Languages

[Mel Asher]

Originally Posted by sesame

Thank you Mel Asher, or just Mel!
That was such a rich article! Something more on old Saxon, with examples would be delicious.

Make your point with hard evidence please.

OK, Sesame - just for you. I'll come back to the Celtic question later.

AngloSaxon, otherwise called Old English, is one of those blends from the Indo-European ' Germanic ' languages which was widely spoken in England prior to and contemporary with the Norman Invasion. Not to be confused with Middle English which was a much more streamlined version eliminating a lot of the gender inflections and rigid inflections occurring in the verb endings. Middle English was therefore much nearer English as we know it today and was the lingo that Chaucer used in his Cantebury Tales ( Fairly raunchy in parts - viz the Miller's Tales etc. )

As requested a sample with rough translation. ( I would add that although I can read some Middle English, Old English is beyond my scholarship - so I asked a friend for this sample !

hlude bi hearpan hleoþor swinsade, þonne monige men, modum wlonce,
wordum sprecan, þa þe wel cuþan, þæt hi næfre song sellan ne hyrdon.

Then many men with noble hearts, who understood these things,
openly said that they had never heard a better song.

Good poetic stuff, but my learning has taken me elsewhere
!