On Sat, Mar 30, 2002 at 12:43:15PM -0500, BombadilAslan@... wrote:
>
> I started going over the early lessons trying to find out how you would use
> names in conjunction with nouns. for example alfr means "an Elf" I'm
> trying to create Character names in a book for a race of alien beings that
> formed the factual basis for legends about Elves and I'm gfiving them Norse
> names. The very first Elf in history is called "Alfr" but I'm having trouble
> figuring out how to say "Elf" when "Alfr" means "An Elf" second, his first
> son has his name, but what to call his first daughter? I wanted to use the
> word for "Girl" but I couldn't find an English to norse dictionary that would
> tell me how to decline the word for use as a proper name rather than a word
> that means "A girl" Can anyone help me, since english-Norse dictionaries seem
> to be a bit scarce?
What makes you think that a person named Alfr should have his name declined
differently than the same word when used as an ordinary noun meaning elf?
It sounds like you are confused about the indefinite article. Alfr means
both "elf" and "an elf" depending on context; basically English makes
a distinction between the 2 that Icelandic doesn't make. At least, that's
the simple explanation; I'll leave the complex one for Haukur (whose name
means "hawk" or "a hawk", by the way).
At any rate, the word will decline the same way whether or not it's used
as a name. "The elf" would be different, but only because "the" is a suffix
(tacked to the end of the word) and declined itself.
What word are you trying to use for girl? I found a couple in an Icelandic
dictionary, but I don't know whether they'd have been in use in Old Icelandic.
--
Arlie
(Arlie Stephens arlie@...)