  I sang, you sang, he/she/it sang, etc.
examples  I have sung, the song has been sung
In OE, strong verbs have four principal parts. This is because these verbs show two different
vowels within the preterite tense, one for the first and third person singular, and another for
the second person singular and the whole plural.
To summarize, the principal parts (pp) are used to form the following forms:
1st pp
whole present
tense
2nd pp
1st and 3rd person
singular preterite
3rd pp
2nd person
singular and
whole plural
preterite
4th pp
past participle
3rd pp
sungon
4th pp
sungen
The principal parts of singan in OE are:
1st pp
singan
2nd pp
sang
______________________________________________________________________
Here's how we use those principal parts to form verb forms we can actually use in sentences.
Note the personal endings and learn these; they will apply to all strong verbs. It may be useful
to go back and compare them to the personal endings for weak verbs.
1st pp singan 
Present tense forms:
ic singe I sing
†u singest you (sg.) sing
he/heo/hit singe† he/she/it sings
we/ge/hi singa† we/you (pl.)/they sing
OEFR, p. 73
2nd pp sang 
Preterite tense forms:
ic sang I sang
he/heo/hit sang he/she/it sang
3rd pp sungon 
Preterite tense forms:
†u sunge you (sg.) sang
we/ge/hi sungon we/you (pl.)/they sang
4th pp sungon 
Past participle:
he hafa† sungen he has sung
______________________________________________________________________
Exercise 7.1: Practice conjugating singan in present and preterite tenses by translating the
following sentences into OE. Note: the OE noun song is masculine and declines like stan.
a. We sang the song.
____________________________________________
b. You (sg.) sang the old song. ____________________________________________
c. You (pl.) sang a long song.
____________________________________________
d. I sing a happy song.
____________________________________________
e. She sang this terrible song.
____________________________________________
f. The warrior sings a bloody song
_______________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Strong verb classes and model verbs
Learn the principal parts and meanings of the following model strong verbs. (Note on long
vowels: although you do not need to memorize vowel length, the classification of strong verbs
is based in part on vowel length, so I have marked length here.)
Class I
scìnan
scàn
scinon
scinen
shine
Class II
crèopan
brùcon
crèap
brèac
crupon
brucon
cropen
brocen
creep
enjoy
Class III
Class III variants
bregdan
helpan
beorcan
gielpan
drincan
brægd
healp
bearc
gealp
dranc
brugdon
hulpon
burcon
gulpon
druncon
brogden
holpen
burcen
golpen
druncen
shake
help
bark
boast
drink
OEFR, p. 74
Class IV
beran
bær
båron
boren
bear
Class V
tredan
træd
trådon
treden
trample
Class VI
faran
fòr
fòron
faren
go
Class VII
healdan
hatan
hèold
hèt
hèoldon
hèton
healden
hàten
hold
order,
be called
______________________________________________________________________
Why are there so many variant types for Class III? You'll notice that the basic Class III form
is a stem with a short vowel followed by two consonants. Before and during the OE period,
particular combinations of consonants caused changes in the vowels that preceded them. For
example, r plus another consonant and l plus another consonant both caused "breaking" of
simple vowels, turning them into diphthongs. "Breaking" before r and before l followed slightly
different rules and so produce slightly different results in different verbs. In gielpan, a diphtong
is created by the g- that starts the word ("palatal diphthongization"). In drincan, the nasal n
plus another consonant raises the -e- of the basic series to -i-.
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary: Strong Verbs
Class I
scìnan
shine
crèopan
creep
brùcon
enjoy
bregdan
shake
helpan
help
beorcan
bark
gielpan
boast
drincan
drink
Class II
Class III
OEFR, p. 75
gelimpan
happen, befall
weor†an
become
beran
bear
sprecan
speak, say
tredan
tread on, trample
faran
go
slean
strike, beat, attack
healdan
hold
hatan
order, be called
Class IV
Class V
Class VI
Class VII
______________________________________________________________________
Irregular verbs
As in MnE, a large number of very high-frequency verbs have irregular conjungations.
Although it is tedious to memorize all these, they occur so frequently that it is worth the effort
to save you future labor in dictionary-flipping.
These verbs are don, gan, willan, agan, cunnan, magan, motan, sculan, †urfan, witan.
______________________________________________________________________
don "do"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
don
do†
Second person
dest
do†
Third person
de†
do†
OEFR, p. 76
Preterite
all persons
Singular
Plural
dyde
dydon
______________________________________________________________________
gan "go"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
ga
ga†
Second person
gæst
ga†
Third person
gæ†
ga†
Singular
Plural
eode
eodon
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
willan "wish, will"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
wille
willa†
Second person
wilt
willa†
Third person
wile
willa†
Singular
Plural
wolde
woldon
Preterite
all persons
OEFR, p. 77
______________________________________________________________________
agan "possess"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
ah
agon
Second person
ahst
agon
Third person
ah
agon
Singular
Plural
ahte
ahton
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
cunnan "can, know how to"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
cann
cunnon
Second person
canst
cunnon
Third person
cann
cunnon
Singular
Plural
cu†e
cu†on
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
magan "be able to"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
mæg
magon
Second person
mæht
magon
Third person
mæg
magon
OEFR, p. 78
Preterite
all persons
Singular
Plural
mihte
mihton
______________________________________________________________________
motan "be allowed to, may"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
mot
moton
Second person
most
moton
Third person
mot
moton
Singular
Plural
moste
moston
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
sculan "be obliged to"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
sceal
sculon
Second person
scealt
sculon
Third person
sceal
sculon
Singular
Plural
sceolde
sceoldon
Preterite
all persons
OEFR, p. 79
______________________________________________________________________
†urfan "need"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
†earf
†urfon
Second person
†earft
†urfon
Third person
†earf
†urfon
Singular
Plural
†orfte
†orfton
Preterite
all persons
______________________________________________________________________
witan "know"
Present
Singular
Plural
First person
wat
witon
Second person
wast
witon
Third person
wat
witon
Singular
Plural
wiste
wiston
Preterite
all persons
OEFR, p. 80
______________________________________________________________________
Negation
The basic negative particle in OE is ne “not”.
OE also regularly negates other words by adding an initial n- or replacing the first consonant
with an n-:
an “one” – nan “none, not one”
is “is” – nis “isn’t”
willan “to wish” – nillan “to not wish, to wish not” (hence to MnE expression willy-nilly: “will he
or will he not”, i.e. “whether he wishes or whether he doen’t”.)
Double negation is regular in OE and the two negatives do not cancel each other out:
Nis nan wyrm
There is no serpent
Two ne-s can mean neither...nor and act as a connector joining two like elements:
He wolde ne seon ne hieran
He wished neither to see nor to hear.
______________________________________________________________________
Infinitives
OE has two infinitives, both of which may be translated by the MnE infinitive (the “to” form
of the verb). One infinitive is the dictionary form of the verb, the form that ends in –an. The
other is called the “inflected” infinitive, although it isn’t really inflected – that is, its endings
don’t change. It is instantly recognizable because it is preceded by to and ends in –nne, as in to
lufienne.
______________________________________________________________________
The uninflected infinitive is used as a complementary infinitive, in conjunction with many of
the verbs we have just learned. Examples:
He can lufian.
He sceal lufian.
He mot lufian.
He †earf lufian.
He knows how to love
He is obliged to love, he must love
He is allowed to love
He needs to love
OEFR, p. 81
______________________________________________________________________
Kernel analysis and complementary infinitives.
A helping verb and a complementary infinitive together make up a whole verb for the purposes
of kernel-element identification. The auxiliary provides information about person and tense,
and the infinitive provides the core meaning and, where relevant, the voice (active or passive).
The same is true of complex verbs formed from “have” or “be” plus a participle.
___________________________________________________________________________
Accusative + infinitive constructions
The uninflected infinitive can also be used in commands. A verb of commanding may be
followed by the person who is to carry out the command in the accusative and the action that is
to be done in the infinitive. Example:
Se cyning heht [†one guman feohtan].
The king ordered the warrior to fight.
The accusative and the infinitive in this construction are in a subject-verb relationship – that
is, the accusative and infinitive together make a kernel and can be analyzed as such. The
accusative and the infinitive kernel can have objects or modifiers in it, too:
Se cyning heht [†one guman cwellan †one aglæcan]. The king ordered the warrior to kill the
combatant.
Se cyning heht [†one guman feohtan modiglice]. The king ordered the warrior to fight
bravely.
(If the first of these seems ambiguous to you, it is. It's usually possible to tell from context,
though, which accusative is the subject and which is the direct object within the accusativeand-infinitive construction.)
______________________________________________________________________
There is also a construction peculiar to OE in which the infinitive, although it is active in
form, must be translated passive.
Se cyning heht [an hus wyrcan].
The king ordered a house to be built.
It's obvious from logic and context that the king is not ordering the house to do something, so
here the relationship between the accusative subject and the infinitive verb must be passive.
Context usually suggests the appropriate translation.
OEFR, p. 82
______________________________________________________________________
The inflected infinitive can be used to express purpose. Examples:
He com to cwellenne †æt wyrm. He came to slay the serpent.
He com to nerienne †a eor∂e.
He came to save the earth.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Forms
principal parts of strong verbs and irregular verbs
negation of verb forms
Terms and concepts
inflected and uninflected infinitive
complementary infinitive
accusative and infinitive construction
OEFR, p. 83
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Poet Cædmon, part 2
______________________________________________________________________
ˇa he ∂a †as andsware onfeng, †a ongon he sona singan in herenesse Godes Scyppendes
†a fers ond †a word †e he næfre gehyrde, †ara endebyrdnes †is is:
"Nu sculon herigean heofonrices Weard,
Meotodes meahte ond his modge†anc,
5
weorc Wuldorfæder, swa he wundra gehwæs,
ece Drihten, or onstealde.
He ærest sceop eor∂an bearnum
heofon to hrofe halig Scyppend;
†a middangeard monncynnes Weard,
10
ece Drihten, æfter teode
firum foldan, Frea ælmihtig."
ˇa aras he from †æm slæpe, ond eal †a †e he slæpende song fæste in gemynde hæfde ond †æm
wordum sona monig word in †æt ilce gemet Gode wyr∂es songes toge†eodde.
ˇa com he on morgenne to †æm tungerefan, †e his ealdormon wæs: sægde him hwylce
15
gife he onfeng; ond he hine sona to †ære abbudissan gelædde ond hire †a cy∂de ond sægde. ˇa
heht heo gesomnian ealle †a gelæredestan men ond †a leorneras: ond him ondweardum het
secgan †æt swefn, ond †æt leo∂ singan, †æt ealra heora dome gecoren wære, hwæt o∂∂e hwonon
†æt cuman wære. ˇa wæs him eallum gesegen, swa swa hit wæs, †æt him wære from Drihtne
sylfum heofonlic gifu forgifen.
OEFR, p. 84
Unit 8
Subordination
Correlation
Clause markers
Clauses as adverbial modifiers
______________________________________________________________________
Subordination – subordinate clauses
As you know, every sentence contains at least one kernel – at least one clause – and may
contain two or more clauses joined by a connector meaning “and” or “but”. Clauses joined by
coordinating conjunctions like “and” or “but” retain their status as “main” or “independent”
clauses.
But clauses can also fill other sentence roles. A clause can act like a noun kernel item, like an
adverbial modifier, or like an adjectival modifier. If a clause serves one of these roles within a
larger sentence or clause, it is called a dependent or subordinate clause, and the clause within
which it is acting is called the governing clause.
Let’s look briefly, with MnE examples, at how clauses fulfil noun, adjective, and adverb roles in
sentences. In this and the following chapters, we will consider more specifically what these
clauses look like in OE.
Noun clauses
Clauses may act as any noun kernel item, but most often act as the direct object of a verb of
saying, thinking, asking, commanding, etc., and give the content of the statement, thought,
belief, question, or command.
Compare:
He said a prayer. (noun)
He said that he wished the dragon would go away. (clause)
He asked a question. (noun)
He asked what the best method was for getting rid of dragons. (clause)
He believed the answer. (noun)
He believed that it would be hard to kill the dragon. (clause)
He ordered breakfast. (noun)
He ordered that his men help him get breakfast for the dragon. (clause)
OEFR, p. 85
Noun clauses may also serve as subjects:
The dragon’s dislike was all too apparent. (noun)
That the dragon did not like scrambled eggs was all too apparent. (noun clause)
______________________________________________________________________
Adverb clauses
A clause may answer most of the wide range of adverb questions (see Unit 5):
where?
when?
why?
for what purpose?
where the dragon has his lair
when the dragon wakes
because dragons are really grouchy
so that he could protect his hoard
______________________________________________________________________
Adjective clauses
An adjective clause specifies or gives additional information about a noun-head, just like other
adjectival modifiers do. Adjectival clauses take the form of relative clauses. Compare:
the grouchy dragon (adjective)
Beowulf’s dragon (noun in the genitive)
the dragon who lives in the barrow (adjective clause)
______________________________________________________________________
Clause markers
Notice that in the examples above, there is a word in bold that marks the beginning of the
clause. The general term for these is clause marker. Different kinds of clauses are marked by
different categories of marker:
Noun clauses are marked by subordinating conjunctions or question words.
Adverb clauses are marked by subordinating conjunctions or adverbs.
Adjective clauses are marked by relative pronouns.
The rules for what words can serve as clause markers are somewhat different for MnE and OE,
so we will look at the specific possibilities for OE as we consider different clause types.
OEFR, p. 86
______________________________________________________________________
Clauses as adverbial modifiers
Anticipation and recapitulation
OE likes to signal that a subordinate clause is coming – or remind us that we’ve just had one –
by placing an adverb in the main clause that indicates what type of clause is coming (or just
went past) and how that clause fits into the syntax of the governing clause.
We sometimes do this in MnE:
[Where the dragon lives], there men fear to tread.
[When the dragon comes], then men will be afraid.
In these examples, the subordinate clause comes first and is introduced by a wh- word as clause
marker. The main clause starts with the th- counterpart to the wh- word, and serves to sum up
(recapitulate) the content of the subordinate clause.
We can also flip the order of main and subordinate clauses, although this is an un-idiomatic
construction in MnE, which would normally leave out the th- word in the main clause when
using this element order.
There men fear to tread, [where the dragon lives].
Then men will be afraid, [when the dragon comes].
In these examples, the th-word serves to alert us in advance (anticipate) that a clause is coming
up that will explain where “there” is or when “then” is. Notice that “there” and “then” are
adverbs and “where” and “when” are subordinating conjunctions introducing adverb clauses.
There is no problem figuring out that the wh- clause is an adverb clause, because the th- word
is a place-holder for it in the main clause.
In OE, this is the normal pattern for signaling the presence of a subordinate clause.
Identification is complicated somewhat by the fact that in OE the adverb in the main clause
and the subordinating conjunction are, more often than not, the same word. Here is how OE
would express the sentences from the examples above.
Subordinate clause first:
[ˇa se draca lif†], †a nilla† menn trædan
[ˇonne se draca cym†], †onne †olia† menn.
OEFR, p. 87
Main clause first:
ˇa nilla† menn trædan, [†a se wyrm lif†].
ˇonne †olia† menn, [†onne se wyrm cym†].
How, then, do we tell which is the main and which the subordinate clause? Usually, context
makes it reasonably certain which is which. There is a good syntactical rule of thumb, though,
as suggested by the examples above:
In the SUBORDINATE clause, the kernel elements come in the order SUBJECT-VERB.
In the MAIN clause, the kernel elements come in the order VERB-SUBJECT.
Althugh both of these are normal element orders for main clauses, when a pair of clauses are
correlated with matching adverbs/clause markers, OE authors normally contrast main and
subordinate by following this element-order rule.
Sometimes, though, it’s just impossible to tell, and Anglo-Saxonists have made whole careers
out of trying to discover rules and decide famous ambiguous cases.
We will meet other common correlating pairs of adverbs and subordinating conjunctions as
we read.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
subordination
correlation
dependent (subordinate) clause
independent (main) clause
governing clause
adverbial clauses
clause markers
subordinating conjunctions
anticipation
recapitulation
OEFR, p. 88
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Poet Cædmon, part 3
______________________________________________________________________
ˇa rehton heo him ond sægdon sum halig spell ond godcundre lare word: bebudon him
†a, gif he meahte, †æt he in swinsunge leo†songes †æt gehwyrfde. ˇa he ∂a hæfde †a wisan
onfongne, †a eode he ham to his huse ond cwom eft on morgenne ond †y betstan leo∂e
geglenged him asong ond ageaf †æt him beboden wæs. Îa ongan seo abbudisse clyppan ond
5
lufigean †a Godes gife in †æm men; ond heo hine †a monade ond lærde †æt he woruldhad
anforlete ond munuchad onfenge: ond he †æt wel †afode.
Ond heo hine in †æt mynster onfeng mid his godum, ond hine ge†eodde to gesomnunge
†ara Godes †eowa; ond heht hine læran †æt getæl †æs halgan stæres ond spelles. Ond he eal †a
he in gehyrnesse geleornian meahte mid hine gemyndgade ond swa swa clæne neten eodorcende
10
in †æt sweteste leo∂ gehwerfde; ond his song ond his leo∂ wæron swa wynsumu to gehyranne,
†ætte seolfan †a his lareowas æt his mu∂e wreoton ond leornodon. Song he ærest be
middangeardes gesceape ond bi fruman moncynnes ond eal †æt stær Genesis, †æt is seo æreste
Moyses boc; ond eft bi utgonge Israhela folces of Ægypta londe ond bi ingonge †æs
gehatlandes; ond bi o∂rum monegum spellum †æs halgan gewrites canones boca; ond bi Cristes
15
menniscnesse; ond bi his †rowunge; ond bi his upastignesse in heofonas; ond bi †æs Halgan
Gastes cyme, ond †ara apostola lare: ond eft bi †æm dæge †æs toweardan domes, ond bi fyrhtu
†æs tintreglican wiites, ond bi swetnesse †æs heofonlecan rices, he monig leo∂ geworhte. Ond
swelce eac o∂er monig be †æm godcundan fremsumnessum ond domum he geworhte.
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 89
Unit 9
Clauses as adjectival modifiers: relative clauses
Clauses as kernel items: noun clauses
______________________________________________________________________
Relative clauses
A clause that plays an adjective role in a governing clause is a relative clause. The clause
marker for a relative clause in MnE is a relative pronoun:
The dragon [who lives in the barrow]...
The hoard [that the dragon possesses]...
The cup, [which I borrowed from an apparently empty barrow,]...
In the above examples, the bracketed clauses are relative clauses, and who, that, and which
are relative pronouns.
The each relative clause is an adjectival modifier with a noun as its head. Dragon, hoard,
and cup are the noun heads in the above sentences. (The roles that those nouns are
playing in their {incomplete} main clauses don’t affect the way the relative clauses are set
up.) In traditional grammar, these noun heads are called the antecedents of their
respective relative pronouns. It makes sense to call attention in this way to the
relationship between the relative pronoun and the noun modified by the relative clause,
because the choice of a pronoun may depend on what the antecedent is. In MnE, for
example, we make a distinction between animate and inanimate antecedents when we
decide whether who is an appropriate way to start a relative clause.
______________________________________________________________________
“†e” as marker for relative clauses
In OE, the choice of marker for a relative clause is both simpler - we don’t have to decide
between who, which, and that - and more complicated. The basic marker for relative
clauses in OE is the indeclinable particle †e. Here are some relative clauses in which †e
marks the clause:
Se cyning [†e cwealde †one aglæcan] cwealde †one dracan.
The king [who slew the monster] slew the dragon.
Se draca [†e cwealde †one cyning] is mihtig.
The dragon [who slew the king] is mighty.
OEFR, p. 90
In both these examples, the antecedent is the subject of the main clause and the relative
particle also acts as subject within the relative clause. But these noun-roles can vary
independently of one another. In the following reshaping of the first example, the
antecedent has become the direct object in its main clause, but the relative clause remains
unchanged:
Se draca cwealde †one cyning [†e cwealde †one aglæcan].
The dragon slew the king [who slew the monster].
ˇone cyning takes its case (accusative) from its function in the main clause. In the relative
clause, †e doesn’t change form, because it is indeclinable, but we can tell from the case of
†one aglæcan that †e must be acting as the subject in the relative clause.
In the next example, the †e is acting as direct object in its clause, and we can tell that
because the dragon in the relative clause is nominative:
Se cyning [†e se draca cwealde] nas bli∂e.
The king [whom the dragon slew] was not happy.
In formal MnE, we make that clear by using whom, the objective case of the relative
pronoun.
______________________________________________________________________
The “se †e” relative
Sometimes it’s helpful or desirable to mark the case of the relative pronoun in OE, too.
The usual way to do that is to add the appropriate form of se before the †e. The form of
se will be chosen to reflect the gender and number of its antecedent and the case
demanded by its function in the relative clause. Adding se to the relative particle is
always an option and sometimes a necessity. Here are the examples from above
reconstructed with the se + †e form of the relative but with their meanings unchanged:
Se cyning [se †e cwealde †one aglæcan] cwealde †one dracan.
The king [who slew the monster] slew the dragon.
Se draca [se †e cwealde †one cyning] is mihtig.
The dragon [who slew the king] is mighty.
Se cyning [†one †e se draca cwealde] nas bli∂e.
The king [whom the dragon slew] was not happy.
OEFR, p. 91
If the antecedent is feminine, the feminine form of the pronoun must be used:
Seo hlæfdige [seo †e cwealde †one aglæcan] cwealde †one dracan.
The lady [who slew the monster] slew the dragon.
Likewise with the neuter, although the neuter is more likely to be followed by plain †e
(since neuter pronouns can’t help distinguish between nominative and accusative anyway).
______________________________________________________________________
When the relative pronoun plays a non-kernel role in its clause
The se + †e form of the relative is normally used when the relative plays a non-kernel role
in its clause, and so must be clearly marked as genitive or dative. Here the relative is
serving as indirect object in its own clause:
Se draca [†æm †e ic sælde †a boc] is bli∂e.
The dragon [to whom I gave the book] is happy.
Seo hlæfdige [†ære †e ic sælde †a boc] is bli∂u.
The lady [to whom I gave the book] is happy.
And here the relative is in the genitive in its own clause:
ˇa leode [†ara †e cyning cwælde †one dracan] is bli∂e.
The people [whose king killed the dragon] are happy.
______________________________________________________________________
Noun clauses
Noun clauses (also called substantive clauses) fulfill noun kernel roles. They include
clauses in which a relative clause behaves like a substantive adjective, clauses that give the
content of a thought, saying, command, or question, and clauses marked by †æt that serve
as subjects or subject complements.
______________________________________________________________________
Relative clauses as substantives
Just as adjectives without noun heads can act like nouns, relative clauses, which are
usually adjectival, may act as noun clauses – normally as the subject of the sentence.
Example:
OEFR, p. 92
[Se †e cwella† †one dracan] bi† se cyning.
[He who slays the dragon] will be king.
______________________________________________________________________
Noun clauses expressing the content of commands
One form of noun clause is the accusative-and-infinitive construction that you learned in
Unit 7. The accusative-and-infinitive clause does not have a clause marker in the normal
sense, but the presence of the accusative and infinitive forms marks out the clause as a
unit. The content of a command may also be expressed by a clause introduced by †æt.
Such clauses are called "indirect commands" in traditional grammar. The verb in an
indirect command is often in the subjunctive, the forms of which we will learn in the
next unit. Here's an example, which you can compare to the examples of accusative +
infinitive in Unit 7:
Se cyning heht †æt se guma feohte modiglice.
The king ordered that the warrior fight bravely.
A verb of command creates the expectation of a noun clause expressing the content of the
command, which may be of the †æt type or of the accusative-and-infinitive type.
______________________________________________________________________
More †æt clauses
Noun clauses introduced by †æt may also be the objects of verbs of saying, thinking,
knowing, discovering, etc. The opening of The Battle of Maldon, which you will start
reading this lesson, provides a good example:
...†æt Offan mæg ærest onfunde, [†æt se eorl nolde ierg†e ge†olian]...
...Offa's kinsman first found [that the leader would not tolerate slackness]...
(literally:) Offa's kinsman first found that, [that the leader would not tolerate slackness]
Note that not only is the noun clause introduced by †æt, but there is another †æt in the
main clause. The pronoun †æt in the main clause serves a similar function to the adverb
that signals that an adverb clause is coming up, which we studied in the last unit. Here,
the †æt in the main clause stands in for the direct object of the verb onfunde ("found") and
anticipates that a clause is coming up that will specify just what it was that Offa's kinsman
found: "Offa's kinsman found that, (namely) [that the leader would not tolerate
slackness]." You will also find many instances in which the noun clause comes first and
another †æt appears later, to recapitulate the noun clause and remind us that we saw it
recently.
A †æt clause can also be the subject of an impersonal verb of “happening” or “befalling”
OEFR, p. 93
or related meanings:
Gelamp [†æt se draca awehte].
It happened that the dragon awoke.
In MnE, we use a “dummy subject”, it, to hold the place of the subject when a clause is
the subject of an impersonal verb. The “it” in MnE here serves an anticipatory function
familiar to you from OE correlated adverb clauses and from the example from Maldon on
the previous page. You can prove to yourself that the clause is really the subject of the
verb gelimpan in this example if you ask yourself the question, “What happened?” Answer:
the dragon awoke.
______________________________________________________________________
Indirect questions
A noun clause introduced by a question word (a hw- interrogative) is called an indirect
question. An indirect question is normally the object of a verb of asking, knowing, etc.
Examples:
Se cyning cann [hwæt se draca hyg†].
The king knows [what the dragon is thinking]
Se cyning acsode [hwær se draca lifode]
The king asked [where the dragon lived].
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
noun clauses
adjectival clauses
substantive (noun) relative clauses
relative clauses
indirect commands
relative conjunction
indirect questions
relative particle
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Battle of Maldon
Read and translate the first 16 lines of The Battle of Maldon from Pope, Eight Old English
Poems. Use the glossary in Pope.
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 94
Unit 10
Mood
The Subjunctive
The Imperative
______________________________________________________________________
The verb forms with personal endings that we have studied throughout this book have so
far been in the indicative mood. “Mood” comes from the OE word mod “mind”, and it is
so called because, in principle, it signals the attitude of the speaker or narrator to the
reality of the idea expressed in the verb. The subjunctive mood is used in OE – and still
to some extent in MnE – for verbal ideas that are unreal, potential, wished-for, or
conditional. That sounds fairly abstract, but we can illustrate the distinction between real
and unreal – indicative and subjunctive – verbal ideas with some MnE examples. Focus
here on the meaning of the verbal phrases, not the specific forms of the verbs.
Indicative verbal ideas:
I am eating cake.
I love cake.
She hated cake.
Subjunctive verbal ideas:
I might eat some cake.
Oh, that I could have some cake!
If I ate cake, I would be sick.
She would have hated this cake if she had been here to taste it.
Let them eat cake!
Note that the first batch of examples contains verbal ideas that are real or factual from the
speaker’s point of view. The second batch contains verbal ideas that are hoped for or
conditional or might have happened in the past, but didn’t. MnE generally expresses
these latter ideas, the subjunctive ones, with a variety of auxiliary (helping) verbs, like
might, may, would, etc. You may recognize these as descendents of the OE preteritepresent verbs, most of which express an intention or state of mind on the part of the
subject.
Instead of mainly using auxiliaries to express subjunctive ideas, OE had a special set of
verb endings to mark the verb as subjunctive. Usually, OE uses these special verb forms
to convey subjunctive verbal ideas. But the inflected, one-word subjunctive verb was
already starting to die out in OE, so you will find as you read that the subjunctive is
relatively rare. You will also find constructions with the preterite-present verbs as
OEFR, p. 95
auxiliaries that look much like the comparable MnE constructions and express
subjunctive-like ideas. The rules for where the subjunctive gets used in OE are not nearly
as hard-and-fast as they are, for example, in Latin, and so the subjunctive is not normally
a crucial clue in determining what kind of clause you are looking at. In reading, you
should be alert to subjunctive forms and translate the verb appropriately according to
context. We will practice doing this as we read.
The forms of the inflected subjunctive are very easy: the whole singular ends in -e and
the whole plural ends in -en. In the present tense, these are added to the root; in the
preterite, they are added after the dental suffix (for weak verbs) or to the appropriate
preterite stem (for strong verbs).
______________________________________________________________________
The Imperative
The imperative mood is used for direct commands: Do this! Eat that!
If command is addressed to one person, the imperative verb ends in -e or -a or has no
ending. If the command is addressed to multiple people, the imperative ends in -a†.
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
mood
Forms
Formation of subjunctive
Formation of imperative
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Battle of Maldon
Read and translate lines 17-41 of The Battle of Maldon.
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 96
Unit 11
More adverbial clauses:
causal clauses
purpose clauses
result clauses
conditional clauses
______________________________________________________________________
A causal clause answers the adverbial question ”why?” and is introduced by a word
meaning “because”. In OE, causal clauses are usually introduced by the compound
conjunction for†on †e or a variant.
Wæs se guma bli†e, [for†on †e he cu†e cwellan †one dracan].
The warrior was happy [because he knew how to kill the dragon].
Often, for†on also appears in the main clause as an adverb, signaling that a cause will be
explained in an adjacent clause:
For†on wæs se guma bli†e, for†on †e he cu†e cwellan †one dracan.
The warrior was happy for that reason, (namely) because he knew how to kill the dragon.
______________________________________________________________________
A purpose clause is one that answers the adverbial questions “to what end?” or “for what
purpose?” In MnE, purpose clauses are introduced by “so that”. In OE, purpose clauses
are introduced by †æt “so that” and negative purpose clauses are introduced by †y læs †e
“lest”. The verb in the purpose clause is normally in the subjunctive.
Brohte se guma his sweord [†æt he †one dracan cwelle].
The warrior brought his sword [so that he might kill the dragon].
Brohte se guma his sweord [†y læs †e se draca hine cwelle].
The warrior brought his sword[lest the dragon kill him].
______________________________________________________________________
A result clause shows the result of the action or situation described in the main clause. In
MnE, the result clause is introduced by “that” or “so that”, and there is very often a “so”
in the main clause to signal that a result clause is coming. OE uses similar markers:
OEFR, p. 97
Wæs se guma swa modig [†æt he gealp].
The warrior was so bold [that he boasted].
______________________________________________________________________
Conditional clauses are those of the “if...then” type. The clause with the “if” in it is the
subordinate clause, and the “then” clause is the main clause. In OE, “if” is gif. In this
example, the subjunctive occurs in both halves of the condition:
“Gif se draca me cwelle, scopas me herien.”
“If the dragon should kill me, let bards praise me.”
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Summary
______________________________________________________________________
Terms and concepts
causal clauses
purpose clauses
result clauses
conditional clauses
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Reading: The Battle of Maldon
Read and translate lines 42-83 of The Battle of Maldon.
______________________________________________________________________
OEFR, p. 98
______________________________________________________________________
Vocabulary for The Poet Cædmon (in alphabetic order)
abbudisse
ac
agiefan
anforlætan
apostola
arfæstnis
asingan
asong (see asingan)
ateon
atuge (see ateon)
aweccan
awehte (see aweccan)
abbess
but
give back
abandon, renounce
apostle (gen sg)
piety
recite
æfæst
ærest
ætgædere
ætsomne
pious
first
together
together
bearn
bebeodan
becuman
gebeorscipe
beran
betynan
bidan
biddan
gebiddan
bilewit
bocere
child
command, commend
come
feast, beer party
carry, bring, bear
close, conclude
await
bid
pray
innocent
scholar
canon
(ge)ceosan
gecoren (past pple of geceosan)
clyppan
cwe∂an
cyme
canon
choose
draw, unsheathe
awaken, arouse
embrace
say
coming, arrival
OEFR, p. 99
cy∂an
reveal, make known, inform
gedafenian
dæd
deman
befit
deed
judge, deem
eac
eal
ealdormon
ea∂modlice
ece
efne
eft
Egipte
ellenwodnis
endebyrdnes
geendian
Engliscgereord
eodorcan
also, and
all
overseer, superior
humbly
eternal, everlasting
even, only
again, afterwards, thereupon, back
Egyptians
zeal
order, succession, sequence
end, complete (verb)
the English language (English + voice)
chew the cud
fæc
fæger
gefeon
feor
feowertyne
fers
firas
folde
for
forgiefan
forhodgnis
for hwon
forlætan
for †on, for†on
fremsumnes
frignan
fruma
frumsceaft
fultumian
interval
beautiful, pleasant
rejoice
far
fourteen
verse (here pl.)
people, human beings
earth, ground
for, because of, before
give
contempt
why
abandon, neglect, forsake, let go
because, therefore, and so, wherefore, for that reason
benefit
ask, inquire
beginning
first creation, genesis
help, support (verb)
OEFR, p. 100
fyrhtu
fear, horror
ge ... ge
gegearwian
geman
geornfulnes
geornlice
glædlice
glengan
gleowian
godcund
gongan
gretan
gyt
both... and
prepare
take heed
desire
eagerly, zealously
joyfully
adorn
make merry, joke
religious, divine
go, walk
greet, touch, approach
yet, still
halettan
halwende
gehatland
hefigan
heord
herenes
herigean
hluttor
hrof
gehwa
hwæthwugu
hwæ†ere, hwæ∂re
hwelc
gehwierfan
hwonon
hail
salutary, saving
promised land
weigh down
care, custody
praise (noun)
praise (verb)
pure
roof
each, everyone
something
however, nevertheless, yet, but
which, what kind of
turn
whence
idel
ilce
inbryrdnes
ingong
inlædan
inne
intinga
Israhelas
idle, worthless, vain
same, the same
inspiration
immigration, entry
bring in
inside, within
cause
Israelites; Israhela (gen pl)
OEFR, p. 101
lareow
gelædan
læran
gelæran
leasung
leornere
leof
(ge)leornian
leo∂
lim
gelimplic
lof
lufu
gelyfed
teacher
lead
teach, admonish
teach, advise, urge
lying, fable, fiction
scholar
dear, beloved
learn, study
song, poem, poetry
limb; leomu (acc pl)
suitable
praise
love (noun)
advanced
mancynn
manian
mæst
medmicel
menniscnis
gemet
gemetlice
micel
mid †y
middangeard
middeneaht
miht
mod
modge†anc
monade (see manian)
munuchad
gemynd
gemyndgian
mynstre
mankind
exhort, urge, admonish
most, greatest
moderate, brief
incarnation
measure, meter
moderately
great, large, much
when
world, middle earth
midnight
might, power; meahte (acc sing)
spirit, courage, mind
mind-thought, conception, purpose
nales
nanwuht
næfre
nænig
not at all
nothing
never
none, no one (ne + ænig)
monastic orders
mind, remembrance
remember
church, monastery; mynster (acc sing)
OEFR, p. 102
neah
neahte (dat., gen. sg. of niht)
nealecan
nemnan
nealecan
neat n noun:
nieten, neten
neawest
nu
near, imminent
onbærnan
ondweard
him ondweardum
onfon
onfeng (pret. of onfon)
onfongne (past pple of onfon)
Ongel†eode
onginnan
onslepan
onstellan
or
o†
o∂∂e
kindle, inspire
present
they being present; in their presence
recieve, accept, take up
ræran
reccan
rest
gerestan
gerisenlic
gerisenlice
lift up, offer up
explain, relate
rest, resting place (noun)
rest (verb)
fitting, proper
fittingly, properly
gesceap
Scyppend
scipen
scomu
scopgereord
se ∂e
is gesegen
(ge)settan
creation (noun)
God, the Creator
shed (noun)
shame
poetic language (lit. bard + voice)
he who
seems (lit. “is seen”; translating Lat. videtur)
set, put, set out, go, set down, compose, establish
draw near
call, name
draw near
cattle
beast, cattle
neighbourhood
now, now that; just now
the English people, England
begin
fall asleep
establish
beginning (noun)
up to, as far as, until (preposition)
or
OEFR, p. 103
gesih∂
gesomnian
gesomnung
sona
spell
sprecan
stæf
stær
stilnes
stow
sum
swa
swa hwæt swa
swa swa
swa †ætte
swefn
swelce, swylce
swelce eac, eac swelce swa
swinsung
symbel
syndriglice
sight, vision, presence
gather, assemble
gathering, community
immediately
story, message
speak, say
letter (of the alphabet)
history
peace
place
a certain, some
thus, so (adv.) as, when (clause marker)
whatsoever (pronoun)
just as (clause marker)
so that (clause marker)
dream
likewise
also likewise, moreover
melody
feast
individually, seperately, especially
getæl
teala
teon
tid
tintreglic
toge†eodan
toweard
getrymman
tungerefa
†afian
†eaw
†eodscipe
ge†eodan
ge†eodnis
†eow
†eowan
†rowung
account, sequence
well, so, good
adorn
time
tormenting (adj.)
add
coming, future (adj.)
strengthen
steward, overseer of an estate
receive
custom, practice
discipline; fellowship
join
joining?, attachment? (= under†eodness submission?)
servant, slave
serve
passion, suffering
OEFR, p. 104
uhtsong
under†eodan
upastignes
utgong
matins (lit. dawn-song)
subject, devote (verb)
ascension
exodus, emigration
Weard
weor∂
weor∂an
geweor†ian
weoruldhad
wilsumnes
gewis
wise
witan
wuton
gewitan
writan
gewrit
wrixendlice
Wuldorfæder
wundor
wundrian
gewunian
wynsum
guardian
worthy, dear, valuable
become, happen; geworden past ptc
respect, honor; geweor†ad past ptc
secular life
devotion
aware
way, manner, wise
know; wiston pret. pl.
let us
depart; gewat pret. sg.
write; wreoton pret.
writing, writ, scripture (noun)
in turn
Father of Glory (God) (gen sing)
miracle, wonder
wonder, marvel at
remain, be accustomed to
delightful
yldu
age, old age
OEFR, p. 105
Collected Unit Vocabulary
Weak Nouns
weak masculine
se aglæca
se anwealda
se bana
se boda
se boga
se gefera
se fe∂a
se frea
se geleafa
se Gota
se guma
se lichama
se mona
se nama
se oxa
se papa
se scima
se sefa
se wræcca
definition
combatant, belligerent, monster
lord, ruler ("one" + "ruler")
slayer
messenger
bow
companion
foot-troop, infantry
lord, master, The Lord
belief, faith
Goth
man, warrior
body
mona
name
ox
Pope
light, radiance
heart, mind
wanderer, exile
weak neuter
†æt eage
†æt eare
†æt wange
eye
ear
cheek, jaw
weak feminine
seo byrne
seo cirice
seo eor∂e
seo heorte
seo hlæfdige
seo sunne
corselet, mail coat
church
earth
heart
lady
sun
OEFR, p. 106
Strong Nouns
strong masculine
se a†
se bearo
se cyning
se dæg
se deofol
se dom
se ende
se engel
se eoh
se feoh
se fugol
se God
se hæle†
se here
se mann
se mearh
se meotod
se mona†
se munuc
se scoh
se sige
se stan
se stede
se wealh
se wer
se wine
definition
oath
grove
king
day
devil
judgement, glory, reputation
end
angel
horse
money
bird
(Christian) God
hero, warrior
army
man
horse
creator
month
monk
shoe
victory
stone
place
foreigner, stranger, slave, Welshman
man
friend
strong neuter
†æt cild
†æt fæt
†æt god
†æt gear
†æt heafod
†æt rice
†æt scip
child
vessel
(pagan) god
year
head
kingdom
ship
OEFR, p. 107
†æt spere
†æt wæter
†æt werod
†æt wite
spear
water
troop
punishment, torment
strong feminine
seo boc
seo giefu
seo lar
†a leode (plural only)
seo spræce
seo stow
book
gift
teaching, doctrine
people
speech
place
Adjectives
definition
æ∂ele
an
ana
anræd
begen
bli∂e
blodig
brad
eadig
eadmod
earm
eald
ece
fæst
forma
god
hlud
hold
lang
lytel
noble
one
alone
singleminded, resolute
both
happy, cheerful, friendly
bloody
broad, wide, spacious
blessed
humble
poor, wretched
old, ancient
eternal
firm, fixed ("hold fast"
first
good
{Note: the adjective gòd has a long ò;
the noun god "God" has a short o.}
loud
loyal
long, tall
little
OEFR, p. 108
micel
mihtig
o†er
re†e
snotor
so†
swi†
twegen
wid
yfel
ylca
big, great, large, much
mighty, powerful
second
fierce, cruel, harsh
wise
true
mighty
two
broad, wide
evil
same
Weak Verbs
Class 1
awendan
deman
feran
fremman
hieran
geliefan (look up liefan)
læran
nerian
rædan
ræran
sendan
settan
tæcan
tæcnan
wenan
wendan
werian
definition
translate
judge
set out, proceed, go
do, accomplish
hear, obey
believe
teach
save, protect
read, instruct, give counsel
lift up, offer up
send
put, establish, set, appoint
teach, show, direct
point out, signify, direct
think, expect
go, turn, wend one's way
defend, protect
OEFR, p. 109
Class 1 w/vowel change
brengan
bycgan
cwellan
reccan
secan
sellan
†encan
†yncan
wyrcan
definition
bring
buy
kill
care about, explain, relate
seek
give, sell
think, intend
seem
make, form, produce
Class 2
clypian
fæstnian
halgian
halian
hergian
lufian
locian
namian
ricsian
si∂ian
†rowian
weor†ian
wunian
wundrian
definition
call
make fast, establish
hallow, consecrate
heal
harry, devastate
love
look
name
reign
travel
suffer
honor, respect, worship
dwell
wonder, marvel at
Class 3
habban
hycgan
libban
secgan
definition
have
think
live
say
OEFR, p. 110
Strong Verbs
Class I
scìnan
shine
Class II
crèopan
brùcon
creep
enjoy
Class III
bregdan
helpan
beorcan
gielpan
drincan
gelimpan
weor†an
shake
help
bark
boast
drink
happen, befall
become
Class IV
beran
bear
Class V
sprecan
tredan
speak, say
tread on, trample
Class VI
faran
slean
go
strike, beat, attack
Class VII
healdan
hatan
hold
order, be called
Adverbs
hra†e
wide and side
a
ær
ea∂e
innan
neah
nu
oft
symble
†a
swiftly
far and wide
forever
earlier, previously
easily
from within
near
now
often
always, unceasingly
then
OEFR, p. 111
†ær
upp
utan
wel
there
up
from without
well
Prepositions
These prepositions normally take the dative:
æfter
ær
æt
be
beforan
betweox
butan
for
fram
mid
of
ongean
togeanes
after, along, according to
before
at, from, by
by, along, alongside, about
before, in front of
between, among
except, without
before, in front of, because of
from, by
with, among, by means of
from, of
against, towards
against, towards
These prepositions normally take the accusative:
geond
o†
†urh
ymb
throughout
up to, until
through
around
These prepositions take different cases and, where noted, the meaning varies with the
case:
in
on
to
under
wi†
in (dat.); into (acc.)
in, on (dat.); into (acc.)
at, for (gen.); towards, to, at, near, as (dat.)
under, beneath (dat.); with sense of movement (acc.)
against (acc., gen., dat.)