Old Norse For Beginners – Lesson Two

Old Norse for Beginners - Lesson Two

by Haukur Þorgeirsson and Óskar Guðlaugsson

Grammar

1.1 First and second person personal pronouns

Now you have to learn those singular personal pronouns:

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	ek	þú
Accusative	mik	þik

The corresponding English table looks like this:

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	I	you
Accusative	me	you

The forms ‘þú’ and ‘þik’ are the relatives of the English forms ‘thou’ and ‘thee’.

And then there are the plural pronouns, still fairly similar to English:

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	vér	þér
Accusative	oss	yðr

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	we	you
Accusative	us	you

And finally a concept that doesn’t exist in Modern English, dual pronouns:

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	vit	þit
Accusative	okkr	ykkr

	1.person	2.person
Nominative	we two	you two
Accusative	us two	you two

1.2 Plural of third person pronouns

We will now introduce the plural of the third person pronouns. As before we begin with English.

	Singular				Plural
Nominative	he	she	it		they	they	they
Accusative	him	her	it		them	them	them

The reason for writing “they” out three times is that the plural of “he” is the same as the plural of “she” or the plural of “it”, unlike Old Norse :

	Singular				Plural
Nominative	hann	hon	þat		þeir	þær	þau
Accusative	hann	hana	þat		þá	þær	þau

Thus, many “hons” make a “þær” and many “hanns” make a “þeir” (to put it in silly terms). We are still only using the masculine pronoun as all nouns we have introduced are masculine.

1.3 Plural of nouns

Nouns, of course, have a plural form. The plural form declines in cases and can be with or without definitive article. We’ll write up a table showing the declension of our strong masculine words. This time we will use a {stem + ending} scheme. The grammatical stem of a word is the word without grammatical ending.

	Without article		With article
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nom.	stem + r	stem + ar	stem + r + inn	stem + ar + nir
Acc.	stem	stem + a	stem + inn	stem + a + na

And then with the good old elf as the example.

	Without article		With article
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nom.	álfr	álfar	álfrinn	álfarnir
Acc.	álf	álfa	álfinn	álfana

Now you know eight different forms of each noun. This might be a bit overwhelming at first but if you immediately begin memorising the table above and work hard at the exercises it will soon be very familiar.

1.4 Some slightly irregular nouns

Some words of the strong masculine declension lack the nominative singular ending ‘r’.

In order to make it completely clear what we mean we decline a sample word from this group. The word is ‘jarl’ and means ‘earl’. The reason is probably that pronouncing “jarlr” would not be comfortable.

	Without article		With article
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nom.	jarl	jarlar	jarlinn	jarlarnir
Acc.	jarl	jarla	jarlinn	jarlana

The vocabulary also introduces the word ‘geirr’. It is completely regular, so do not get confused by the two r’s at the end. The first r is part of the stem whereas the second one is the nominative singular ending.

1.5 Maðr – an irregular noun

We will now introduce a masculine noun that in its declension does not follow the patterns already described. The word is ‘maðr’ and means ‘human being’ or ‘person’.

	Without article		With article
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nom.	maðr	menn	maðrinn	menninir
Acc.	mann	menn	manninn	mennina

Notice how the irregularity is similar to that of the corresponding English word, ‘man’. Also notice that the endings for the article are very similar to those for the regular words. This is no coincidence, in fact the article declines in the same basic way for every word of the same gender.

The word ‘maðr’ is a very useful one and will help us make more interesting sentences.

1.6 Verbal conjugation

The form of a verb depends upon the subject in the sentence, so in Old Norse as it is in English. Let us give an example

Infinitive: (to) be
I am	we are
thou art	you are
he/she/it is	they are

We will now give the corresponding Old Norse verb; like its English counterpart, it is completely irregular.

Infinitive: (at) vera
ek em	vit/vér erum
þú ert	þit/þér eruð
hann/hon/þat er	þeir/þær/þau eru

Remember what everything means here. The plural of ‘hann’ is ‘þeir’ et cetera. Also note that the dual pronouns have the same conjugation as the plural ones.

Now we will look at more regular verbs. We don’t have to remember every form of every verb; for now it will be sufficient for us to remember two; the infinitive and the first person singular. The endings are tacked on in the following way.

Infinitive: [form 1]
ek [form 2]	vit/vér [form 1] – a + um
þú [form 2] + r	þit/þér [form 1] – a + ið
hann/hon/þat [form 2] + r	þeir/þær/þau [form 1]

This code may be a bit cryptic. When I say ” – a + um” I mean “subtract ‘a’ and add ‘um'”. This is best illustrated with examples:

vega, veg
ek veg	vit/vér vegum
þú vegr	þit/þér vegið
hann/hon/þat vegr	þeir/þær/þau vega

heita, heiti
ek heiti	vit/vér heitum
þú heitir	þit/þér heitið
hann/hon/þat heitir	þeir/þær/þau heita

taka, tek
ek tek	vit/vér tökum (explained below)
þú tekr	þit/þér takið
hann/hon/þat tekr	þeir/þær/þau taka

segja, segi
ek segi	vit/vér segjum
þú segir	þit/þér segið (explained below)
hann/hon/þat segir	þeir/þær/þau segja

kalla, kalla (to call)
ek kalla	vit/vér köllum
þú kallar	þit/þér kallið
hann/hon/þat kallar	þeir/þær/þau kalla

hafa, hefi (to have, wear, carry)
ek hefi	vit/vér höfum
þú hefir	þit/þér hafið
hann/hon/þat hefir	þeir/þær/þau hafa

And now for one verb that is almost regular, but not quite:

sjá, sé (to see)
ek sé	vit/vér sjám (not *sjáum)
þú sér	þit/þér séð (not *sjáið)
hann/hon/þat sér	þeir/þær/þau sjá

A u in a grammatical ending always changes a preceding ‘a’ to an ‘ö’. This is known as u-mutation and is treated in more detail later.
The letters ‘j’ and ‘i’ cannot coexist; for this reason we have ‘segið’ and not ‘*segjið’.
We won’t use the infinitive just yet but it is still one of two forms of each verb you need to memorise.
The verb ‘á’ does not follow this pattern, it is conjugated in lesson 3.
The forms ‘sjáum’ and ‘sjáið’ are correct in later Icelandic.

1.7 “Er” – an all purpose relative pronoun

Relative pronouns are words like ‘who, which, that’. In Norse we have one very useful word that can play the role of all those. The word is ‘er’ and it should not be confused with the 3rd person singular of the verb “to be”. An example will be in order.

The people (that) he sees are Norwegians.	Relative pronoun can be dropped.
Menninir, er hann sér, eru Norðmenn.	Relative pronoun cannot be dropped.

We say that the relative pronoun represents a word from the main sentence in the case appropriate for the verb in the relative clause. Since the word ‘er’ is the same in all cases this is mostly a technical thing and need not be worried overly about. We will, somewhat arbitrarily, separate all relative clauses in Norse with commas.

1.8 The present tense

So far we have only been discussing the present tense of verbs. The ON present tense actually corresponds to two forms in English.

Víkingarnir koma.	The vikings come.
Víkingarnir koma.	The vikings are coming.

When translating remember to use the most natural English form.

1.9 Word order

While word order in Old Norse is fairly free there are usually some things that are more normal than others. The normal word order in a simple sentence is, as in English: “subject verb object”. Another common word order is “verb subject object”. The greatest emphasis in a sentence is usually on the first word. Thus, if we want to draw special attention to the object we can use “object verb subject”. Other word-order schemes are usually reserved for elaborate poetry.

Where do you put the negating word “eigi”? Those examples will illustrate the variety of normal structures. Do not be overwhelmed by this, there is little need to memorise every possible pattern, you will slowly become familiar with normal word order in reading the translation exercises.

Subject-verb-object
- Hann sér eigi úlfinn.
- Hann sér úlfinn eigi.
Verb-subject-object
- Sér hann úlfinn eigi.
- Sér hann eigi úlfinn.
- Eigi sér hann úlfinn.
Object-verb-subject
- Úlfinn sér hann eigi.

All the legal sentences above have one thing in common: “The verb is always the first or the second word in the sentence.” This phenomenon is known as V2 and is treated in more detail later in the course.

Other adverbs are usually placed in the same way.

Vocabulary

2.1. Nouns

maðr	person, man, human being (declension described in 1.5)
Norðmaðr	Norwegian (declines like maðr)

Then two words whose declension we described in 1.4.

hrafn	raven
jarl	earl

The rest of the words given are regular strong masculine.

bátr	boat
geirr	spear
Íslendingr	Icelander
vargr	wolf
víkingr	viking
þjófr	thief

And for good measure we also list the names used in the lesson. You should never forget that names behave as any other nouns. They decline according to their declension group.

Eiríkr

Erlingr

2.2 Pronouns

er	that, which, who, whom

Also remember to memorise the masculine pronoun in plural.

Nom. þeir (they)

Acc. þá (them)

2.3 Verbs

The verbs from lesson one are reiterated here for easy reference.

hafa, hefi	have, hold, wear
hata, hata	hate
heita, heiti	be called
deyja, dey	die
bíða, bíð	wait
koma, køm	come
mæla, mæli	talk
sjá, sé	see
vega, veg	slay
segja, segi	says
taka, tek	take
sjá (irregular)	see
vera (irregular)	be
á	owns (only form of this verb yet presented)

2.4 Adverbs

nú	now
þar	there

2.5 A greeting

The following forms can be used as greetings. This is actually an adjective that is declining according to gender and number but we’ll talk about that later.

Heill! – to greet one man

Heil! – to greet one woman

Heilir! – to greet a group of men

Heilar! – to greet a group of women

Heil! – to greet a group including both sexes

2.6 Yes or no questions

To change a statement into a question you use the word order

Verb-subject-(object/complement)

And often you add the word ‘hvárt’ in front.

Hvárt er hann hér?

Er hann hér?

But it’s not good fashion to answer a yes or no question with yes or no! That’s almost never done in the Old Icelandic texts. Instead you just repeat the question as a statement.

Question: Hvárt er hann hér?

Answer: Hann er hér.

Oh, alright, we can tell you the words:

já	yes
nei	no

2.7 Sample sentences

Norðmenn hata Íslendinga.
- Subject: Norðmenn [nominative, plural, without article]
- Object: Íslendinga [accusative, plural, without article]
- Meaning: Norwegians hate Icelanders.
Hatar konungrinn úlfa.
- Subject: konungrinn [nominative, singular, with article]
- Object: úlfa [accusative, plural, without article]
- Meaning: The king hates wolfs.
Þeir eru Norðmenn.
- Subject: þeir [nominative, plural]
- Complement: Norðmenn [nominative, plural, without article]
- Meaning: They are Norwegians.
Brandrinn, er hann á, heitir Tyrfingr.
- Subject in main sentence: brandrinn [nominative, singular, with article]
- Complement in main sentence Tyrfingr [nominative, singular, proper name]
- Subject in relative clause: hann [nominative, singular]
- Object in relative clause: er [accusative, singular]
- Meaning: The sword which he has is called Tyrfingr.
Vit höfum hjálma.
- Subject: vit [nominative, dual]
- Object: hjálma [accusative, plural]
- Meaning: We two have (are wearing) helmets.

Exercises

3.1 Translate the phrases into English

Sjá jarlarnir konungana.
Álfrinn á knífa.
Úlfar heita ok vargar.
Baugana sjá menninir.
Hrafnarnir deyja.

3.2 Translate the phrases into Old Norse

The raven sees a hawk.
The king hates thieves.
A viking is called Erlingr.
The earls are called Erlingr and Eiríkr.
You (pl.) are coming.

3.3 Translate the text into English

Note: As our vocabulary and knowledge of grammar expands we will find better things to do with our exercises than killing Óláfr.

Norðmenn hafa konung; hann heitir Óláfr. Maðr heitir Eiríkr; hann er jarl ok víkingr. Óláf hatar Eiríkr. Óláfr á bát. Hann heitir Ormr. Nú sér Eiríkr bátinn. Segir hann: “Hér er bátrinn, er Óláfr á.” Eiríkr hatar Óláf en hann tekr eigi bátinn, er Óláfr á. Hann bíðr. Óláfr kømr. Eiríkr segir: “Nú deyr þú, Óláfr konungr! Ek veg þik!” ok vegr Óláf. Óláfr segir “Þú vegr mik! Ek dey! Á! Á! (exclamation of pain)

3.4 Translate the text into Old Norse

A man is called Eiríkr. He owns (some) helmets, (some) boats and a spear. He is a viking. He kills people and takes boats. But Eiríkr is not a thief. Thieves don’t kill. Now Eiríkr sees Óláfr and the Serpent. He kills Óláfr and takes the Serpent.

3.5 Translate the play into English

[Óláfr bíðr.]

Óláfr: Ek sé mann!

[maðr kømr]

Maðr: Heill Óláfr konungr! Ek heiti Eiríkr ok ek em Íslendingr.

Óláfr: Heill Eiríkr!

Eiríkr: Hvárt sér þú orminn þar, konungr?

Óláfr: Eigi sé ek orm.

Eiríkr: En hann er hér!

[nú sér Óláfr orminn]

Óláfr: Ormr! Ek sé orm!

Ormr: Óláfr! Ek sé Óláf!

Eiríkr: Segir ormrinn “Óláfr”?

Ormr: Nei. Ormar mæla eigi.

[Óláfr ok Eiríkr flýja]

3.6 Translate the play into English

[Eiríkr, þjófr ok víkingr, sér Orm, bát er Óláfr á]

Eiríkr: “Þar er bátr!”

[Haukr, Íslendingr, mælir]

Haukr: “Óláfr á bátinn.”

[Óláfr kømr]

Óláfr: “Menn sé ek!”

Eiríkr ok Haukr: “Vit erum hér.”

Óláfr: “Hvárt takið þit bátinn?”

Eiríkr ok Haukr: “Vit tökum hann eigi.”

Óláfr: “Ormr heitir bátrinn. Ek á Orm”

[Eiríkr ok Haukr kalla]

E & H: “Úlfr! Úlfr! Þar er úlfr!”

Óláfr: “Úlfr? Ek hata úlfa!”

[Úlfr, Norðmaðr ok þjófr, kømr]

Óláfr: “Ek sé eigi úlf. Hvárt er hér úlfr?”

Úlfr: “Hér em ek, Óláfr konungr.”

[Eiríkr, Haukr ok Úlfr taka bátinn ok flýja]

Óláfr: “Þjófar! Ek hata þjófa!”

E, H & Ú: “Vér erum víkingar, vér höfum bát er heitir Ormr!”

Looking at Real Text

4.1 Half a stanza by Snorri Sturluson

Drífr handar hlekkr

þar er hilmir drekkr.

Mjök er brögnum bekkr

blíðskálar þekkr.

This half-stanza will not look recognisable to you, indeed it shouldn’t, it is a complicated poetic passage. But we will apply the principles set forth earlier [The Norse and English tongues] to help us with individual words.

Some we can guess at without thought; ‘handar’ looks like it’s a cognate of ‘hand’ and ‘drífr’ could be a cognate of ‘drive’. We are right on both accounts; ‘handar’ means ‘of hand’ but while ‘drífr’ is indeed related to ‘drive’ in this case it means ‘snows’. Compare with the English word ‘(snow)drift’.

The next word is ‘hlekkr’. Doesn’t look familiar. But English dropped all h’s in front of consonants, maybe if we change it to ‘lekkr’. Looks better but we need to do more. The cluster ‘nk’ was frequently assimilated to ‘kk’ in Old Norse, maybe we need to reverse such a change. Then we’ve got ‘lenkr’. Of course English doesn’t have r as a grammatical ending, out it goes. New result ‘lenk’. Still not an English word but let’s remember that vowels are more prone to change than consonants. If we change the ‘e’ to an ‘i’ then we’ve finally made it to ‘link’ which is the right word.

It’s a good and correct guess that ‘þar’ means ‘there’. In this context ‘þar er’ means ‘where’.

What might ‘hilmir’ be? No way to figure that one out, it means ‘king’. The word is related to ‘hjálmr’ and refers to the fact that kings tend to bear helmets.

Then there’s ‘drekkr’. We apply the same rules as before; Norse ‘kk’ can be English ‘nk’ and English doesn’t have ‘r’ as a grammatical ending. Then we’ve got ‘drenk’. Maybe if we change the vowel to ‘i’ as before. Hocus-pocus we’ve got ‘drink’ which is correct. More specifically ‘drekkr’ means ‘drinks’.

Let’s look at that first sentence in toto.

“Drífr handar hlekkr þar er hilmir drekkr.”

The subject is ‘handar hlekkr’ which means ‘link of the hand’. And what does _that_ mean? It is a poetic paraphrase for ‘gold’. The verb is ‘drífr’ which means ‘snows’. Then ‘þar er’ means ‘where’, ‘hilmir’ means ‘king’ and ‘drekkr’ means ‘drinks’.

“(The) link of the hand [gold] snows where (the) king drinks.”

This sentence is quite typical of Norse court poetry; praise of the king’s generosity in florid language.

Let’s look at the second sentence.

The word ‘mjök’ means ‘very’. The English cognate is ‘much’. You already know that ‘er’ can mean ‘is’. Such is the case here. The word ‘brögnum’ doesn’t have an English cognate. It means ‘for men’ and is a poetic word.

Then there’s ‘bekkr’. In with the n, out with the r! We’ve got ‘benk’. Hmm… The correct cognate is ‘bench’ and the meaning is the same.

The word-form ‘blíðskálar’ is made out of ‘blíð’ and ‘skálar’. The first is an adjective cognate to English ‘blithe’. The second is the possessive form of ‘skál’ which means ‘bowl’. Modern Scandinavians can often be heard shouting this word. Skál! Skål! Toast!

Last word: ‘þekkr’. Once more we change ‘kk’ into ‘nk’ and get ‘thenk’. The correct cognate is ‘thank’ but the word means ‘comfortable’ rather than ‘thankful’.

If we draw together the second sentence.

“Mjök er brögnum bekkr blíðskálar þekkr.”

Meaning: “The bench of the blithe bowl is very comfortable for men.”

And who doesn’t like sitting and drinking…

In summary we could guess correctly at the meaning of many words: ‘handar, drekkr, blíð, hlekkr, bekkr’ but we also had some whose cognates didn’t help us much: ‘drífr, þekkr’. This is quite typical.

Do not rely on cognate trickery but use it, where it applies, as an aid to memory.

4.2 Two half-strophes from the Sigdrífumál

– – –

Heill Dagr!

Heilir Dags synir!

Heil Nótt ok nipt!”

– – –

Heilir Æsir!

Heilar Ásynjur!

Heil sjá in fjölnýta fold!”

– – –

Compare the greeting carefully with chapter 2.5; notice how it changes according to gender and number.

“Hail, Day!

Hail, Day’s sons!

Hail, Night and [her] sister!”

“Hail, Æsir (gods)!

Hail, Ásynjur (goddesses)!

Hail, bountiful earth!”

Old Norse For Beginners – Lesson Two