--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, laurel_crowned_cernnunos@...
wrote:

>
> Pu, ulf batinn benja berandi, skalt deyr eigi.
> You, wolf bitten wound bearer, shall die not.

This would be my guess, but bear in mind that I'm not a native
speaker of Icelandic, and still have a lot to learn:

þú, úlfbitinn benja berandi, skalt eigi deyja.
OR: benberandi

Note the root vowel in 'bitinn', just like its English
cognate 'bitten'. 'deyja' is a form of the verb called the
infinitive, "[to] die". This is the form listed in dictionary
entries. This is the form used with finite forms of modal verbs
like 'skulu'. My inclination would be to put 'eigi' immediately
after the finite 'skalt', rather than finally after 'deyja'--but I
don't know if that's forbidden. I tested it in Google and found
this very phrase in the Icelandic bible.

The past participle, as you rightly suspected, is used passively in
Old Norse as in English, e.g. hjálmfaldinn "helm-capped". Sometimes
also the dative case is used with an instrumental meaning together
with a past participle, e.g. blóði stokkinn "sprinkled with blood".
(The past participle has various other adjective-making functions
too besides forming the passive voice: snjallmæltr "finely spoken,
eloquent"; svíndrukkinn "drunk as a swine"; kveldrunninn "evening-
travelling"--i.e. given to witchcraft; holdgróinn "grown into the
flesh".)

> Hann er inn ulfborinn.

He is the wolfborne.


Adjectives take a different (simpler) set of endings, called
the "weak" declension, when used with the definite article, so: 'inn
úlfborni'.

> Hann er inn ulfberandi.

He is the wolfbearer.


The substantivized (i.e. turned-into-a-noun) present participle can
be used with a genitive--as you did with 'benja berandi'--or made
into a compound word: eigandi járnskós "owner of iron shoe";
sverðberandi "sword-bearer". Although these look just like the
present participle in the singular, they're actually a type of
noun. The nominative plural would be 'berendr' "bearers", rather
than the adjectival 'þeir kvámu berandi' "they came bearing" (*Made
up example).

> Hann var inn ulfberandi.

He was the wolfbearer.

> It seems odd to me that participle tense would determine

grammatical subject,
but I have intuitively adopted it from English.



I don't understand. Could you explain more? What is it about the
subject that you are saying is determined by the tense of the
participle?

> I am finding myself using participles as if the grammatical

subject is fairly intrinsic, and I wanted to determine if it is
incorrect. [...] This facilitates the existence of frequent
occurences of changing tenses in a sentence, as in the first
sentence [Hann er inn ulfborinn. He is the wolfborne.] with its
present third person iteration of vera, to be, [...]


I'm a bit confused. By "fairly intrinsic", are you referring to the
use of 'úlf-' as the first part of a compound with the past
participle?

> with its present third person iteration of vera, to be,

To me, iteration means "repetition" or "recursion", especially a
mathematical process that involves performing a function repeatedly,
each time using the result produced by the previous "iteration" in
place of the previous starting value. But I'm not an expert on
syntactical terminology, so maybe this is a specialised use I'm not
familiar with. Or did you just mean the tendency to repetetively
use forms of 'vera' "to be" (+ participles), as opposed to just
using other finite verbs by themselves?

> This facilitates the existence of frequent occurences of changing

tenses in a sentence,

Do you mean that it makes it easier for you to form a sentence
without knowing how to conjugate other verbs besides 'vera'? If
not, appologies for the misunderstanding. If so, I'd caution that
using the present participle predicatively 'X er VERB-andi' "X is
VERB-ing" is much rarer in Old Norse than in Present-day English.
In ordinary prose, I think, you'd be more likely to meet phrases
like 'hann berr úlfinn' "he carries the wolf" = "he is carrying the
wolf", rather than 'hann er úlfberandinn' "he is the wolf-bearer".
The latter sounds to me like his job description, a title or
nickname or kenning, rather than something he just happens to be
doing at the moment.

According to Álvarez the predicate use of the present participle
appears in Old Norse in learned style, "en estilo culto" with
VERA "to be" and VERÐA "to become" (Pilar Fernández Álvarez, Antiguo
Islandés: Historia y lengua). Does this imply Latin influence, or
native refinements and stylistic flourish? I'm not sure.

Hallfreðr var eggjandi at við honum væri tekit
"H. was urging them to take him on [as a
guide]" (Hallfreðar saga vandræðaskálds (Möðruvallabók)).

...ok eggjandi vil ek þess vera at...
"...and I hope that..." (Hálfdanar saga Eysteinssonar, Pálsson &
Edwards translation in Seven Viking Romances).

ok fór Helga til bús með honum ok varð honum lítt unnandi
"Helga went there to live with him, but had little feeling
for him" – i.e. "not much affection" (Gunnlaugs saga
ormstungu, Gwyn Jones´s translation in Eirik the Red and Other
Icelandic Sagas).


Note in the last example that 'unnandi' takes the dative 'honum',
just as the finite verb would.