| Also Known As: | Old Nordic |
| Nativename: | Norse, Old: dǫnsk tunga ('Danish tongue') Norse, Old: norrǿnt mál ('Northern speech') |
| Ethnicity: | Norsemen and their descendants |
| Region: | Nordic countries, Great Britain, Ireland, Isle of Man, Normandy, Newfoundland, the Volga and places in-between |
| States: | Scandinavia, Iceland, Faroe Islands, Greenland and other Norse settlements |
| Era: | Evolved from Proto-Norse in the 8th century, developed into the various North Germanic languages by the 15th century |
| Protoname: | Proto-Norse (attested) |
| Familycolor: | Indo-European |
| Fam2: | Germanic |
| Fam3: | North Germanic |
| Ancestor: | Proto-Norse (attested) |
| Script: | Runic, later Latin (Old Norse alphabet) |
| Iso2: | non |
| Iso3: | non |
| Glotto: | oldn1244 |
| Glottorefname: | Old Norse |
| Notice: | IPA |
| Old Norse | |
Old Norse, Old Nordic,[1] or Old Scandinavian is a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlements and chronologically coincides with the Viking Age, the Christianization of Scandinavia, and the consolidation of Scandinavian kingdoms from about the 8th to the 15th centuries.[2]
The Proto-Norse language developed into Old Norse by the 8th century, and Old Norse began to develop into the modern North Germanic languages in the mid- to late 14th century, ending the language phase known as Old Norse. These dates, however, are not absolute, since written Old Norse is found well into the 15th century.
Old Norse was divided into three dialects: Old West Norse (Old West Nordic, often referred to as Old Norse),[3] Old East Norse (Old East Nordic), and Old Gutnish. Old West Norse and Old East Norse formed a dialect continuum, with no clear geographical boundary between them. Old East Norse traits were found in eastern Norway, although Old Norwegian is classified as Old West Norse, and Old West Norse traits were found in western Sweden. In what is present-day Denmark and Sweden, most speakers spoke Old East Norse. Though Old Gutnish is sometimes included in the Old East Norse dialect due to geographical associations, it developed its own unique features and shared in changes to both other branches.[4]
The 12th-century Icelandic Gray Goose Laws state that Swedes, Norwegians, Icelanders, and Danes spoke the same language, Norse, Old: dǫnsk tunga ("Danish tongue"; speakers of Old East Norse would have said ). Another term was Norse, Old: norrœnt mál ("northern speech"). Today Old Norse has developed into the modern North Germanic languages Icelandic, Faroese, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, and other North Germanic varieties of which Norwegian, Danish and Swedish retain considerable mutual intelligibility. Icelandic remains the most conservative language, such that in present-day Iceland, schoolchildren are able to read the 12th-century Icelandic sagas in the original language (in editions with normalised spelling).[5]
Old Icelandic was very close to Old Norwegian, and together they formed Old West Norse, which was also spoken in Norse settlements in Greenland, the Faroes, Ireland, Scotland, the Isle of Man, northwest England, and in Normandy. Old East Norse was spoken in Denmark, Sweden, Kievan Rus', eastern England, and Danish settlements in Normandy. The Old Gutnish dialect was spoken in Gotland and in various settlements in the East.
In the 11th century, Old Norse was the most widely spoken European language, ranging from Vinland in the West to the Volga River in the East. In Kievan Rus', it survived the longest in Veliky Novgorod, probably lasting into the 13th century there. The age of the Swedish-speaking population of Finland is strongly contested, but Swedish settlement had spread the language into the region by the time of the Second Swedish Crusade in the 13th century at the latest.
See main article: North Germanic languages.
The modern descendants of the Old West Norse dialect are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic, Faroese, Norwegian, and the extinct Norn language of Orkney and Shetland; the descendants of the Old East Norse dialect are the East Scandinavian languages of Danish and Swedish. Norwegian is descended from Old West Norse, but over the centuries it has been heavily influenced by East Norse, particularly during the Denmark–Norway union.
Among these, the grammar of Icelandic and Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years. In contrast, the pronunciations of both Icelandic and Faroese have changed considerably from Old Norse. With Danish rule of the Faroe Islands, Faroese has also been influenced by Danish.
Both Middle English (especially northern English dialects within the area of the Danelaw) and Early Scots (including Lowland Scots) were strongly influenced by Norse and contained many Old Norse loanwords. Consequently, Modern English (including Scottish English), inherited a significant proportion of its vocabulary directly from Norse.
The development of Norman French was also influenced by Norse. Through Norman, to a smaller extent, so was modern French.
Written modern Icelandic derives from the Old Norse phonemic writing system. Contemporary Icelandic-speakers can read Old Norse, which varies slightly in spelling as well as semantics and word order. However, pronunciation, particularly of the vowel phonemes, has changed at least as much in Icelandic as in the other North Germanic languages.
Faroese retains many similarities but is influenced by Danish, Norwegian, and Gaelic (Scottish and/or Irish). Although Swedish, Danish and Norwegian have diverged the most, they still retain considerable mutual intelligibility. Speakers of modern Swedish, Norwegian and Danish can mostly understand each other without studying their neighboring languages, particularly if speaking slowly. The languages are also sufficiently similar in writing that they can mostly be understood across borders. This could be because these languages have been mutually affected by each other, as well as having a similar development influenced by Middle Low German.[6]
Various languages unrelated to Old Norse and others not closely related have been heavily influenced by Norse, particularly the Norman language; to a lesser extent, Finnish and Estonian. Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Lithuanian and Latvian also have a few Norse loanwords. The words Rus and Russia, according to one theory, may be named after the Rus' people, a Norse tribe, probably from present-day east-central Sweden. The current Finnish and Estonian words for Sweden are Finnish: Ruotsi and Estonian: Rootsi, respectively.
A number of loanwords have been introduced into Irish, many associated with fishing and sailing. A similar influence is found in Scottish Gaelic, with over one hundred loanwords estimated to be in the language, many of which are related to fishing and sailing.[7]
The vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The standardized orthography marks the long vowels with an acute accent. In medieval manuscripts, it is often unmarked but sometimes marked with an accent or through gemination.
Old Norse had nasalized versions of all ten vowel places. These occurred as allophones of the vowels before nasal consonants and in places where a nasal had followed it in an older form of the word, before it was absorbed into a neighboring sound. If the nasal was absorbed by a stressed vowel, it would also lengthen the vowel. This nasalization also occurred in the other Germanic languages, but were not retained long. They were noted in the First Grammatical Treatise, and otherwise might have remained unknown. The First Grammarian marked these with a dot above the letter. This notation did not catch on, and would soon be obsolete. Nasal and oral vowels probably merged around the 11th century in most of Old East Norse. However, the distinction still holds in Dalecarlian dialects. The dots in the following vowel table separate the oral from nasal phonemes.
| Front vowels | Back vowels | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | ||||||
| Close | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ĩ/ | pronounced as /iː/ • pronounced as /ĩː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ỹ/ | pronounced as /yː/ • pronounced as /ỹː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ũ/ | pronounced as /uː/ • pronounced as /ũː/ | |||
| Mid | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ẽ/ | pronounced as /eː/ • pronounced as /ẽː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ø̃/ | pronounced as /øː/ • pronounced as /ø̃ː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /õ/ | pronounced as /oː/ • pronounced as /õː/ | |||
| Open, open-mid | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ɛ̃/ | pronounced as /ɛː/ • pronounced as /ɛ̃ː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /œ̃/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ã/ | pronounced as /aː/ • pronounced as /ãː/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ɔ̃/ | pronounced as /link/ • pronounced as /ɔ̃ː/ |
Note: The open or open-mid vowels may be transcribed differently:
Sometime around the 13th century, pronounced as //ɔ// (spelled (ǫ)) merged with pronounced as //ø// or pronounced as //o// in most dialects except Old Danish, and Icelandic where pronounced as //ɔ// (Norse, Old: ǫ) merged with pronounced as //ø//. This can be determined by their distinction within the 12th-century First Grammatical Treatise but not within the early 13th-century Prose Edda. The nasal vowels, also noted in the First Grammatical Treatise, are assumed to have been lost in most dialects by this time (but notably they are retained in Elfdalian and other dialects of Ovansiljan). See Old Icelandic for the mergers of pronounced as //øː// (spelled (œ)) with pronounced as //ɛː// (spelled (æ)) and pronounced as //ɛ// (spelled (ę)) with pronounced as //e// (spelled (e)).
| Front vowels | Back vowels | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | ||||||
| High | pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /iː/ | pronounced as /y/ | pronounced as /yː/ | pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /uː/ | |||
| Mid | pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /eː/ | pronounced as /ø/ | pronounced as /øː/ | pronounced as /o/ | pronounced as /oː/ | |||
| Low/Low-mid | pronounced as /ɛ/ | pronounced as /ɛː/ | pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /aː/ |
Old Norse had three diphthong phonemes: pronounced as //ɛi//, pronounced as //ɔu//, pronounced as //øy ~ ɛy// (spelled (ei), (au), (ey) respectively). In East Norse these would monophthongize and merge with pronounced as //eː// and pronounced as //øː//, whereas in West Norse and its descendants the diphthongs remained.
| Northwest Germanic | Primitive Old West Norse | Old Icelandic (1st Grammarian) | Later Old Icelandic | Example (Old Norse) | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ (a) | pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ | Norse, Old: land "land" < Germanic languages: *landą | |
| pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /ɛ/ (ę) | pronounced as /e/ (e) | pronounced as /e/ | Norse, Old: menn "men" < Germanic languages: *manniz | |
| pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ (+u/w-mut) | pronounced as /ɔ/ (ǫ) | pronounced as /ɔ/ | pronounced as /ø/ (ö) | Norse, Old: lǫnd "lands" < Uncoded languages: *landu < Germanic languages: *landō; Norse, Old: sǫngr "song" < Norse, Old: sǫngr < Germanic languages: *sangwaz | |
| pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a/ (+i-mut +w-mut) | pronounced as /œ/ (ø₂) | pronounced as /ø/ | pronounced as /ø/ (ö) | Norse, Old: gøra "to make" < Germanic languages: *garwijaną | |
| pronounced as /æː/ (ē) | pronounced as /aː/ | pronounced as /aː/ (á) | pronounced as /aː/ | pronounced as /aː/ | Norse, Old: láta "to let" < Germanic languages: *lētaną | |
| pronounced as /æː/ (ē) | pronounced as /aː/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /ɛː/ (æ) | pronounced as /ɛː/ | pronounced as /ɛː/ | Norse, Old: mæla "to speak" < Uncoded languages: *mālijan < Germanic languages: *mēlijaną | |
| pronounced as /æː/ (ē) | pronounced as /aː/ (+u-mut) | pronounced as /ɔː/ (ǫ́) | pronounced as /ɔː/ | pronounced as /aː/ (á) | Norse, Old: mǫ́l "meals" < 'Uncoded languages: *mālu < Germanic languages: *mēlō | |
| pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ (e) | pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ | Norse, Old: sex "six" < Germanic languages: *seks; Norse, Old: bresta "to burst" < Germanic languages: *brestaną | |
| pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ (+u/w-mut) | pronounced as /ø/ (ø₁) | pronounced as /ø/ | pronounced as /ø/ (ö) | Norse, Old: tøgr "ten" < Germanic languages: *teguz | |
| pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ (broken) | pronounced as /ea/ (ea) | pronounced as /ja/ (ja) | pronounced as /ja/ | Norse, Old: gjalda "to repay" < Germanic languages: *geldaną | |
| pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /e/ (broken +u/w-mut) | pronounced as /eo/io/ (eo)/(io) | pronounced as /jo/ > pronounced as /jɔ/ (jǫ) | pronounced as /jø/ (jö) | Norse, Old: skjǫldr "shield" < Germanic languages: *skelduz | |
| pronounced as /eː/ (ē₂) | pronounced as /eː/ | pronounced as /eː/ (é) | pronounced as /eː/ | pronounced as /eː/ | Norse, Old: lét "let (past tense)" < Germanic languages: *lē₂t | |
| pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /i/ (i) | pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /i/ | Norse, Old: mikill "great" < Germanic languages: *mikilaz | |
| pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /i/ (+w-mut) | pronounced as /y/ (y) | pronounced as /y/ | pronounced as /y(ː)/ | Norse, Old: slyngva "to sling" < Germanic languages: *slingwaną | |
| pronounced as /iː/ | pronounced as /iː/ | pronounced as /iː/ (í) | pronounced as /iː/ | pronounced as /iː/ | Norse, Old: líta "to look" < Germanic languages: *lītaną | |
| pronounced as /oː/ | pronounced as /oː/ | pronounced as /oː/ (ó) | pronounced as /oː/ | pronounced as /oː/ | Norse, Old: fór "went" < Germanic languages: *fōr; Norse, Old: mót "meeting" < Germanic languages: *mōtą | |
| pronounced as /oː/ | pronounced as /oː/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /øː/ (œ) | pronounced as /øː/ | pronounced as /ɛː/ (æ) | Norse, Old: mœðr "mothers" < Germanic languages: *mōdriz | |
| pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /u/ (u) | pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /u/ | Norse, Old: una "to be content" < Germanic languages: *unaną | |
| pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /u/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /y/ (y) | pronounced as /y/ | pronounced as /y/ | Norse, Old: kyn "race" < Germanic languages: *kunją | |
| pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /u/ (+a-mut) | pronounced as /o/ (o) | pronounced as /o/ | pronounced as /o/ | Norse, Old: fogl/Norse, Old: fugl "bird" < Germanic languages: *fuglaz; Norse, Old: morginn "morning" < Germanic languages: *murganaz | |
| pronounced as /uː/ | pronounced as /uː/ | pronounced as /uː/ (ú) | pronounced as /uː/ | pronounced as /uː/ | Norse, Old: drúpa "to droop" < Germanic languages: *drūpaną | |
| pronounced as /uː/ | pronounced as /uː/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /yː/ (ý) | pronounced as /yː/ | pronounced as /yː/ | Norse, Old: mýss "mice" < Germanic languages: mūsiz | |
| pronounced as /ai/ | pronounced as /ai/ | pronounced as /ai/ > pronounced as /ɛi/ (ei) | pronounced as /ɛi/ | pronounced as /ɛi/ | Norse, Old: bein, Gut. Uncoded languages: bain "bone" < Germanic languages: *bainą | |
| pronounced as /ai/ | pronounced as /ai/ (+w-mut) | pronounced as /øy/ (ey), (øy) | pronounced as /øy/ (ey) | pronounced as /ɛy/ | Norse, Old: kveykva "to kindle" < Germanic languages: *kwaikwaną | |
| pronounced as /au/ | pronounced as /au/ | pronounced as /au/ > pronounced as /ɔu/ (au) | pronounced as /ɔu/ (au) | pronounced as /au/ | Norse, Old: lauss "loose" < Germanic languages: *lausaz | |
| pronounced as /au/ | pronounced as /au/ (+i-mut) | pronounced as /øy/ (ey), (øy) | pronounced as /øy/ (ey) | pronounced as /ɛy/ | Norse, Old: leysa "to loosen" < Germanic languages: *lausijaną | |
| pronounced as /eu/ | pronounced as /eu/ | pronounced as /eu/ (eu) | pronounced as /juː/ (jú) | pronounced as /juː/ | Norse, Old: djúpr "deep" < Germanic languages: *deupaz | |
| pronounced as /eu/ | pronounced as /eu/ (+dental) | pronounced as /eo/ (eo) | pronounced as /joː/ (jó) | pronounced as /juː/ | Norse, Old: bjóða/Norse, Old: bjúða "to offer" < Germanic languages: *beudaną | |
| pronounced as /Ṽ/ | pronounced as /Ṽ/ | pronounced as /Ṽ/ | pronounced as /Ṽ/ | pronounced as /V/ | Norse, Old: komȧ < Germanic languages: *kwemaną "to come, arrive"; OWN Norse, Old: vėtr/vėttr < Norse, Old: vintr < Germanic languages: *wintruz "winter" | |
| pronounced as /Ṽː/ | pronounced as /Ṽː/ | pronounced as /Ṽː/ | pronounced as /Ṽː/ | pronounced as /Vː/ | Norse, Old: hȧ́r "shark" < Germanic languages: *hanhaz; Norse, Old: ȯ́rar "our" (pl.) < Germanic languages: *unseraz; Norse, Old: ø̇́rȧ "younger" (acc. neut. wk.) < Germanic languages: *junhizą |
Old Norse has six plosive phonemes, pronounced as //p// being rare word-initially and pronounced as //d// and pronounced as //b// pronounced as voiced fricative allophones between vowels except in compound words (e.g. Norse, Old: veðrabati), already in the Proto-Germanic language (e.g. Germanic languages: *b pronounced as /
| Labial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Labiovelar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | pronounced as /pronounced as /link/ pronounced as /link// | pronounced as /pronounced as /link/ pronounced as /link// | pronounced as /pronounced as /link/ pronounced as /link// | |||||
| Nasal | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | pronounced as /(pronounced as /link/)/ | |||||
| Fricative | pronounced as /pronounced as /link/ (pronounced as /link/)/ | pronounced as /pronounced as /link/ (pronounced as /link/)/ | pronounced as /link/ | pronounced as /ʀ/ | pronounced as /(pronounced as /link/)/ | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | ||
| Trill | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | |||||||
| Approximant | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// | ||||||
| Lateral approximant | pronounced as /pronounced as /link// |
The consonant digraphs (hl), (hr), and (hn) occurred word-initially. It is unclear whether they were sequences of two consonants (with the first element realised as pronounced as //h// or perhaps pronounced as //x//) or as single voiceless sonorants pronounced as //l̥//, pronounced as //r̥// and pronounced as //n̥// respectively. In Old Norwegian, Old Danish and later Old Swedish, the groups (hl), (hr), and (hn) were reduced to plain (l), (r), (n), which suggests that they had most likely already been pronounced as voiceless sonorants by Old Norse times.
The pronunciation of (hv) is unclear, but it may have been pronounced as //xʷ// (the Proto-Germanic pronunciation), pronounced as //hʷ// or the similar phoneme pronounced as //ʍ//. Unlike the three other digraphs, it was retained much longer in all dialects. Without ever developing into a voiceless sonorant in Icelandic, it instead underwent fortition to a plosive pronounced as //kv//, which suggests that instead of being a voiceless sonorant, it retained a stronger frication.
See also: Stød.
Primary stress in Old Norse falls on the word stem, so that Norse, Old: hyrjar would be pronounced pronounced as //ˈhyr.jar//. In compound words, secondary stress falls on the second stem (e.g. Norse, Old: lærisveinn, pronounced as //ˈlɛːɾ.iˌswɛinː//).
See main article: Old Norse orthography. Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark, runic Old Norse was originally written with the Younger Futhark, which had only 16 letters. Because of the limited number of runes, several runes were used for different sounds, and long and short vowels were not distinguished in writing. Medieval runes came into use some time later.
As for the Latin alphabet, there was no standardized orthography in use in the Middle Ages. A modified version of the letter wynn called vend was used briefly for the sounds pronounced as //u//, pronounced as //v//, and pronounced as //w//. Long vowels were sometimes marked with acutes but also sometimes left unmarked or geminated. The standardized Old Norse spelling was created in the 19th century and is, for the most part, phonemic. The most notable deviation is that the nonphonemic difference between the voiced and the voiceless dental fricative is marked. The oldest texts and runic inscriptions use þ exclusively. Long vowels are denoted with acutes. Most other letters are written with the same glyph as the IPA phoneme, except as shown in the table below.
Ablaut patterns are groups of vowels which are swapped, or ablauted, in the nucleus of a word. Strong verbs ablaut the lemma's nucleus to derive the past forms of the verb. This parallels English conjugation, where, e.g., the nucleus of sing becomes sang in the past tense and sung in the past participle. Some verbs are derived by ablaut, as the present-in-past verbs do by consequence of being derived from the past tense forms of strong verbs.
See also: Germanic umlaut.
Umlaut or mutation is an assimilatory process acting on vowels preceding a vowel or semivowel of a different vowel backness. In the case of i-umlaut and ʀ-umlaut, this entails a fronting of back vowels, with retention of lip rounding. In the case of u-umlaut, this entails labialization of unrounded vowels. Umlaut is phonemic and in many situations grammatically significant as a side effect of losing the Proto-Germanic morphological suffixes whose vowels created the umlaut allophones.
Some pronounced as //y//, pronounced as //yː//, pronounced as //ø//, pronounced as //øː//, pronounced as //ɛ//, pronounced as //ɛː//, pronounced as //øy//, and all pronounced as //ɛi// were obtained by i-umlaut from pronounced as //u//, pronounced as //uː//, pronounced as //o//, pronounced as //oː//, pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //aː//, pronounced as //au//, and pronounced as //ai// respectively. Others were formed via ʀ-umlaut from pronounced as //u//, pronounced as //uː//, pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //aː//, and pronounced as //au//.
Some pronounced as //y//, pronounced as //yː//, pronounced as //ø//, pronounced as //øː//, and all pronounced as //ɔ//, pronounced as //ɔː// were obtained by u-umlaut from pronounced as //i//, pronounced as //iː//, pronounced as //e//, pronounced as //eː//, and pronounced as //a//, pronounced as //aː// respectively. See Old Icelandic for information on pronounced as //ɔː//.
pronounced as //œ// was obtained through a simultaneous u- and i-umlaut of pronounced as //a//. It appears in words like gøra (Norse, Old: gjǫra, Norse, Old: geyra), from Proto-Germanic
OEN often preserves the original value of the vowel directly preceding runic Norse, Old: ʀ while OWN receives ʀ-umlaut. Compare runic OEN Norse, Old: glaʀ, haʀi, hrauʀ with OWN Norse, Old: gler, heri (later Norse, Old: héri), Norse, Old: hrøyrr/hreyrr ("glass", "hare", "pile of rocks").
U-umlaut is more common in Old West Norse in both phonemic and allophonic positions, while it only occurs sparsely in post-runic Old East Norse and even in runic Old East Norse.
| Meaning | West Old Norse | Old Swedish | Modern Swedish | Icelandic | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Transcription | IPA | Transcription | IPA | ||||
| Guardian / Caretaker | Uncoded languages: v'''a'''rþer | in Swedish pronounced as /voːɖ/ | in Icelandic pronounced as /ˈvœrðʏr/ | ||||
| Eagle | Uncoded languages: '''ø'''rn | in Swedish pronounced as /œːɳ/ | in Icelandic pronounced as /œrtn/ | ||||
| Earth | Uncoded languages: [[wikt:iorþ#Old Swedish|i'''o'''rþ]] | in Swedish pronounced as /juːɖ/ | in Icelandic pronounced as /jœrð/ | ||||
| Milk | Uncoded languages: [[wikt:miolk#Old Swedish|mi'''o'''lk]] | in Swedish pronounced as /mjœlk/ | in Icelandic pronounced as /mjoul̥k/ |
Old Swedish orthography uses (þ) to represent both pronounced as /link/ and pronounced as /link/. The change from Norse (ð) to Old Swedish (þ) represents only a change in orthography rather than a change in sound. Similarly (i) is used in place of (j). And thus changes from Norse (j) to Old Swedish (i) to Swedish (j) should be viewed as a change in orthography.
Represents the u-umlaut found in Swedish.
This is still a major difference between Swedish and Faroese and Icelandic today. Plurals of neuters do not have u-umlaut at all in Swedish, but in Faroese and Icelandic they do, for example the Faroese and Icelandic plurals of the word, and respectively, in contrast to the Swedish plural and numerous other examples. That also applies to almost all feminine nouns, for example the largest feminine noun group, the o-stem nouns (except the Swedish noun Swedish: jord mentioned above), and even i-stem nouns and root nouns, such as Old West Norse Norse, Old: mǫrk (mörk in Icelandic) in comparison with Modern and Old Swedish Uncoded languages: [[wikt:mark#Swedish|mark]].
See also: Vowel breaking.
Vowel breaking, or fracture, caused a front vowel to be split into a semivowel-vowel sequence before a back vowel in the following syllable. While West Norse only broke pronounced as //e//, East Norse also broke pronounced as //i//. The change was blocked by a pronounced as //w//, pronounced as //l//, or pronounced as //ʀ// preceding the potentially-broken vowel.
Some pronounced as //ja// or pronounced as //jɔ// and pronounced as //jaː// or pronounced as //jɔː// result from breaking of pronounced as //e// and pronounced as //eː// respectively.
When a noun, pronoun, adjective, or verb has a long vowel or diphthong in the accented syllable and its stem ends in a single l, n, or s, the r (or the elder r- or z-variant ʀ) in an ending is assimilated. When the accented vowel is short, the ending is dropped.
The nominative of the strong masculine declension and some i-stem feminine nouns uses one such -r (ʀ). Norse, Old: Óðin-r (Norse, Old: Óðin-ʀ) becomes Norse, Old: Óðinn instead of Norse, Old: *Óðinr (Norse, Old: *Óðinʀ).
The verb ('to blow'), has third person present tense Norse, Old: blæss ('[he] blows') rather than Norse, Old: {{tooltip|*|Indicates improper form (Norse, Old: *blæsʀ). Similarly, the verb ('to shine') had present tense third person Norse, Old: skínn (rather than Norse, Old: *skínr, Norse, Old: *skínʀ); while ('to cool down') had present tense third person Norse, Old: kell (rather than Norse, Old: *kelr, Norse, Old: *kelʀ).
The rule is not absolute, with certain counter-examples such as ('friend'), which has the synonym Norse, Old: vin, yet retains the unabsorbed version, and ('giant'), where assimilation takes place even though the root vowel, Norse, Old: ǫ, is short.
The clusters pronounced as /
Furthermore, wherever the cluster pronounced as /
In Old Norse, Norse, Old: i/j adjacent to Norse, Old: i, Norse, Old: e, their u-umlauts, and Norse, Old: æ was not possible, nor Norse, Old: u/v adjacent to Norse, Old: u, Norse, Old: o, their i-umlauts, and Norse, Old: ǫ. At the beginning of words, this manifested as a dropping of the initial pronounced as //j// (which was general, independent of the following vowel) or pronounced as //v//. Compare ON Norse, Old: orð, Norse, Old: úlfr, Norse, Old: ár with English word, wolf, year. In inflections, this manifested as the dropping of the inflectional vowels. Thus, Norse, Old: klæði + dat Norse, Old: -i remains Norse, Old: klæði, and Norse, Old: sjáum in Icelandic progressed to Norse, Old: sjǫ́um > Norse, Old: sjǫ́m > Norse, Old: sjám. The Germanic languages: jj and Germanic languages: ww of Proto-Germanic became Norse, Old: ggj and Norse, Old: ggv respectively in Old Norse, a change known as Holtzmann's law.
An epenthetic vowel became popular by 1200 in Old Danish, 1250 in Old Swedish and Old Norwegian, and 1300 in Old Icelandic. An unstressed vowel was used which varied by dialect. Old Norwegian exhibited all three: pronounced as //u// was used in West Norwegian south of Bergen, as in Norse, Old: aftur, Norse, Old: aftor (older aptr); North of Bergen, pronounced as //i// appeared in Norse, Old: aftir, Norse, Old: after; and East Norwegian used pronounced as //a//, Norse, Old: after, Norse, Old: aftær.
Old Norse was a moderately inflected language with high levels of nominal and verbal inflection. Most of the fused morphemes are retained in modern Icelandic, especially in regard to noun case declensions, whereas modern Norwegian in comparison has moved towards more analytical word structures.
Old Norse had three grammatical genders – masculine, feminine, and neuter. Adjectives or pronouns referring to a noun must mirror the gender of that noun, so that one says, "Norse, Old: heill maðr!" but, "Norse, Old: heilt barn!". As in other languages, the grammatical gender of an impersonal noun is generally unrelated to an expected natural gender of that noun. While indeed Norse, Old: karl, "man" is masculine, Norse, Old: kona, "woman", is feminine, and Norse, Old: hús, "house", is neuter, so also are Norse, Old: hrafn and Norse, Old: kráka, for "raven" and "crow", masculine and feminine respectively, even in reference to a female raven or a male crow.
All neuter words have identical nominative and accusative forms, and all feminine words have identical nominative and accusative plurals.
The gender of some words' plurals does not agree with that of their singulars, such as Norse, Old: lim and Norse, Old: mund. Some words, such as Norse, Old: hungr, have multiple genders, evidenced by their determiners being declined in different genders within a given sentence.
See main article: Old Norse morphology. Nouns, adjectives, and pronouns were declined in four grammatical casesnominative, accusative, genitive, and dativein singular and plural numbers. Adjectives and pronouns were additionally declined in three grammatical genders. Some pronouns (first and second person) could have dual number in addition to singular and plural. The genitive was used partitively and in compounds and kennings (e.g., Norse, Old: [[Urðarbrunnr]], the well of Urðr; Norse, Old: [[Lokasenna]], the gibing of Loki).
There were several classes of nouns within each gender. The following is an example of the "strong" inflectional paradigms:
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Norse, Old: armr | Norse, Old: armar | |
| Accusative | Norse, Old: arm | Norse, Old: arma | |
| Genitive | Norse, Old: arms | ||
| Dative | Norse, Old: armi | Norse, Old: ǫrmum/Norse, Old: armum |
| Old West Norse | Old East Norse | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative- Accusative | Singular | Norse, Old: hǫll | Norse, Old: hall |
| Plural | Norse, Old: hallir | Norse, Old: hallar | |
| Genitive | Singular | Norse, Old: hallar | |
| Plural | Norse, Old: halla | ||
| Dative | Singular | Norse, Old: hǫllu | Norse, Old: hallu |
| Plural | Norse, Old: hǫllum | Norse, Old: hallum | |
| Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative-Accusative | Norse, Old: troll | ||
| Genitive | Norse, Old: trolls | Norse, Old: trolla | |
| Dative | Norse, Old: trolli | Norse, Old: trollum | |
The numerous "weak" noun paradigms had a much higher degree of syncretism between the different cases; i.e. they had fewer forms than the "strong" nouns.
A definite article was realised as a suffix that retained an independent declension; e.g., Norse, Old: troll (a troll) – Norse, Old: trollit (the troll), Norse, Old: hǫll (a hall) – Norse, Old: hǫllin (the hall), Norse, Old: armr (an arm) – Norse, Old: armrinn (the arm). This definite article, however, was a separate word and did not become attached to the noun before later stages of the Old Norse period.
The earliest inscriptions in Old Norse are runic, from the 8th century. Runes continued to be commonly used until the 15th century and have been recorded to be in use in some form as late as the 19th century in some parts of Sweden. With the conversion to Christianity in the 11th century came the Latin alphabet. The oldest preserved texts in Old Norse in the Latin alphabet date from the middle of the 12th century. Subsequently, Old Norse became the vehicle of a large and varied body of vernacular literature. Most of the surviving literature was written in Iceland. Best known are the Norse sagas, the Icelanders' sagas and the mythological literature, but there also survives a large body of religious literature, translations into Old Norse of courtly romances, classical mythology, and the Old Testament, as well as instructional material, grammatical treatises and a large body of letters and official documents.
Most of the innovations that appeared in Old Norse spread evenly through the Old Norse area. As a result, the dialects were very similar and considered to be the same language, a language that they sometimes called the Danish tongue (Norse, Old: Dǫnsk tunga), sometimes Norse language (Norse, Old: Norrœnt mál), as evidenced in the following two quotes from Norse, Old: [[Heimskringla]] by Snorri Sturluson:
However, some changes were geographically limited and so created a dialectal difference between Old West Norse and Old East Norse.
As Proto-Norse evolved into Old Norse, in the 8th century, the effects of the umlauts seem to have been very much the same over the whole Old Norse area. But in later dialects of the language a split occurred mainly between west and east as the use of umlauts began to vary. The typical umlauts (for example Norse, Old: fylla from Norse, Old: fullijan) were better preserved in the West due to later generalizations in the east where many instances of umlaut were removed (many archaic Eastern texts as well as eastern runic inscriptions however portray the same extent of umlauts as in later Western Old Norse).
All the while, the changes resulting in breaking (for example Norse, Old: hiarta from Norse, Old: *hertō) were more influential in the East probably once again due to generalizations within the inflectional system. This difference was one of the greatest reasons behind the dialectalization that took place in the 9th and 10th centuries, shaping an Old West Norse dialect in Norway and the Atlantic settlements and an Old East Norse dialect in Denmark and Sweden.
Old West Norse and Old Gutnish did not take part in the monophthongization which changed Norse, Old: æi (Norse, Old: ei) into Norse, Old: ē, Norse, Old: øy (Norse, Old: ey) and Norse, Old: au into Norse, Old: ø̄, nor did certain peripheral dialects of Swedish, as seen in modern Ostrobothnian dialects. Another difference was that Old West Norse lost certain combinations of consonants. The combinations Norse, Old: -mp-, Norse, Old: -nt-, and Norse, Old: -nk- were assimilated into Norse, Old: -pp-, Norse, Old: -tt- and Norse, Old: -kk- in Old West Norse, but this phenomenon was limited in Old East Norse.
Here is a comparison between the two dialects as well as Old Gutnish. It is a transcription from one of the Funbo Runestones in Sweden (U 990) from the eleventh century:
The OEN original text above is transliterated according to traditional scholarly methods, wherein u-umlaut is not regarded in runic Old East Norse. Modern studies have shown that the positions where it applies are the same as for runic Old West Norse. An alternative and probably more accurate transliteration would therefore render the text in OEN as such:
Some past participles and other words underwent i-umlaut in Old West Norse but not in Old East Norse dialects. Examples of that are Icelandic Icelandic: slegið/sleginn and Icelandic: tekið/tekinn, which in Swedish are slagit/slagen and tagit/tagen. This can also be seen in the Icelandic and Norwegian words sterkur and sterk ("strong"), which in Swedish is stark as in Old Swedish. These differences can also be seen in comparison between Norwegian and Swedish.
Old West Norse is by far the best attested variety of Old Norse.[10] The term Old Norse is often used to refer to Old West Norse specifically, in which case the broader subject receives another name, such as Old Scandinavian.[3] Another designation is Old West Nordic.
The combinations Norse, Old: -mp-, Norse, Old: -nt-, and Norse, Old: -nk- mostly merged to Norse, Old: -pp-, Norse, Old: -tt- and Norse, Old: -kk- in Old West Norse around the 7th century, marking the first distinction between the Eastern and Western dialects. The following table illustrates this:
| English | Old West Norse | Old East Norse | Proto-Norse | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| mushroom | Norse, Old: s(v)ǫppr | Norse, Old: swampʀ | Uncoded languages: *swampuz | |
| steep | Norse, Old: brattr | Norse, Old: brantʀ | Uncoded languages: *brantaz | |
| widow | Norse, Old: ekkja | Norse, Old: ænkija | Uncoded languages: *ain(a)kjōn | |
| to shrink | Norse, Old: krimpa | Uncoded languages: *krimpan | ||
| to sprint | Norse, Old: spretta | Norse, Old: sprinta | Uncoded languages: *sprintan | |
| to sink | Norse, Old: søkkva | Norse, Old: sænkwa | Uncoded languages: *sankwijan |
An early difference between Old West Norse and the other dialects was that Old West Norse had the forms Norse, Old: bú, "dwelling", Norse, Old: kú, "cow" (accusative) and Norse, Old: trú, "faith", whereas Old East Norse Norse, Old: bó, Norse, Old: kó and Norse, Old: tró. Old West Norse was also characterized by the preservation of u-umlaut, which meant that, for example, Proto-Norse Norse, Old: *tanþu, "tooth", became Norse, Old: tǫnn and not Norse, Old: tann as in post-runic Old East Norse; OWN Norse, Old: gǫ́s and runic OEN Norse, Old: gǫ́s, while post-runic OEN Norse, Old: gás "goose".
The earliest body of text appears in runic inscriptions and in poems composed by Þjóðólfr of Hvinir (although the poems are not preserved in contemporary sources, but only in much later manuscripts). The earliest manuscripts are from the period 1150–1200 and concern legal, religious and historical matters. During the 12th and 13th centuries, Trøndelag and Western Norway were the most important areas of the Norwegian kingdom and they shaped Old West Norse as an archaic language with a rich set of declensions. In the body of text that has survived into the modern day from until, Old West Norse had little dialect variation, and Old Icelandic does not diverge much more than the Old Norwegian dialects do from each other.
Old Norwegian differentiated early from Old Icelandic by the loss of the consonant h in initial position before l, n and r; thus whereas Old Icelandic manuscripts might use the form Norse, Old: hnefi, "fist", Old Norwegian manuscripts might use Norse, Old: nefi.
From the late 13th century, Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian started to diverge more. After, the Black Death and following social upheavals seem to have accelerated language changes in Norway. From the late 14th century, the language used in Norway is generally referred to as Middle Norwegian.
Old West Norse underwent a lengthening of initial vowels at some point, especially in Norwegian, so that OWN Norse, Old: eta became Norse, Old: éta, ONW Norse, Old: akr > Norse, Old: ákr, OIC Norse, Old: ek > Norse, Old: ék.
In Iceland, initial pronounced as //w// before pronounced as //ɾ// was lost: compare Icelandic rangur with Danish Danish: vrang, OEN Norse, Old: wrangʀ. The change is shared with Old Gutnish.
A specifically Icelandic sound, the long, u-umlauted A, spelled (Ǫ́) and pronounced pronounced as //ɔː//, developed around the early 11th century. It was short-lived, being marked in the Grammatical Treatises and remaining until the end of the 12th century. It then merged back into pronounced as //aː//; as a result, long A is not affected by u-umlaut in Modern Icelandic.
pronounced as //w// merged with pronounced as //v// during the 12th century, which caused pronounced as //v// to become an independent phoneme from pronounced as //f// and the written distinction of (IPA|v) for pronounced as //v// from medial and final (IPA|f) to become merely etymological.
Around the 13th century, Norse, Old: Œ/Ǿ (pronounced as //øː//, which had probably already lowered to pronounced as //œː//) merged to Norse, Old: Æ (pronounced as //ɛː//). Thus, pre-13th-century Icelandic: grœnn (with (œ)) 'green' became spelled as in modern Icelandic Icelandic: grænn (with (æ)). The 12th-century Gray Goose Laws manuscripts distinguish the vowels, and so does the Codex Regius copy. However, the 13th-century Codex Regius copy of the Poetic Edda probably relied on newer or poorer quality sources, or both. Demonstrating either difficulty with or total lack of natural distinction, the manuscripts show separation of the two phonemes in some places, but they frequently confuse the letters chosen to distinguish them in others.[11]
Towards the end of the 13th century, Norse, Old: Ę (pronounced as //ɛ//) merged to Norse, Old: E (pronounced as //e//).
Around the 11th century, Old Norwegian (IPA|hl), (IPA|hn), and (IPA|hr) became (IPA|l), (IPA|n) and (IPA|r).[12] It is debatable whether the (IPA|hC) sequences represented a consonant cluster (pronounced as //hC//) or devoicing (pronounced as //C̥//).
Orthographic evidence suggests that in a confined dialect of Old Norwegian, pronounced as //ɔ// may have been unrounded before pronounced as //u// and that u-umlaut was reversed unless the u had been eliminated: Norse, Old: ǫll, Norse, Old: ǫllum > Norse, Old: ǫll, Norse, Old: allum.
This dialect of Old West Norse was spoken by Icelandic colonies in Greenland. When the colonies died out around the 15th century, the dialect went with it. The phoneme pronounced as //θ// and some instances of pronounced as //ð// merged to pronounced as //t// and so Old Icelandic Norse, Old: Þórðr became Norse, Old: Tortr.
The following text is from Norse, Old: Alexanders saga, an Alexander romance. The manuscript, AM 519 a 4to, is dated . The facsimile demonstrates the sigla used by scribes to write Old Norse. Many of them were borrowed from Latin. Without familiarity with these abbreviations, the facsimile will be unreadable to many. In addition, reading the manuscript itself requires familiarity with the letterforms of the native script. The abbreviations are expanded in a version with normalized spelling like that of the standard normalization system. Compared to the spelling of the same text in Modern Icelandic, pronunciation has changed greatly, but spelling has changed little since Icelandic orthography was intentionally modelled after Old Norse in the 19th century.
* a printed in uncial. Uncials not encoded separately in Unicode as of this section's writing.
Old East Norse or Old East Nordic between 800 and 1100 is called Runic Swedish in Sweden and Runic Danish in Denmark, but for geographical rather than linguistic reasons. Any differences between the two were minute at best during the more ancient stages of this dialect group. Changes had a tendency to occur earlier in the Danish region. Even today many Old Danish changes have still not taken place in modern Swedish. Swedish is therefore the more conservative of the two in both the ancient and the modern languages, sometimes by a profound margin. The language is called "runic" because the body of text appears in runes.
Runic Old East Norse is characteristically conservative in form, especially Swedish (which is still true for modern Swedish compared to Danish). In essence it matches or surpasses the conservatism of post-runic Old West Norse, which in turn is generally more conservative than post-runic Old East Norse. While typically "Eastern" in structure, many later post-runic changes and trademarks of OEN had yet to happen.
The phoneme ʀ, which evolved during the Proto-Norse period from z, was still clearly separated from r in most positions, even when being geminated, while in OWN it had already merged with r.
The Proto-Germanic phoneme pronounced as //w// was preserved in initial sounds in Old East Norse (w-), unlike in West Norse where it developed into pronounced as //v//. It survived in rural Swedish dialects in the provinces of Westro- and North Bothnia, Skåne, Blekinge, Småland, Halland, Västergötland and south of Bohuslän into the 18th, 19th and 20th century. It is still preserved in the Dalecarlian dialects in the province of Dalarna, Sweden, and in Jutlandic dialects in Denmark. The pronounced as //w//-phoneme did also occur after consonants (kw-, tw-, sw- etc.) in Old East Norse and did so into modern times in said Swedish dialects and in a number of others. Generally, the initial w-sound developed into pronounced as /[v]/ in dialects earlier than after consonants where it survived much longer.
In summation, the pronounced as /link/-sound survived in the East Nordic tongues almost a millennium longer than in the West Norse counterparts, and does still subsist at the present.
Monophthongization of Norse, Old: æi > Norse, Old: ē and Norse, Old: øy, au > Norse, Old: ø̄ started in mid-10th-century Denmark. Compare runic OEN: Norse, Old: fæigʀ, Norse, Old: gæiʀʀ, Norse, Old: haugʀ, Norse, Old: møydōmʀ, Norse, Old: diūʀ; with Post-runic OEN: Norse, Old: fēgher, Norse, Old: gēr, Norse, Old: hø̄gher, Norse, Old: mø̄dōmber, Norse, Old: diūr; OWN: feigr, geirr, haugr, Norse, Old: meydómr, Norse, Old: dýr; from PN Uncoded languages: *faigijaz, Uncoded languages: *gaizaz, Norse, Old: *haugaz, Norse, Old: *mawi- + Norse, Old: dōmaz 'maidendom; virginity', Norse, Old: *diuza '(wild) animal'.
Feminine o-stems often preserve the plural ending Norse, Old: -aʀ, while in OWN they more often merge with the feminine i-stems: (runic OEN) Norse, Old: *sōlaʀ, Norse, Old: *hafnaʀ, Norse, Old: *hamnaʀ, Norse, Old: *wāgaʀ versus OWN Norse, Old: sólir, Norse, Old: hafnir and Norse, Old: vágir (modern Swedish Swedish: solar, Swedish: hamnar, Swedish: vågar ("suns, havens, scales"); Danish has mainly lost the distinction between the two stems, with both endings now being rendered as Danish: -er or Danish: -e alternatively for the o-stems).
Vice versa, masculine i-stems with the root ending in either Norse, Old: g or Norse, Old: k tended to shift the plural ending to that of the ja-stems while OEN kept the original: Norse, Old: drængiaʀ, Norse, Old: *ælgiaʀ and Norse, Old: *bænkiaʀ versus OWN drengir, Norse, Old: elgir ("elks") and bekkir (modern Danish drenge, elge, bænke, modern Swedish drängar, Swedish: älgar, Swedish: bänkar).
The plural ending of ja-stems were mostly preserved while those of OWN often acquired that of the i-stems: Norse, Old: *bæðiaʀ, Norse, Old: *bækkiaʀ, Norse, Old: *wæfiaʀ versus OWN Norse, Old: beðir ("beds"), bekkir, vefir (modern Swedish Swedish: bäddar, Swedish: bäckar, Swedish: vävar).
Until the early 12th century, Old East Norse was very much a uniform dialect. It was in Denmark that the first innovations appeared that would differentiate Old Danish from Old Swedish as these innovations spread north unevenly (unlike the earlier changes that spread more evenly over the East Norse area), creating a series of isoglosses going from Zealand to Svealand.
In Old Danish, pronounced as //hɾ// merged with pronounced as //ɾ// during the 9th century. From the 11th to 14th centuries, the unstressed vowels -a, -o and -e (standard normalization -a, -u and -i) started to merge into -ə, represented with the letter (e). This vowel came to be epenthetic, particularly before -ʀ endings. At the same time, the voiceless stop consonants p, t and k became voiced plosives and even fricative consonants. Resulting from these innovations, Danish has Danish: kage (cake), Danish: tunger (tongues) and Danish: gæster (guests) whereas (Standard) Swedish has retained older forms, Swedish: kaka, Swedish: tungor and Swedish: gäster (OEN Norse, Old: kaka, Norse, Old: tungur, Norse, Old: gæstir).
Moreover, the Danish pitch accent shared with Norwegian and Swedish changed into stød around this time.
At the end of the 10th and early 11th century initial h- before l, n and r was still preserved in the middle and northern parts of Sweden, and is sporadically still preserved in some northern dialects as g-, e.g. Norse, Old: gly (lukewarm), from Norse, Old: hlýʀ. The Dalecarlian dialects developed independently from Old Swedish and as such can be considered separate languages from Swedish.
This is an extract from Norse, Old: [[Västgötalagen]], the Westrogothic law. It is the oldest text written as a manuscript found in Sweden and from the 13th century. It is contemporaneous with most of the Icelandic literature. The text marks the beginning of Old Swedish as a distinct dialect.
See main article: Old Gutnish. Due to Gotland's early isolation from the mainland, many features of Old Norse did not spread from or to the island, and Old Gutnish developed as an entirely separate branch from Old East and West Norse. For example, the diphthong Norse, Old: ai in Norse, Old: aigu, Norse, Old: þair and Norse, Old: waita was not subject to anticipatory assimilation to Norse, Old: ei as in e.g. Old Icelandic Norse, Old: eigu, Norse, Old: þeir and Norse, Old: veita. Gutnish also shows dropping of pronounced as //w// in initial pronounced as //wɾ//, which it shares with the Old West Norse dialects (except Old East Norwegian[13]), but which is otherwise abnormal. Breaking was also particularly active in Old Gutnish, leading to e.g. Norse, Old: biera versus mainland Norse, Old: bera.
The Norse, Old: [[Gutalagen|Guta lag]] is the longest text surviving from Old Gutnish. Appended to it is a short texting dealing with the history of the Gotlanders. This part relates to the agreement that the Gotlanders had with the Swedish king sometime before the 9th century:
See also: List of English words of Old Norse origin.
Old English and Old Norse were related languages. It is therefore not surprising that many words in Old Norse look familiar to English speakers; e.g., Norse, Old: armr (arm), Norse, Old: fótr (foot), Norse, Old: land (land), Norse, Old: fullr (full), Norse, Old: hanga (to hang), Norse, Old: standa (to stand). This is because both English and Old Norse stem from a Proto-Germanic mother language. In addition, numerous common, everyday Old Norse words were adopted into the Old English language during the Viking Age. A few examples of Old Norse loanwords in modern English are (English/Viking Age Old East Norse), in some cases even displacing their Old English cognates:
In a simple sentence like "They are both weak", the extent of the Old Norse loanwords becomes quite clear (Old East Norse with archaic pronunciation: Norse, Old: Þæiʀ eʀu báðiʀ wæikiʀ while Old English English, Old (ca.450-1100);: híe syndon bégen (þá) wáce). The words "they" and "weak" are both borrowed from Old Norse, and the word "both" might also be a borrowing, though this is disputed (cf. German German: beide). While the number of loanwords adopted from the Norse was not as numerous as that of Norman French or Latin, their depth and everyday nature make them a substantial and very important part of everyday English speech as they are part of the very core of the modern English vocabulary.
Tracing the origins of words like "bull" and "Thursday" is more difficult. "Bull" may derive from either Old English English, Old (ca.450-1100);: bula or Old Norse Norse, Old: buli, while "Thursday" may be a borrowing or simply derive from the Old English English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Þunresdæg, which could have been influenced by the Old Norse cognate. The word "are" is from Old English English, Old (ca.450-1100);: earun/English, Old (ca.450-1100);: aron, which stems back to Proto-Germanic as well as the Old Norse cognates.
| pronounced as /a/ (a) | pronounced as /a(ː)/[16] | pronounced as /a/ɛaː/
| pronounced as /a/ɑː/ (a); pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ (å) (+ld,rd,ng) | (a)
| ON land "land": Ic/Fa/Sw/Da/No land; ON dagr "day": Ic/Fa dagur, Sw/Da/No dag; ON harðr "hard": Ic/Fa harður, Sw/Da hård, No hard; ON langr "long": Ic/Fa langur, Sw lång, Da/No lang |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as /ja/ (ja) | pronounced as /ja(ː)/ | pronounced as /ja/jɛaː/ | pronounced as /(j)ɛ(ː)/ ((j)ä) | pronounced as /jɛ:/ (jæ); pronounced as /jæ:/ (je) (+r) | ON hjalpa "to help": Ic/Fa hjálpa, Sw hjälpa, Da hjælpe, No hjelpe, NN hjelpa; ON hjarta "heart": Ic/Fa hjarta, Sw hjärta, Da/NB hjerte, NN hjarta/hjarte |
| pronounced as /aː/ (á) | pronounced as /au(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɔ/ɔaː/ | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ (å) | pronounced as /ɔ/ɒ:/ (å) | ON láta "to let": Ic/Fa láta, Sw låta, Da lade, No la |
| pronounced as /ɛː/ (æ) | pronounced as /ai(ː)/ | pronounced as /a/ɛaː/ | pronounced as /ɛ(ː)/ (ä) | ON mæla "to speak": Ic/Fa/NN mæla, Sw mäla, No mæle; ON sæll "happy": Ic sæll, Fa sælur, Sw säll, Da/No sæl | |
| pronounced as /e/ (e) | pronounced as /ɛ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɛ/eː/ | ON menn "men": Ic/Fa menn, Sw män, Da mænd, No menn; ON bera "to bear": Ic/Fa bera, Sw bära, Da/NB bære, NN bera/bere; ON vegr "way": Ic/Fa vegur, Sw väg, Da vej, No veg/vei | ||
| pronounced as /eː/ (é) | pronounced as /jɛ(ː)/ | pronounced as /a/ɛaː/ (æ) | ON kné "knee": Ic hné, Fa/Da knæ, Sw knä, No kne | ||
| pronounced as /i/ (i) | pronounced as /ɪ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɪ/iː/ | pronounced as /ɪ/iː/ (i) | pronounced as /e/ (i)/ pronounced as /eː/ (e) | ON kinn "cheek": Ic/Fa/No kinn, Sw/Da kind |
| pronounced as /iː/ (í) | pronounced as /i(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊɪ(ː)/ pronounced as /ʊt͡ʃː/ (íggj)[17] | (i) | ON tíð "time": Ic/Fa tíð, Sw/Da/No tid | |
| pronounced as /ɔ/ (ǫ) | pronounced as /ø/ > pronounced as /œ(ː)/ (ö) | pronounced as /œ/øː/ (ø) pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ (o) [18] | (a)
| ON hǫnd "hand": Ic hönd, Fa hond, Sw/NN hand, Da/NB hånd; ON nǫs "nose": Ic nös, Fa nøs, Sw/NN nos, Da næse, NB nese, NN nase; ON ǫrn "eagle": Ic/Sw örn, Fa/Da/No ørn; ON sǫngr "song": Ic söngur, Fa songur, Sw sång, Da/NB sang, NN song | |
| pronounced as /jɔ/ (jǫ) | pronounced as /jø/ > pronounced as /jœ(ː)/ (jö) | pronounced as /jœ/jøː/ (jø) | pronounced as /(j)œ/(j)øː/ ((j)ö) | ON skjǫldr "shield": Ic skjöldur, Fa skjøldur, Sw sköld, Da/No skjold; ON bjǫrn "bear": Ic/Sw björn, Fa/Da/NN bjørn | |
| pronounced as /ɔː/ (ǫ́) | pronounced as /aː/ > pronounced as /au(ː)/ (á) | pronounced as /ɔ/ɔaː/ (á), pronounced as /œ/ɔuː/ (ó) | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ (å) | (å) | ON tá (*tǫ́) "toe": Ic/Fa tá, Sw/Da/No tå |
| pronounced as /o/ (o) | pronounced as /ɔ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ (o) | ON morginn/morgunn "morning": Ic morgunn, Fa morgun, Sw/NN morgon, Da/NB morgen | |
| pronounced as /oː/ (ó) | pronounced as /ou(ː)/ | pronounced as /œ/ɔuː/ pronounced as /ɛkv/ (ógv) | pronounced as /ʊ/uː/ (o) | (o) | ON bók "book": Ic/Fa bók, Sw/No bok, Da bog |
| pronounced as /u/ (u) | pronounced as /ʏ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊ/uː/ | pronounced as /ɵ/ʉː/ (u) | ON fullr "full": Ic/Fa fullur, Sw/Da/No full | |
| pronounced as /uː/ (ú) | pronounced as /u(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʏ/ʉuː/ pronounced as /ɪkv/ (úgv) | (u) | ON hús "house": Ic/Fa hús, Sw/Da/No hus | |
| pronounced as /joː/ (jó) | pronounced as /jou(ː)/ | pronounced as /jœ/jɔuː/ pronounced as /(j)ɛkv/ ((j)ógv) | pronounced as /jɵ/jʉː/ (ju) | (y) | ON bjóða "to offer, command": Ic/Fa bjóða, Sw bjuda, Da/No byde, NN byda, No by |
| pronounced as /juː/ (jú) | pronounced as /ju(ː)/ | pronounced as /jʏ/jʉuː/ pronounced as /(j)ɪkv/ ((j)úgv) | ON djúpr "deep": Ic/Fa djúpur, Sw/No djup, Da dyb, NB dyp | ||
| pronounced as /ø/ (ø) | pronounced as /ø/ > pronounced as /œ(ː)/ (ö) | pronounced as /œ/øː/ (ø) | pronounced as /œ/øː/ (ö) | ON gøra "to prepare": Sw göra | |
| pronounced as /øː/ (œ) | pronounced as /ɛː/ > pronounced as /ai(ː)/ (æ) | (ø) | ON grœnn "green": Ic grænn, Fa grønur, Sw grön, Da/NN grøn, No grønn | ||
| pronounced as /y/ (y) | pronounced as /ɪ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɪ/iː/ | (ö)
| ON dyrr "door": Ic/Fa dyr, Sw dörr, Da/No dør ON fylla "to fill": Ic/Fa/NN/Sw fylla, Da fylde, No fylle | |
| pronounced as /yː/ (ý) | pronounced as /i(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊɪ(ː)/ pronounced as /ʊt͡ʃː/ (ýggj) | pronounced as /ʏ/yː/ (y) | (y) | ON dýrr "dear": Ic dýr, Fa dýrur, Sw/Da/No dyr |
| pronounced as /ɛi/ (ei) | pronounced as /ei(ː)/ | pronounced as /aɪ(ː)/ pronounced as /at͡ʃː/ (eiggj) | pronounced as /e(ː)/ (e) | (e) | ON steinn "stone": Ic steinn, Fa steinur, Sw/Da/NB sten, No stein |
| pronounced as /œy/ (ey) | pronounced as /ei(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɔɪ(ː)/ (oy) pronounced as /ɔt͡ʃː/ (oyggj) | pronounced as /œ/øː/ (ö) | (ø) | ON ey "island": Ic ey, Fa oyggj, Sw ö, Da ø, No øy |
| pronounced as /ɔu/ (au) | pronounced as /øy(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɛ/ɛɪː/ (ey) pronounced as /ɛt͡ʃː/ (eyggj) | ON draumr "dream": Ic draumur, Fa dreymur, Sw dröm, Da/NB drøm, NN draum |
| (a) | pronounced as /a/ | pronounced as /a(ː)/ | pronounced as /a/ɛaː/ | pronounced as /a/ɑː/ | pronounced as /ɑ(ː)/ | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (á) | pronounced as /aː/ | pronounced as /au(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɔ/ɔaː/ | – | ||
| (ä) | – | pronounced as /ɛ/ɛː/ | – | |||
| (å) | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ | |||||
| (æ) | pronounced as /ɛː/ | pronounced as /ai(ː)/ | pronounced as /a/ɛaː/ | – | pronounced as /æ(ː)/, pronounced as /ɛ/eː/ | |
| (e) | pronounced as /e/ | pronounced as /ɛ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɛ/eː/ | pronounced as /e/eː/ | pronounced as /ɛ/eː/, pronounced as /ə/, pronounced as /æ(ː)/ | |
| (é) | pronounced as /eː/ | pronounced as /jɛ(ː)/ | – | |||
| (i) | pronounced as /i/ | pronounced as /ɪ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɪ/iː/ | |||
| (í) | pronounced as /iː/ | pronounced as /i(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊɪ(ː)/ | – | ||
| (o) | pronounced as /o/ | pronounced as /ɔ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ | pronounced as /ʊ/uː/, pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ | pronounced as /uː/, pronounced as /ɔ/oː/ | |
| (ó) | pronounced as /oː/ | pronounced as /ou(ː)/ | pronounced as /œ/ɔuː/ | – | ||
| (ǫ) | pronounced as /ɔ/ | – | ||||
| (ǫ́) | pronounced as /ɔː/ | |||||
| (ö) | – | ø > œ(ː) | – | œ/øː | – | |
| (ø) | pronounced as /ø/ | – | pronounced as /œ/øː/ | – | pronounced as /œ/øː/ | |
| (œ) | pronounced as /øː/ | – | ||||
| (u) | pronounced as /u/ | pronounced as /ʏ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊ/uː/ | pronounced as /ɵ/ʉː/ | pronounced as /ʉ(ː)/ | |
| (ú) | pronounced as /uː/ | pronounced as /u(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʏ/ʉuː/ | – | ||
| (y) | pronounced as /y/ | pronounced as /ɪ(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɪ/iː/ | pronounced as /ʏ/yː/ | ||
| (ý) | pronounced as /yː/ | pronounced as /i(ː)/ | pronounced as /ʊɪ(ː)/ | – | ||
| (ei) | pronounced as /ɛi/ | pronounced as /ei(ː)/ | pronounced as /aɪ(ː)/ | – | pronounced as /æɪ/ | |
| (ey) | pronounced as /œy/ | pronounced as /ei(ː)/ | pronounced as /ɛ/ɛɪː/ | – | ||
| (oy) | – | pronounced as /ɔɪ(ː)/ | – | |||
| (øy) | – | pronounced as /œʏ/ | ||||
| (au) | pronounced as /ɔu/ | pronounced as /øy(ː)/ | – | pronounced as /æʉ/ | ||