Re: Old Norse in English

Hi Xigung

With respect to Thursday, Baugh puts it in the class of words where the
Anglo-Saxon word Thunresdæg was modified, taking on some of the
character of the Norse word.

While the Cambridge Encyclopedia listed silver or knife in its list of
examples of words of Norse origin, Baugh doesn´t so you may well have a
point. My lack of knowledge in these matters means I am unable to give
any informed opinion of my own.

Cheers
Alysseann

-----Original Message-----
From: xigung [mailto:xigung@...]
Sent: Thursday, 22 January 2004 4:19 AM
To: norse_course@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [norse_course] Re: Old Norse in English

Hi,
Concerning some of the mentioned words:

I am a bit uncertain about "knife", because I saw
the other day that Dutch also has "knijf" in addition
to "mes". The Dutch "ij" developed systematically from
the previous long "i", hence we expect a previous Dutch
'kniif".

"Silver" I also suspect of being another common Germanic
word. e.g. German silber and Dutch zilver. ON silfr.

With respect to Thursday, Dutch has donderdag,
and German Donnerstag. Old English had dunor m.
for thunder, Dutch donder and German Donner.
OE also has Ður for the god of thunder, which
is supposed to have been borrowed from Danish.
Had the Anglo-Saxons forgotten about the old
thundergod Donar, and thus had to reimport him
from the Danes?


Regards
Xigung

--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, pdhanssen@... wrote:
>
> There's a book entitled "The Viking Legacy" by Geipel
> dealing with the Norse contribution/influence to the English language.
>
>
>
>
> In a message dated 1/17/2004 1:04:37 AM Eastern Standard Time,
athompso@... writes:
>
> >
> >
> > The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language (Ed. David
Crystal)
> > claims that, quote, "many general words (of Norse origin) entered
the
> > language, nearly 1,000 eventually becoming part of Standard English.
> > Only c. 150 of these words appear in Old English manuscripts, the
> > earliest in the treaty between Alfred and Guthrum, and in the
northern
> > manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. They include landing,
score,
> > beck fellow, take, husting and steersman, as well as many words
which
> > did not survive in later English )mostly terms to do with Danish
law and
> > culture, which died away after the Norman Conquest. The vast
majority of
> > loans do not begin to appear until the early 12th century. These
include
> > many of our modern words which use sk- sounds (an Old Norse
feature),
> > such as skirt, sky and skin, as well as most of the words listed
below.
> > The closeness of the contact between the Anglo-Saxons and the Danish
> > settlers is clearly shown by the extensive borrowings. Some of the
> > commonest words in Modern English came into the language at that
time,
> > such as both, same, get and give. Even the personal pronoun system
was
> > affected, with they, them and their replacing the earlier forms.
And the
> > most remarkable invasion of all - Old Norse influenced the verb to
be.
> > The replacement of sindon by are is almost certainly the result of
> > Scandinavian influence, as is the spread of the third person
singular -s
> > ending in the present tense of other verbs.
> >
> > A few more Norse loans...again, anger, awkward, bag, band, bank,
birth,
> > brink, bull, cake, call, clip, crawl, crook, die, dirt, dregs, egg,
> > flat, fog, freckle, gap, gasp, get, guess, happy, husband, ill,
keel,
> > kid, knife, law, leg, loan, low, muggy, neck, odd, outlaw, race,
raise,
> > ransack, reindeer, rid, root, rugged, scant, scare, scowl, scrap,
seat,
> > seem, silver, sister, skill, skirt, sly, smile, snub, sprint, steak,
> > take, thrift, Thursday, tight, trust, want, weak, window"
> >
> > While the Encyclopedia says nearly 1,000 words, A.C. Baugh in A
History
> > of the English Language suggests that while about this number of
words
> > are of almost certain Norse origin, at least as many again are of
> > probable Norse origin.
> >
> > I hope this helps
> >
> > -Alyssean



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