User talk:Hundwine

gangweg

Do you think that the earliest Old English pronunciation could also have been [ˈɣɑŋɡˌweɣ] ? I've often wondered if weg might have been /weɣ/ in earlier OE times, then in later Old English evolved into /wej/. Do you think this is possible ? Leasnam (talk) 16:55, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

Source of except on “wyrd”

Hello,

You added this couplet to the entry on “wyrd”:

“Wyrd wielt þisse weorolde, ac blindlīċe and būtan andġiete.”

Is this from an OE text or is it your own creation? Mausfield (talk) 22:37, 18 July 2019 (UTC)

I've checked the Corpus of Old English, and this citation is invented. The closest seems to be 'Gelefst ðu þæt sio wyrd wealde <þisse> worulde, <oððe> auht godes swa geweorðan mæge <butan> þæm wyrhtan?' (from Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy: Sedgefield, 1899 7-149; Sedgefield, W.J.(Oxford) [repr. Darmstadt 1968], ch. 5, p. 12, l. 15). Alarichall (talk) 20:58, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

AngloFrisian Sources.

Hi, I've seen plenty of your edits on certain Ænglisc words and I've noticed you've added reconstructions of said words in Proto/Primitive Old English/Frisian. Might I ask what books, texts, and or theories you are referring to? I would really like to view the sources of this information for academic purposes.

Wes hǣl. EH800 (talk) 17:56, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Hi ! Very interesting stuff tracing the intermediate stages of words from PGmc to OE. Do you think it might be overkill though ? Leasnam (talk) 01:02, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't mind it, and your reconstructions are dead on ! but we really don't have the right lang codes set up to accommodate this... :( Leasnam (talk) 01:03, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

forbirnan

Despite the fact that this word is clearly a derivative of birnan, which *is* attested, is the combined form forbirnan actually attested ? Leasnam (talk) 17:11, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

That spelling isn't attested as far as I can tell. þeah þæt is to wundrienne for þon þe man hit oft fint on handbocum and cræftbocum. Hundwine (talk) 20:26, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

OE stress on un-

Hi ! I see you've changed the pronunciation at unhāliġ to /ˈunhɑːlij/. This term is an adjective. How is the stress on the un- ? Leasnam (talk) 17:53, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

Un- always carried primary stress, whether it was part of an adjective or not. That's how it behaves in Anglo-Saxon poetry, where only stressed syllables alliterate. I remember being pretty surprised at reading in this study (page five) that it's even stressed before ge-, so that ungeþyldig was actually pronounced /ˈunjeˌθyldij/.

Also, adjectives normally have the stress on the prefix (except for prefixes that are always unstressed and adjectives derived from verbs/adverbs). Hence æfweard, not *ofweard; andweard, not *onweard. Hundwine (talk) 18:50, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

hreddan

Thanks for making that correction. I don't know what happened. I never made this edit here: [[1]]. I only changed the ppt in the Conjugation template by putting brackets around it. Strange. Maybe a glitch ? Leasnam (talk) 07:22, 13 October 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, I checked my Contribution history and I only made ONE edit to hreddan. That's scary. Leasnam (talk) 07:26, 13 October 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, that's weird. Don't know how that happens.

Eac, wast þu micel be Ealdengliscum swegcræfte? Ic red þæt /ɑ/ wære [ɒ] gecweden ær /n/ oþþe /m/, and for þy wære se sweg on þæm stowum oft mid ⟨o⟩ gewriten. Ac ic neom swa þeah gewiss þæt þis healde on eallum ymbstandennessum. To hwy næs ⟨on⟩ oftor gewriten for ⟨an⟩ on worda geendiendlicum? Eac ic wundrode simle hwy se /ɑn/ næfre ne wurde /æn/ (and þonne lator /en/) swa swa on strangra worda forþgewitenum dælnimendum, ac þæt is oðer axung. Hundwine (talk) 20:18, 13 October 2019 (UTC)

Non-Latin script links in etymologies

Hey, thank you for your work on Old English, but please refrain from replacing regular {{cog}} links to Gothic, Russian, Greek and other entries in non-Latin scripts with only their transliterations instead of their native script plus transliteration as is generated by the {{cog}} template (and other related templates). This is not how we do things on Wiktionary, so your changing it up creates an unnecessary inconsistency in the dictionary. Examples of what I'm talking about (diffs of my reversions):

• Special:Diff/56020842/56779638
• Special:Diff/55067230/56779688
• Special:Diff/55336752/56779660

Another point is that we don't add hypothetical forms in otherwise attested languages to etymologies, e.g. (diff of my reversion):

• Special:Diff/56631491/56779548

Other than that your edits look pretty much fine, so I nominated you to become an autopatroller at WT:Whitelist. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 16:42, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

Moving Descendants

When you move a Descendants section from one spelling to another, as you did at Old English cneo, please click on What links here and look for ancestor entries that might be using {{desctree}}. That way you can change the link so you don't leave a module error. Thanks! Chuck Entz (talk) 20:27, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

Please use new Template:ang-conj

Hi. I wrote a new verb module Module:ang-verb, and changed {{ang-conj}} to accept a new format that requires many fewer parameters (generally only the infinitive and verb class). I have already converted almost all uses of the old format of {{ang-conj}} as well as {{ang-conj-weak-1}} and {{ang-conj-weak-2}}, and am going to convert {{ang-conj-strong}} soon. For now the old {{ang-conj}} format is still accepted but it won't be soon; please use the new format, which I've documented at Template:ang-conj/documentation. Keep in mind that the module knows about (or should know about) all irregular forms of all strong, preterite-present and irregular verbs, but knows only about general patterns of weak verbs. It does a good job with weak verbs too (e.g. it knows about the particularities of nerian, fremman, settan, leċġan, swebban, restan, dēman, drenċan, hyngran, eġlan, ġierwan, etc.) but sometimes needs hints, particularly for verbs like byċġan/cweċċan/dreċċan/sellan/stellan/tellan/etc. with irregular past forms.

BTW if you find a mistake in the new tables, please let me know and I'll fix the module accordingly. Please note that the module currently follows Wright's Old English Grammar (available e.g. here), meaning it primarily gives West Saxon conjugations and doesn't include every possible variant spelling to avoid overwhelming the tables. Both of these choices are intentional, as only West Saxon was reasonably standardized. Anglian-variant tables may be possible to implement (e.g. the current module heavily favors syncope in 2nd/3rd sg. pres. indc. because that's what Wright indicates is normal for West Saxon, whereas Anglian apparently does not have much syncope); but they'd have to be done carefully.

Thanks!

Benwing2 (talk) 22:03, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

BTW, since you seem to know a great deal about Old English, do you know whether verbs in -ettan (grimettan, līċettan, etc.) were conjugated as weak class 1a (like settan) or weak class 1b (like dēman)? Wright says they are class 1b, but etymologically they end in -jan (not -ijan), which is the class 1a ending. So far I've assumed class 1a. Also do you know whether unprefixed verbs with the -lǣċan suffix can take ġe-? So far I've assumed they can. Benwing2 (talk) 22:26, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Unattested words in usage examples

Hey, I recently removed some of the OE usage examples found on Woden and Frig, which involved unattested terminology. While the appeal is understandable, on Wiktionary we ward off these kinds of modern reconstructions. Usually it is a far better idea, and lexicographically (and historically) more desirable, to add actual citations from the sources for terms as example sentences: that way you will both add a clear and authentic usage context and be sure that all terms involved (and the cultural sentiment expressed!) are in fact Anglo-Saxon as opposed to a translation from Old Norse.

Another issue is the fact that a lot of these usage examples are essentially a projection of Norse mythology onto Old English (and thus Anglo-Saxon society), which would give an incorrect (or at least not historically confirmed) impression of what Anglo-Saxon paganism was actually like. Surely it is better for our entries to reflect what is in fact known from the sources, instead of what we would like to read into what little we know of Anglo-Saxon paganism?

Speaking of which, is Frig actually attested outside of the compound frīġedæġ? — Mnemosientje (t · c) 10:27, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

@Mnemosientje Can you check the last remaining sentence? Or maybe just replace it with one of the sentences from Bosworth-Toller, e.g. Wóden worhte weós, wuldor alwalda rúme roderas. Benwing2 (talk) 02:53, 3 December 2019 (UTC)

Bosworth-Toller says Frīġ occurs only in Frīġe dæġ, but attests the variant form Fricg, apparently borrowed from Old Norse. Benwing2 (talk) 02:57, 3 December 2019 (UTC)

I see, if it's not just a compound but attested as Frīġe separately in that set phrase then there is a basis for a mainspace entry. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 08:50, 3 December 2019 (UTC)

eage

Is there support that suggests that the g in ēage was /j/ in some positions (before e) and /ɣ/ in others (before a, u) ? Leasnam (talk) 02:28, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

The pronunciation and spelling of the present-day English form eye indicate descent from a form with a palatal consonant. Since the g in eage comes from an originally velar consonant, it would be expected to be [ɣ] before a back vowel. But in the form eage, a front vowel follows. The Oxford English Dictionary entry for the word eye says "the original velar consonant would have undergone palatalization in the nominative and accusative singular (before a front vowel) while remaining unchanged elsewhere (although subject to analogical levelling as indicated by inflected forms such as eagean)". Hundwine has also indicated a palatal consonant in compounds such as eagþyrel and eagæppel, which I find interesting as I don't know how these would be known to have had palatal rather than velar g.--Urszag (talk) 05:33, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

As you point out, the forms I gave for ēaġe were the expected forms. They're also the forms given by Richard Hogg in his book on OE morphology (page 64).

In compounds a palatal consonant would be expected, since unlike [t͡ʃ] and [d͡ʒ], [ʃ] and [j] weren't de-palatalized by contact with a following consonant. Hence þencst, þencþ, mengst, mengþ, but wȳsċst, wȳsċþ and sæġst, sæġþ. Hundwine (talk) 06:46, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

For compounds, I guess what I'm not clear on is whether the consonant-final (on the surface) form used for forming compounds has [j] by analogy with the nominative singular, or whether it has [j] because it is contracted from the form "eage" which ends in a front vowel, or whether there's some third reason. Could you point me towards rules for the form the first element of a compound takes?--Urszag (talk) 16:23, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

It doesn't seem logical that a word like ēaġþyrel would have a /j/ sound...for one, it's too difficult to pronounce that way. In a real-world situation it would have quickly elided to something along the lines of ēaþyrel. The retention of the g in spelling is a strong indication that the fricative remained: /ˈæːɑɣˌθyrel/ is easy to pronounce; /ˈæːɑjˌθyrel/ is not ! Leasnam (talk) 17:54, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

@Urszag: But the final -e in ēage is unstressed and descends from a Proto-OE -æ/-ǣ, WGmc -ā, PGmc -ô, which is not fronted and would not cause palatisation. It only becomes weakened to -e in spelling in OE (and Ofs): it's [ēag]+[-e], not [ēa]+[-ġe]. It's possible that palatisation was still occurring in OE, as evidenced by the rare variant ēaġean (a hypercorrected spelling for dialectal ēġe ?), but Middle English forms for "eye" like eh(e), egh(e), eighe, igh clearly show that the fricative existed and was common, and I am not convinced that these are backformations from the plural which somehow managed to remain distinct. "The pronunciation and spelling of the present-day English form eye indicate descent from a form with a palatal consonant." - this is not necessarily true: the word dye descends from dēag and its spelling and pronunciation are not reflective of that. However, I do know that alternation in some consonants did exist, as in dæġ/dagas and also in ċēosan/coren, but I do not believe it occurred in the case of dēage (oblique of dēag), it was still /ˈdæːɑɣe/. Likewise, I maintain that the pronunciation of ēage was still /ˈæːɑɣe/ in the nom/acc singular and it didn't fluctuate when it was dative plural (ēagum /ˈæːɑɣum/) and genitive plural (ēagena /ˈæːɑɣenɑ/). @Hundwine: Perhaps we should reach a compromise and show both pronunciations at ēage since it's likely that both existed side by side, and perhaps the frequency of the fricative was more common at the beginning of the OE period and perhaps less so near its end Leasnam (talk) 17:24, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Ringe gives the following environments in which palatalisation occurred:

1. word-initial *k and *g were palatalized by any following front vowel
2. non-initial *k and *g were palatalized by an immediately following *i or *ī
3. otherwise, intervocalic *g was palatalized between any two front vowels, but *k was palatalized in that position only if the preceding vowel was *i or *ī
4. preconsonantal and word-final *g were palatalized by any preceding front vowel, but word-final *k was palatalized only by a preceding *i or *ī, and it cannot be demonstrated that preconsonantal *k was palatalized at all.

In other words, these are regular cases where *g was palatalised without any following vowel. Leasnam missed the mark a bit by stating that Proto-OE -æ/-ǣ was not a front vowel, when it clearly was. Yes, it evolved from a back vowel, but by the time palatalisation took place, it was a front vowel. However, according to these rules, there should be no palatal in eye, since the diphthong -ēa- ends in a back vowel, and indeed Ringe gives ēage. But then how do we explain the modern form? —Rua (mew) 19:37, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Also, I apologise for all those reverts. I was a bit too hasty there, and have reverted myself again. —Rua (mew) 20:12, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for providing the list of palatalizing environments. When I made my earlier post, I didn't have a firm basis for assuming that /aɪ/ must go back to an OE form with a palatal consonant; it just seemed obvious to me, but based on the example dēag > dye that Leasnam mentioned, it seems much less obvious now. I guess the development from an Old English form with a velar could occur via later palatalization in the Middle English period, something like eye < [ˈiː(jə)] < [ˈɛːjə]/[ˈeːjə]/[ˈeɪjə] < [ˈɛːɣə] < [ˈæːɑɣe],similar to whatever happened in high.--Urszag (talk) 21:19, 2 January 2020 (UTC)

Removal of my audio

Why did you remove my audio on the entry for cyning? It is correct. *

Audio (West Saxon)

(file)

2A01:E35:2E36:FBD0:EC43:CD8A:519E:A58 22:15, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Regarding Sweo

Wes þū hāl Hundwine,

regarding your entry for Sweo, it should be submitted as "Reconstruction:Old_English/Sweo" because it is an unattested word, though its plural form is attested.

For future entries, please make sure they are attested words.

Thank you and stay safe, Cefin Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 22:08, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Ænglisc Discord

Wes þu hal.

We were most impressed by your examples on our Old English discord, e.g. 'Þinne wer þu cyst on weoloras. Ic cysse his earsþyrel. Ne sind we na gelica'. We thought that it would be good to reach out to you and to invite you to our discord. Our skills are diverse. I for one am an amateur with modest ability in writing and reading, but we also have very experienced members. For security, there is an immortal link in this reddit-post. You are also welcome to use the r/OldEnglish subreddit too. The subreddit and discord have some overlap in members. https://www.reddit.com/r/OldEnglish/comments/8hymnu/%C3%A6nglis%C4%8B_discord_%C4%93ala_w%C4%93_gr%C4%93ta%C3%B0_%C3%BEe%C4%8B/ Ælfric of Eynsham (talk) 04:41, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

Edits to the OE entry on "gifu"

Hello Hundwine,

I wanted to thank you for correcting the inaccurate edit I made in regards to to the pronunciation of gifu. I'm new to the study of Old English and I got a little too excited to apply what I was learning, which lead me to make the, likely, incorrect conclusion due to my limited knowledge. Since then, I've read up on Anglo-Saxon alliterative verse and OE phonological history to better understand my error.

Going forward I'll be mindful to not make edits before I know the truth (or as close to it as one can get with OE) of the matter.

Cheers, Glædwine (talk) 09:53, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

(re)moving Descendants

Whenever you remove a Descendants section, even if it's just to move it to another entry, ALWAYS check "what links here" to make sure that any entry that links to it with {{desctree}} gets updated. I'd prefer not to be finding out about your edits via CAT:E. Chuck Entz (talk) 14:18, 8 September 2020 (UTC)

Gecynd's translations

Hello Hundwine,

Removing all of my translations for Ġecynd is definitely uncalled for. I had put a lot of time and effort into those translations for the whole world to see. Sure, to you, the translations may seem unfit but at least the original text is there for all eyes to see and one can judge for himself. A translation being there is better than no translation.

I ask you kindly to revert your edits. Thank you. Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 23:57, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

OE Pronouns

Hi Hundwine ! Why was this edit [[2]] reverted ? Leasnam (talk) 02:46, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Old English words on this site are usually given in their West Saxon forms, and you replaced a bunch of West Saxon forms with Anglian ones. Hundwine (talk) 02:51, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

But shouldn't we show both ? "All words, in all languages" , no ? Leasnam (talk) 02:52, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Imo we should have entries for all words, but that doesn't mean all words have to appear on this declension table. The personal pronoun templates for German and Spanish are also standardized; they don't have the forms from every dialect. Hundwine (talk) 03:01, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Bringing back ƿynn entries

Hello, I'm sorry for bothering you, the point that all entries with ƿynn have been deleted. There was a vote I didn't know anything about - Wiktionary:Votes/2020-09/Removing_Old_English_entries_with_wynns. I found out about it only when it was too late. There was also Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2019/November#Proposal:_Delete_all_Old_English_words_with_-ƿ-

During this discussion I was told that I could start a vote to bring ƿynn entries back Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2020/November#May_at_least_one_entry_with_ƿynn_stay?

There was also Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2019/November#Proposal:_Delete_all_Old_English_words_with_-ƿ-.

I've never created votes and now I'm only leaving messages to users that I think could support it. I know only a few.

I am very uncomfortable with disturbing people like that, but I can't let these entries be gone for good even without trying. I thought you might support this idea.

You always create great Old English entries. I hope you were not so bothered with my ƿynn entries, I liked adding them to the main pages you create. Sorry for bothering again.Birdofadozentides (talk) 09:07, 3 November 2020 (UTC)

færeld

Hi ! You've removed several definitions that are valid. færeld is more than just "journey" and "Passover" Leasnam (talk) 21:48, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Removal of Old English quotations

Would you care to explain why you have deleted sourced quotations from many Old English entries, among which are several past Foreign Words of the Day? [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] I observe that in several of these cases you have actually made past Foreign Words of the Day unfit for being featured. Once they have been put in an entry, quotations are supposed to remain there unless there are issues with them. So, what was wrong with them? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 17:34, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

Wondering about this too, please clarify. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 13:19, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

Come on, Hundwine, it is public knowledge that you have made several edits two days ago, so you have clearly had the opportunity to read this section. Why don't you respond to questions on your own talk page? Removing sourced quotations is not a trifle. ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 09:17, 26 December 2020 (UTC)

@Lingo Bingo Dingo @Mnemosientje Sometimes I'll come across a really bad translation and fixing it would take more time than it's worth. This site is especially full of Old English quotations of two or three words which make no sense without context, sourced to a dictionary without any mention of the author or the work, and translated 100% word-for-word into 17th century English. I didn't know any of them were "foreign words of the day" though: in those cases I'll try to actually fix or replace the quotations because I like the idea of Old English getting some attention. Be þam hwy ic simle manna ascunge on minum agnum gespræctramete ne andwyrde, ic næbbe endeleasne fierst and eac me ne lyst wiþ menn her flitan, manige heora weorðaþ miceles to ierre for dysigre nerdscittan. Hundwine (talk) 01:42, 27 December 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for responding. I don't really know whether removing the quotations was the best course of action, but it does seem justifiable to me. If this is a widespread problem with Old English quotes it may be a good idea to start a Beer Parlour discussion about it. I certainly would appreciate it if you could add replacement quotes for former FWOTDs (they are all linked to in the OP, they're the ones with a template message in the top right). ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 11:29, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

What LBD said.. sometimes it would be better to just try to correct the translations a bit, but there's undeniably a lot of garbage usage examples and quotes on here. (As an aside, nerdscitte is an OE neologism I can get behind.) — Mnemosientje (t · c) 11:54, 2 January 2021 (UTC)

Removal of derived term

Hey, re: Special:Diff/61650414/61650450 - why did you remove the derived term wraeclast here? Is it derived from another word? — Mnemosientje (t · c) 15:21, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

OE glæsen

I've seen you making the stem vowel an e. Where do you see that ? This source shows otherwise [[9]] Leasnam (talk) 03:43, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

Ok, now you've made *glesen the main entry ! Where are you seeing this form ? Leasnam (talk) 17:51, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

That was my attempt to standardize the spelling in line with gylden, triewen, æcen, etc., which all have attested forms showing umlaut. It doesn't bother me that the spelling glesen isn't attested because (a) the word itself is attested and (b) we know that an umlauted form must have existed.

Removals of derived terms

Hey, what's with the removals of derived and related terms (1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6)? Elsewhere on Wiktionary we strive to be complete in listing derived terms and at least list (etymologically) related terms of interest as much as is sensible. So deleting this outright seems to be counterproductive. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 12:46, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

I think listing unimportant terms distracts from important ones. Also, a lot of the words I delete from "derived terms" lists are compounds that are attested once and look like they were coined for the occasion, which wouldn't even get a dictionary entry if they were Modern English. Hundwine (talk) 17:02, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

That goes counter to how the rest of Wiktionary works, though, so I'd say leave them be in the future. Best to keep OE matching up with the rest of the dictionary. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 17:31, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Inventing citations for Old English words

Hi there Hundwine! I'm quite new to editing Old English on Wiktionary, though I'm an old hand with other Wikimedia work. I see that you've been doing loads of fantastic work to build up the coverage of Old English: thanks! We're fortunate to have people working so hard to improve this resource. I also see that you're fond of inventing citations for Old English words. I can see how much care you've put into the getting the morphology right, and can see that your citations are kind of witty in their way. And I can also see that native speakers of a modern language might usefully invent citations. But isn't it a bit misleading to invent citations for Old English, many of which might be sentences that no Old English-speaker ever uttered? Might it not be better to stick to using real attestations (borrowed from Bosworth and Toller, for example)? I wonder what you think? Alarichall (talk) 20:43, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

You mean usage examples? Honestly I think as long as they're good Old English, which mine are, then there's no problem. Latin is also a dead language, and it's always been taught partly with invented usage examples, including on wiktionary. It's just a useful way to demonstrate grammatical points or illustrate facts about a language. Hundwine (talk) 06:19, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply here, Hundwine, and the message on my talk page (which I'll respond to here too).

Have you got an example of an entry which distinguishes between "quotations" and "usage examples"? Your invented examples under wyrd, which were confusing User:Mausfield back in July 2019, are listed as "quotations", which, given what you've said above and on my page, we would probably agree is misleading.

You signed off on my talk page with "Ic eac wundrode hwæðer þu cuðe þis geþeode", which I think might be a good example of the perils here: unless I'm misunderstanding you, it looks like this is translation of 'I also wondered whether you knew this language'. But the first citation in the OED for 'wonder' in that sense is 1297... I'm sure you put much more care into your invented usage examples, but I don't think we can reliably represent real OE by making stuff up: we might be at risk of misleading learners rather than helping them. The professional OE dictionaries all stick to real examples.

(I agree about archaising translations. The attraction of 'self-killer' for sylfcwala to me was just that we seldom use 'suicide' to denote the person who kills themselves -- and 'self-killer' is used increasingly by people moving away from the stigmatised term 'suicide' -- but I agree that it also looks like an over-literal translation. Thanks too for the edit on the citation for selfcwala -- nice to see how you've represented the source and expanded the quotation. I thought it was a shame to lose the precise bibliographic information, but I get that Wiktionary editors often see that as clutter, so fair enough!) Alarichall (talk) 13:34, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

Most of the Old English entries distinguish between quotations and usage examples. Wyrd is actually a good example: the invented sentences are cited with ux:ang, which puts the page in the category "Old English terms with usage examples," while the quotation from Beowulf is cited with quote:ang, which places the page in the category "Old English terms with quotations."

Re: "the first citation in the OED for 'wonder' in that sense is 1297," the OED is just wrong there. It's really common for dictionaries to say English words are first attested hundreds of years after the actual date. The fact is that wundrian was used for "to wonder" all the time in Old English. For example, this sentence in Ælfric's Lives of Saints, c. 996: He aras þa gesund, swylce of slæpe awreaht, and began to wundrigenne hu he wurde ðider gebroht.

Re: "I don't think we can reliably represent OE by making stuff up," I can and do!! Latin and Greek have been taught with invented usage examples for thousands of years, there are even whole textbooks in Latin that are 100% new sentences. The only reason most scholars don't do the same with Old English is that they don't know the language and would risk making embarrassing mistakes. Even then, it's still done occasionally by professionals: Richard Hogg in his Introduction to Old English uses examples like Se dogca bat þone guman ("The dog bit the man").

If you can find instances of me inventing examples with bad Old English, go ahead. Absent that, I use a discord server where many people are trying to learn Old English, and I never see complains about the examples I've invented. I actually see people making use of them all the time, and no one's complained about them at all or said I misrepresented the way the language works. The only thing even remotely similar would be Mausfeld asking me two years ago whether a usage example for wyrd was original or not, but that's a really flimsy basis for worry. Hundwine (talk) 21:50, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm understanding better what seem to be our different assumptions about a historical dictionary: I think of OE Wiktionary primarily as a (hopefully eventually) comprehensive mapping of the attested lexicon of a historical period of the language; you think of it partly (primarily?) as a resource for people who want to compose OE in the present day.

(I guess this helps explain you wanting to delete obscure derived words and poorly translated quotations, that you discussed with User:Mnemosientje: I guess you don't want to present learners with obscure citations or direct them to words which are unlikely to have been in normal use. But the people who want OE coverage to be a comprehensive mapping of the lexicon do want to know all those derivations -- not least because, say, even obscure gloss-words can provide useful evidence about semantics -- and we would probably rather have short, clunkily translated quotations than none at all.)

While I agree that people often make up sentences for learners' textbooks for dead languages, I'm hard put to think of dictionaries that do this. And while I respect your knowledge of OE (nice Ælfric citation there -- I should have been cannier in using the OED and am grateful for the correction!), I personally feel that I know enough about what I don't know that I wouldn't contemplate inventing usage examples even for the modern languages that I know best and where our sources are much more comprehensive. But having read up on Wiktionary and usage examples, I can see that what you're doing fits with current Wiktionary policy, and I can see that the examples you create could be useful for people who want clear and simple examples.

Obviously Wiktionary can accommodate both aspirations, which is a good thing and one of the strengths of this open-access resource :-) I'll pick up on problematic usage examples as I find them and otherwise leave well alone!

Re wyrd, I can see now how I misread the entry, which I can't seem to reproduce here exactly, but it goes something like this:

1. fate, destiny

   Ne wyrcþ man his āgene wyrd, ac hēo hine.

   You don't create your own fate, it creates you.

   Wyrd wielt þisse weorolde, ac blindlīċe and būtan andġiete.

   Fate controls this world, but blindly and without purpose.

   • Beowulf, line 455

     Gǣþ ā wyrd swā hēo sċeal.

     Fate always goes as it must.

In the actual entry, the word 'quotations' appears over the usage examples, making it look to a reader who isn't well acquainted with Wiktionary formatting like the usage examples are quotations. It doesn't help that when we click on 'quotations', the actual quotation appears below the usage examples. Clearly part of this is just a problem with Wiktionary generally and not something we can resolve here.

So, in closing, could I thank you again for your hard work, from which many are I am sure benefitting, but encourage you to work firmly within the first goal for example sentences, 'To place the term in a context in which it is likely to appear, addressing level of formality, dialect, etc.'? And in the spirit of Wiktionary:About Old English#Attestation and reconstruction: 'Wiktionary is a descriptive dictionary that aims to represent languages as they are used. For dead languages such as Old English, this means that only those terms that are attested in the original early medieval sources are allowed'? I'm thinking here, for example, of your example under cunnan, 'Nāwiht nis hefiġre þonne dēad līchama. Atlas self ne cann þæt ġewiht'. It would be very interesting if Atlas was mentioned in the OE corpus; a quick Corpus of Old English search suggests, however, that he never is. It would be easy for an eager student of OE to get excited by an example like this and be sent on a wild goose chase.

Thanks again for your labours here! Alarichall (talk) 18:51, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Deletion of citations

Hi there, Hundwine! I see you've deleted all the citations from ielfen. I wonder why? Also, the definition you've now given is: '1. female elf; 2. also used to gloss nymphs and muses'. This is misleading, because the word is only attested as a gloss on Latin words for nymphs and muses. Can we improve the situation here? Alarichall (talk) 16:12, 9 October 2021 (UTC)

I deleted the citations because they looked really cluttery. I'll try adding them back in while keeping the page neat. As for the definition "female elf": even if ielfen was created on the spot to gloss "nymph," it was clearly supposed to put the idea of a female elf in people's minds. The only reason to gloss it that way is to say a nymph is a female elf, more or less, to readers who might not know what a nymph is. Hundwine (talk) 07:43, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks! What about 'female elf (used to gloss nymphs and muses)'? That would keep the reader from getting the impression that the word is attested to mean 'female elf' and also nymphs and muses. Alarichall (talk) 09:58, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

I added usage notes explaining how it's only attested in those glosses etc. Hundwine (talk) 11:41, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

Thanks! Alarichall (talk) 11:47, 10 October 2021 (UTC)

eald fæder

Hello Hundwine - I left you a message ping at Tea_room#eald_fæder. I just wanted to give you a chance to chime in before I make any changes. Leasnam (talk) 16:45, 30 November 2021 (UTC)

geþeode

May I ask why the quotation from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles was deemed disposable? It's not like there isn't room for two examples.

Moreover, why was tunge removed as a synonym? --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 07:05, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

I thought it was translated into bad Modern English: nobody calls languages "tongues," and "two hundred miles broad" and "in this island" are sub-fluent phrases. I also thought listing tunge as the only synonym would be misleading because it's not much of one; the sense "language" was rare even in OE. But maybe I was being petty. I can add all that back in with a few tweaks if you like. Hundwine (talk) 07:17, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

That's because it was Thorpe's 19C translation. It's dated, not wrong. Also, it was perfectly fluent English when the translation was made. Also, sometimes a translation which is stilted to modern ears better gets across the way the original is constructed. Also, you didn't correct the translation, you just removed wholesale the single best known attestation of that word, with only your word here that you were going to put it back.

Also, you never addressed why you don't think relevant information like valid synonyms deserves to be included. --Catsidhe ^{(verba, facta)} 07:26, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

You're right. I shouldn't have deleted the passage or the synonym: tunge is a synonym, after all. I just added both back in. Thanks for bringing this up. I ought to remember not to be careless about removing things. Hundwine (talk) 07:32, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

Removal of information about displaced native terms in etymology sections

Hello Hundwine, I saw that in a recent edit you removed information about a displaced native term from the etymology section of agreeable. I am unsure of your reason for the change and am wondering if you would be willing to clarify your thought process. Thanks and take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 22:22, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

Sure thing. My thought was, if you're gonna cite something as the word that was displaced in Old English, it had better be the default term in OE, and I wasn't able to confirm that cwēme was more common than its synonyms. Hundwine (talk) 22:32, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

That makes sense. For the record and my personal understanding, can you point me to some of the Old English synonyms of cweme? Currently the entry doesn't have a synonyms section. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 22:37, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

There's a lot of them if you search the Bosworth-Toller for "agreeable." Is eac to witenne that cwēme is one of those words that almost always takes the suffix ge-. Hundwine (talk) 23:57, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

I see them, thank you very much for the clarification and once again take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 00:35, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

No problem, I'm always happy to help or elaborate. You take care too. Hundwine (talk) 08:10, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

On unlinking the "suicide" Thesaurus page from entries

Hello!

Since you have unlinked the the "suicide" wordlist from selfcwala and agenslaga, the only entry it still shows up at is selfbana. I'm not sure if you missed it or whether you think that there need not be ANG thesaurus pages like this one, so I haven't reversed my April 2 change at selfbana. But if you do believe that laying out the synonyms at separate entries, like how they show up on Bosworth-Toller's website, rather than thesaurus pages is better, then the thesaurus page itself should be deleted, as the synonym lists at each of the entries would then replace it.

As for the glosses and renditions, I have not much to say about what is and is not said or about the niceties of "killed himself" and "slew himself", but it was an oversight by me and a blunder to presume that tocnawan is just a counterpart of tell/"know" apart. Bosworth-Toller's has usage examples that show that this presumption was wrong, citing uses that roughly match the meanings of "perceive", so I'm very sorry for that hasty edit.

But seeing that tocnawan does not match discern only, the glosses there are still unsatisfactory. Roger.M.Williams (talk) 21:44, 24 May 2022 (UTC)

cynegierd

Error-proofing is not being "pedantic". There is no attestation of cynegierd. Anywhere. I was being respectful in keeping as much of your content as possible. geard and gierd are not alternative forms. They are separate words. One displays i-mutation where the other doesn't. Just wait till I get to angol (“fishhook”)...that isn't even attested except in angoltwæċċa, angoltwæċċe - so why is it the main entry ? Leasnam (talk) 13:29, 10 August 2022 (UTC)

"Geard and gierd are separate words": okay, I'll give you that. Cynegierd is attested though, that spelling just isn't attested. It's normal practice on wiktionary to normalize spellings to Early West Saxon even when the standard spelling happens not to be attested. There frequently isn't even a way to know whether a certain spelling is attested--the Bosworth-Toller doesn't quote every single manuscript. Hundwine (talk) 01:39, 13 August 2022 (UTC)

Okay, I can live (happily) with that. This means that I will attempt to "correct" (resisting the temptation to 'hypercorrect') OE entries. On a separate topic: I've noticed some OE entries show macrons (lengthening of vowels) compensating for a lost 'h' in the following syllable. I've seen this with mōre (“carrot”) which I have changed to more; but also with þȳrel, which I have not got to yet. Appears to be either you and/or WingerBot ? If so, loss of 'h' can sometimes cause this (like in ēos from eoh), but mōru seems doubtful (if not impossible) - any lengthening of the stem would have caused the -u to disappear. This must be moru (short vowel), and if moru, then more (short vowel). Same with þyrel, it can't be long since the plural nom-acc ends in -u/-o (e.g. þyrelo; ēagþyrelu (plural); a lengthened vowel would have a plural as *(ēag)þȳrel, which doesn't appear to be the case. Leasnam (talk) 20:07, 13 August 2022 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and made correctional updates to þyrel. Please have a look. Leasnam (talk) 04:58, 14 August 2022 (UTC)

Old English -ung

I don't understand why you removed the cognates for ung, nor why you removed the information that class II verbs use this form (implying that they use -ing instead, which they don't appear to do; cf. ascung, earnung, granung in Bosworth-Toller). For this reason, I have reverted your edit for the time being. - Furrykef (talk) 09:10, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

My mistake. I wrote "class I weak verbs" when I meant to say class II. Hundwine (talk) 11:00, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

hālga = holy woman

Hi ! I created hālge f for the feminine; but do you have examples where hālga refers to a woman (I can see where it's possible, like in a title or name) ? Leasnam (talk) 01:49, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

It's just how grammatical gender works in Germanic languages. When words for people have both a masculine and feminine form, the masculine form is used for both men and women while the feminine form is used only of women. See e.g. German Heiliger. Hundwine (talk) 02:41, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

Synomyn move

Just curious, was there a logical reason for doing this [[10]] that I'm missing ? Leasnam (talk) 18:00, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Hyrsum

Hiersum doesn't exist. We already have an entry at hyrsum. Leasnam (talk) 05:55, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Re your edit comment, if a word (and this is only for exemplification purposes) is spelt hȳrsum but the noun derived from it is spelt hīersumnes, and the root verb is either hīeran or hȳran, I feel it's appropriate to use reconstruction to fill in the missing gap, so there would be a form *hīersum (which is unattested) leading to the noun derivative. You may have a different opinion on this, but this is my reasoning. Leasnam (talk) 06:12, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

There's actually a lot of reasons why normalized spellings should stand, without moving them to reconstruction pages. E.g.:

1. The reconstruction category is useful atm because it lists reconstructed words. If you add reconstructed spellings, it becomes a mass of variant spellings lumped in with only a few words that are truly unattested, which makes it polyphyletic and impossible to use.

2. The normalized spellings make editing wiktionary way more straightforward. Right now if I want to create a new entry for an OE word, I can just use the normalized spelling and not worry about searching through Google Books?? the Bosworth-Toller??? a paid subscription service??? to see if the spelling is attested. And if it's unattested, I don't have to choose (at random?) which spelling variant to make the main page from. Is there even a source I could use that lists every spelling a word occurs in?

3. The same difficulty exists if you're a user trying to find a word: how you know which one to search for without normalized spellings? Are you supposed to search a bunch of different variant spellings before you find one which has a wiktionary page?

4. Wiktionary already uses normalized spellings consistently. Undoing that would mean a ton of work, just to make the site more unwieldy. We already include unattested inflections to make the site more straightforward—why not do the same thing with normalized spellings, for the same reason? That has been the practice for as long as I've been here. Hundwine (talk) 07:08, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Declension of fengel, þengel etc.

Hello! I wanted to ask someone who knows Old English to take a look at the declension tables of these words: fenġel, þenġel. I suspect that the nġl sequence that they're currently showing is not correct since palatal plosives seem to have been depalatalized before another consonant within the same word. Should they instead have a declension like enġel? Urszag (talk) 06:28, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Yup you're correct. Palatalization is also overgeneralized in the declension tables for adjectives, since velars (aside from initial *sk) were not palatalized before back vowels: see the last bullet point on the page for -līċ. Hundwine (talk) 07:24, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Pronunciation of certain OE pronouns

Hello. I was wondering whether you could clarify something for me. For the OE pronouns mec, þec, inc, incit, and incer, the pronunciations here are given with /k/. I've looked through a few different OE grammars, and some of them mark the pronouns with ċ, which suggests /tʃ/, while others do not mark it at all, which suggests /k/. I'm not sure which pronunciation is correct. 2601:640:8A80:98E0:807E:3E5B:C1E2:BC7D 06:52, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

mec and þec certainly had hard /k/. Word final *k was only palatalized by a preceding *i (or *ī); see Ringe's Development of Old English: Volume II, page 203. Meanwhile, palatalization of incer < *inkwær would have been blocked by the /w/; this is also why þicce < *þikkwī was not palatalized, and why we say "thick" instead of "thich." As for inc, it's Middle English descendants appear with hard /k/, as does the rhyming word /rinc/ > ME rink. Idk about incit. Hundwine (talk) 09:44, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-West Germanic/haubidamann

Where did you get that one from? To me these "descendants" are compound words. Do you have any indication that in Frankish there was such a term? When were these descendants first attested? Synotia (talk) 14:11, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

angelseaxan

Hello hundwine,

I hope you are well. I am curious about your entry for angelseaxan for Old English. My question is that where is the word attested?

Thank you. Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 16:58, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Gea ic fare wel! Swa ic hopige þe eac. The word appears in three sources: the short poem “Aldhelm,” Charter S566, and a translation of a Latin Bull by Pope Sergius. Hundwine (talk) 06:51, 16 July 2023 (UTC)

Removal of later semantic replacements and cognates of similar formation

I think you would be hard-pressed to find someone that believes that removal of such things from an etymology is productive. If you dislike the use of {{com+}}, whatever, I'm not gonna die on that hill, but I don't think you should remove the other information. Vininn126 (talk) 08:52, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

Regarding forþgewitennes

Wes þū hāl, Hundwine,

Could you please tell me which text has forþgewitennes attested to mean 'the past."?

Thank you. Leornendeealdenglisc (talk) 21:20, 30 March 2024 (UTC)