--- In norse_course@egroups.com, tsdoughty@... wrote:

> "Note that ON has different words for the English concept "know";
> "kenna"above indicates familiarity, while "vita", mentioned above,

is

> the"absolute" knowing, i.e. it means awareness of a fact or event."
>
> Is this a close parallel with Mod German kennen/wissen, or are

there

> important diferences?
>
> Tim

I always assume that the Old Norse words mean the same
thing as they do in modern Norse. This is of course a weakness
as well as a strength. The strength is that I can then quickly
grasp Old Norse words, because I feel they are the same ones
I use every day. The weakness is that when words have changed
their meaning in the intervening 800 years, then I may misinterpret.

With respect to "kenna", this corresponds to modern Norwegian
å kjenne, and means "to be informed" or "to have information"
about something. Also to know a person.

"kjenner du den og den" - do you know that person?
But:
"kjenner du at kaffen er varm?" - do you FEEL that the coffee is warm?
On the other hand, you can also know something, without
necessarily feeling it:
"vet du at kaffen er varm?" -- do you know that the coffee is hot?

I could go on with many examples like that.
But let me translate the 3 sentences I gave as example to German:
"Kennst du ihm?" -- do you know him?
"spürst du dass der Kaffee heiss ist?" - can you feel that the coffee
is hot?
"weisst du dass der Kaffee heiss ist?" -- do you know that the coffe
is hot?

So usuage is not EXACTLY the same in Norwegian and German.
That is of course a difficulty, that words do not always overlap 100%.
As a generalisation one might perhaps say that "kjenne" is
like French "sentir" or "connoir", but "vita" is more like "savoir".

But you ask about Old Norse relative to German.
Fortunately I happen to have a small Edda dictionary
that goes from OLd Norse to German. For "kenna" it has
the meanings:
1)kennen
2)erkennen
3)kennen lernen
4)prüfen, erproben
5)fühlen empfinden
6)jmd etw. angeben, anzeigen, bezeichnen
7)jmd etw. lehren
8)jmd etw. nennen
9)etw. nach jmd benennen
10)jmd etw. anrechnen, zuschreiben
11)jmd etw. zur last legen
12)gebären

Hm.. that sounds complicated! :)
And accordingly I'll just state that this is a complicated
word whose nuances are not easily explained to the user
of another language.

Norw. to German dictionary gives:
kjenne =
1) kennen, erkennen 2) fühlen, empfinden
3)jur. entscheiden, erklären, befinden.

But these short indications of meanings are filled
out with many phrases and examples of usage, so that
the whole word fills more than a whole column of small
print.

vite=
wissen, kennen; verstehen; erfahren
And then nearly a whole column again of phrases and examples of usage.

But these things are not really so very difficult once you
know the languages! It is just that I don't know how to
explain it in a few words...

I remember that in Holland many had difficulties to distinguish
between "kennen" and "kunnen", which in Germany would be
"kennen" und "können". But perhaps German kids do not find
that difficult at all! And maybe I find it easy because
I just compare with Norwegain "kjenne" og "kunne".
(the first is more like feeling something, and the second
is something you can do)
But I do not recall anybody ever having difficulties with
"kennen" versus "weten".
Maybe "wissen" is more like a fluid inside your brain,
whereas "kennen" is more like something in the air around you.
That's about as close as I can get, and there may even be
many exceptions that I didn't think of.


My advice would be not to worry too much about the exact
"meaning" of words that have such long definitions in
the dictionaries. Just get a very rough and approximate
sense of what it means, and then as you read, you will
by and by discover the right usage. And if you are in
doubt about a particular meaning, you can always use
the dictionary!

Keth