--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "kunphuzil" <kunphuzil@...>
wrote:

>
> I have begun to look through the Grammar charts and word entry's

in "A

> Concise Dictionary of Old Icelandic" by Geir T. Zoëga but have

become

> confused with the syntax of the entries. For example, the entry for
> 'ormr':
>
> ormr (-s, -ar), m. snake, serpent.
>
> So, I would assume that this would then belong to the "Strong
> Masculine 1st Declension" group, because that is titled with "1st
> Declension, gen. sing. -s, nom. pl. -ar, acc. pl. -a."

That's right. Another way of describing this declension which you
may come across in some books is "a-stem", because in Proto Germanic
these words had /a/ between the root and the case endings, *wurm-a-z

> ON ormr.




>
> I do not understand why Zoëga did not then just list it as
>
> ormr (1st), m. snake, serpent
>
> But I digress. The entry for 'fors':
>
> fors (pl. -ar), m. waterfall.
>
> Now, which declension is one to assume this noun belongs to?

The same as 'ormr', except that the genitive is just 'fors' like the
nominative.

>
> As well, are nouns whose entries are listed simply as
>
> noun, gender. definition.
>
> in the "weak declension" category?

I think that's right. But you can be sure if a noun is listed as
masculine and ends in -i in the nominative singular, it will be
weak. Likewise if a noun is listed as feminine or neuter and ends
in -a in the nominative singular.

These should be regular unless otherwise noted by Zoega. If you
look up 'vili', you'll see it has after it (gen. vilja). Such nouns
have -j- before all the usual weak endings except the nominative
singular:

nom. vili viljar
acc. vilja vilja
dat. vilja viljum
gen. vilja vilja

> What is more is that there seems to be no explanation for
> abbreviations, such as "pr." and "pp." or "p."

pp. "past participle" Could you post examples of the others?

> Also, charts for weak/strong verbs and their classes/declensions

are

> given, but how does the entry of a verb indicate which it belongs

to?



Some tips:

(að) means like 'kalla' (called 1nd conjugation by Zoega, but 2nd in
Gordon's Introduction to Old Norse, and usually 2nd in books on
other old Germanic languages such as Old English and Old Norse).

(ta, tr) or (ða, ðr) or (Cða, Cðr), where C = a consonant, or (dda,
ddr), or the verb written out in full with to show vowel mutation or
lack of it + endings such as these, means like 'doema', 'fylgja' (if
the root is long) or 'gleðja', 'spyrja' (if short). The forms given
in brackets by Zoega are the 1st person past indicative singular,
followed by the past participle.

Strong verbs are given in the form: infinitive (1st person present
indicative singular; 1st/3rd person past indicative singular, 1st
person past indicative plural; past participle), e.g.

gráta (græt; grét, grétum; grátinn), v. (1) to weep; (2) bewail,
weep for one.

From the vowels in these forms, it´s usually possible to work out
which conjugation this matches in Zoega´s table, although sometimes
assimilations and suchlike soundchanges can obscure the pattern.

Lama Nom