--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Peterson"
<viking_hearted@...> wrote:

>
> [...]
> Take this word, for a random example, in Old Norwegian:

'sjónhverfing' - "optical illusion," has change in Modern Icelandicto
'sjónkverfing.' The only change in pronunciation is that the initial
sj- has changed from s- and j- (pronounced like English 'y' in yes) to
Danish and Norwegian sj- pronounced like English 'sh.' And the other
change, h to k is noted in the spelling.

Just to clarify: the Modern Icelandic word is spelt exactly the same
as it is in Old Norse according to normalised Old Norse orthography,
namely 'sjónhverving'. It's a compound of 'sjón' "sight" and
'hverfing' from the verb 'hverfa' "turn, vanish". Words with 'hv' in
Old Norse are still spelt with 'hv' in Modern Icelandic. Most
Icelandic speakers nowadays pronounce the combination 'hv' as [kv],
although some say [xw] (where [x] is a phonetic symbol representing a
voiceless velar fricative like the 'ch' of Scots English 'loch' or
German 'Bach').

I'm not sure if the word is recorded in any medieval texts from
Norway, but there are at least nine examples in Old Icelandic
(Eyrbyggja saga, Harðar saga og Hólmverja x2, Heimskringla, Íslenska
Homilíubókin, Mörtu saga og Maríu Magdalenu, Snorra Edda x 3).

LN