--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "llama_nom" <600cell@...> wrote:

>
> --- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "Tim Stridmann" <stridmann@>
> wrote:
> >
> > Dear Sirs and Ladies!
> > Let me introduce the second lesson of my course:
> > http://norse.ulver.com/onorse/les40/lesson2e.html
> > All suggestions are welcome!
> > Tim Stridmann



> An older form of 'éta' is 'eta'. But I'm not sure when the vowel was
> lengthened, or whether there's any anachronism in using 'éta'
> alongside other old forms.

"Éta" sounds a bit anachronistic - I would use "eta" (which is still
used by a minority of Icelanders, actually). And, BTW, the sentence
"ek éta menn" is wrong - the 1 sing is "et/ét".

> 'Vér eigum þrjú börn.' Wouldn't the dual 'vit' be used here rather
> than 'vér'?

Absolutely.

> 'Hrafn er heimskri mér.' Should this be 'heimskari'?

In my opinion, yes.

> 'elska at...' Is it possible that this is a modernism? I'm not sure
> about that, but I couldn't find any Old Icelandic examples in
> Cleasby/Vigfússon or Fritzner, or in the Órðabók Háskólans database.

This is very recent usage, totally anachronistic. It was not in
general
use in my part of the country when I was a child. It is the influence
of
English on the younger modern generations, who have taken the
semantics
of the English "love" and superimposed them upon "elska" (the meaning
of
which is much narrower).

ADDITIONAL NOTES:

Trollshjón and trollsbörn both sound rather awkward. Trollhjón and
trollabörn would sound more normal.

Hjón does not mean "family".

"Mér líka úlfar" would be better than "mér líkar við úlfa". Having
said
that, though, I think this usage of "líka" to equal the English "like"
is rather recent. In OI the meaning was closer to "please". (But you
could claim that these two meanings are the same.) I have never seen
or
heard "líka" used with "til".

"Ellri Hrafns" is impossible, as far as I'm concerned. It would have
to be "ellri Hrafni", or simply "ellri en Hrafn".

"Feðgin", at least in prose, more normally means "father and
daughter",
not "parents".

"Fífla" (fem!) is non-existent. "Fífl" is a neuter, and is used of
both genders.

The plural of troll/tröll is troll/tröll. There is no such word as
"trollar".

Regards,
Eysteinn