Thank you again for all of your research! I am very greatful.
You have made it easy to understand and also very interesting!
The Society College of Heralds should have no problem passing my
name. They require quite a bit of historical information in your name
submission. With everything I have recieved here so far I think I am
set.
Many Thanks and Blessings,
Stiarna Gythjudottir

--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "llama_nom" <600cell@...> wrote:
> --- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "akoddsson"
> <konrad_oddsson@...> wrote:
>
> > ea-to-ia before 900 (as above and as you show in your citations
of
> > 9th cent.
>
>
> Do we have any indication as to how long before 900?
>
>
> > --- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "laurenmur913"
> > <laurenmur913@...> wrote:
>
> > Wow, you know your stuff.
>
>
> Don't be too sure of that! Konrad knows much more about this area
> than me.
>
>
> > As I mentioned, I am very new to this. Is
> there a way to write the last name out in a more english spelling?
> And could you also maybe spell it out phoneticly for me? I found
some
> info on Stjarna, for star. I found a great site that even helps with
> the pronunciation. As for the characters, I do not recognize some of
> the ones you have provided so I am unsure how that would be said.
>
>
> The address here is a site with system for representing phonetic
> symbols with computers. This will probably seem MORE complicated
at
> first, but at least it avoids the confusion and ambiguity of trying
> to indicate pronunciation of foreign sounds with English
conventions.
>
> http://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/home/sampa/home.htm
>
>
> Stjarna Gyðjudóttir
> Icelandic spelling. In this case, identical for Modern Icelandic
> and standardised Old Norse.
> 1. Old Norse (13th c. reconstructed pronunciation)
> [stjarna gyDjUdo:ttIr]--[j] = English <y> in 'yes'; [y] = French
<u>
> in 'fumer'; [U] = Northern British English <u> in 'gulp'; [o:] =
> German <o> in 'tot'; [i] = English <i> in 'bit'; vowels all keep
> their distinct quality, even in unstressed positions; and see
> further explanation below.
> 2. Modern Icelandic [stjatna cIDjYtouhtIr]--explanation on demand!
>
>
> Stiarna GyþjudóttiR
> This I think is how the name might be transcribed if it had
appeared
> in a Swedish runic inscription of the 9th century. The
> pronunciation would be similar to the Old Norse reconstructed one
> above, except that <ia> is a falling diphthong, that is with the
> emphasis on the first vowel <i>. The sampa symbol [D] is the sound
> of <th> in English <the>. The <tt> was pronounced double, as in
> modern Swedish or Italian. Think of English 'part-time'. I'm not
> sure of the exact quality of the unstressed vowels, but presumably
> something not too distant from this. According to
> Gordon's "Introduction to Old Norse", medieval Swedish manuscripts
> show a more careful system of vowel harmony than is usual in West
> Norse, but I'm not qualified to comment on that.
>
> The final <R> is somewhere between [r] and [Z], as mentioned.
Maybe
> pronounced like the Czech 'r' with a little upsidedown 'v' on top.
> Or like the <s> in 'pleasure' but with a hint of [r]. Or like the
> final sound you might hear in some Scottish pronunciations of
> e.g. 'furs', 'hairs'. Of course, no one knows exactly, but there
> are clues in the way it affected nearby vowels (suggesting a
palatal
> sound) and in the way it developed later, eventually becoming
> confused with /r/.
>
> To spell the name with English letters, you could go with either
> Gythju- or Gydju-. The former might be a good idea because it
makes
> the sound clear to English speakers. The latter is perfectly
> acceptable though and unambiguous in terms of the Norse sound
> system. It's generally used in modern translations from Old
Norse.
> In fact some medieval manuscripts use <d> where modern editions
> print <ð>. The marking of long vowels was very inconsistent in old
> manuscripts, and wasn't a feature of runic orthography of the 9th
> century. Konrad has suggested (for writing Proto Norse) using <z>
> for the phoneme usually transcribed as <R>. That's one
possibility:
> Stiarna Gythjudottiz? Or if that looks too bizarre you could
> (anachronistically) use the later spelling and just remember that
it
> was pronounced more like 'rz'. Or insist on runes... Speaking of
> which:
>
> http://www.arild-hauge.com/sruner.htm
>
> Llama Nom