At 15:01 25.1.2001 EST, you wrote:

>As speakers of modern English might look upon reproducing the actual sounds
> However, this says more about us and our own
>attitudes rather than on how earlier people felt about their language, or
>about how it actually may have sounded.

While looking for an analogy for Old Norse/Modern Icelandic I was
actually tempted to say "Shakespeare English/Modern English. I didn't
dare, because I feared that our teachers would say: "Við Haukr munum
vega Eystein. Eysteinn er feigr. Vega munum við hann." These guys are
lethal! (... and will spot the NON-FATAL error in this sentence, to be
sure, as you will, as well ...)

We really have only a VERY ROUGH idea of how Snorri would actually
have pronounced his vowels. (Óskar may disagree.)

>In Modern Icelandic the difference between "ei" and "é" is
>ROUGHLY the difference between the vowel sounds (in American
>English) in "bait" and "beer".

>This approximation helps, thanks.

Evidence from Modern Icelandic ALWAYS helps. I've been trying
to state so, but I'm not sure all would agree. Come on, were
in a group where some members would rather write @ than ö. And
others, ae rather than æ. Such preferences have more to do with
personal opinions than facts. I wish I could change the facts,
but I'm afraid I cannot.

A school of thought which insists on reconstrued "ON sounds"
is fine with me, but it is simply a theory, and a not very
useful theory at that, and ABSOLUTELY IMPRACTICAL. We're much
better off with the "old-fashioned" method, actually.

Eysteinn