kindred_asura t1_j0tqkmo wrote
Reply to comment by Yrcrazypa in Ancient Grammatical Puzzle That Has Baffled Scientists for 2,500 Years Solved by Cambridge University Student by Superb_Boss289
Can you work backwards in works like go from Milton and Shakespeare (modern english let's say) to Chaucer (middle english) to Beowulf (old english) and learn the language like that?
I read Paradise Lost and even that was hard for me since English is my 2nd language.
Adlach t1_j0ujus5 wrote
I think a determined reader could get as far as Middle English with that approach but Beowulf, being in Old English, is probably unreadable without academic study of the language. Let me quote the first few sentences to you:
> Hwæt. We Gardena in geardagum,
> þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon,
> hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.
> Oft Scyld Scefing sceaþena þreatum,
> monegum mægþum, meodosetla ofteah,
> egsode eorlas. Syððan ærest wearð
> feasceaft funden, he þæs frofre gebad,
> weox under wolcnum, weorðmyndum þah,
> oðþæt him æghwylc þara ymbsittendra
> ofer hronrade hyran scolde,
> gomban gyldan. þæt wæs god cyning.
I did my undergrad in linguistics and personally the only sentence I can read is the last one, which literally translates to "That was [a] good king."
Volgin t1_j0vj670 wrote
Are there other texts that are contemporary to Beowulf but easier to read? I tried something similar in french a few months back and could easily read early 13th century letters and such but if the text was lyrical or some sort of poetry it was often way harder to read since it was written in an classical/older style that borrowed heavily from Latin.
Adlach t1_j0vr7ar wrote
Not to my knowledge. English went through some huge shifts in pronunciation and orthography since the Old English period. I actually feel that using English as context for this article is misleading because of that—most other languages haven't undergone such dramatic transformations.
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