Old English words we should bring back

Let's resurrect some Old English words! And 🌏 get NordVPN's 2Y plan + 4 months free here ➼ nordvpn.com/robwordsvpn It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! ✌
Enjoy these 10 Anglo-Saxon words that I think we should bring back.
Apologies for my Old English pronunciation. I really tried.
LINKS & SOURCES
Max Miller making medieval mead: • Making Medieval Mead l...
Old English anthology: www.oldenglishaerobics.net/an...
Anglo-Saxon wisdom: blog.oup.com/2015/09/old-engl...
bosworthtoller.com/
oed.com/
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#AngloSaxon #OldEnglish #etymology
==CHAPTERS==
0:00 Introduction
0:42 What is Old English?
1:15 WINETREOW - friendfaith
3:03 HRÆDWYRDE - wordhasty
4:52 RUNCRÆFTIG - runecrafty
6:50 WUNDORSMIÞ - wondersmith
8:29 NordVPN
9:53 HWÆLWEG - whaleway
11:18 EARDFÆST - earthfast
12:50 MEDUDREAM - meadglee
14:57 AERSLING - arselong
16:28 UHTCEARE - morrowsorrow
18:45 FULLÞUNGEN - fullthungen

[@RobWords]

Know any more old words we should resurrect? Comment below. And🌏get NordVPN's 2Y plan + 4 months free here ➼ nordvpn.com/robwordsvpn It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! ✌

[@cool_guy87]

Love this! Made a note so I can start using them soon!

[@jcortese3300]

Fullthungen == perfect as a calque, too -- "completely made." That's really cool! And I think it we have uhtceare, then we also need uhtdream as well -- that's the feeling of waking up on a Saturday morning when you can take your time and wake up slowly. 🙂

[@gary.h.turner]

I think we should start greeting each other again with the phrase "Blithe willspell!" (literally, "pleasant tidings!")

[@KGTiberius]

Bassackwards = Ass Backwards.

[@cysshorts1529]

You should definitely make a video titled "..so I made a conlang"

[@germantoenglish898]

Some idiot drove arselong into my car this morning.

[@Tyrannosaurus_Wrexx]

I’m going to start using that. lol

[@royalroyal2210]

Perhaps he/she is having some kind of a morrowsorrow?

[@germantoenglish898]

@@royalroyal2210 He should do that in bed. lol

[@mariascheu817]

🤣For your comment -😭For the fact

[@bignumbers]

Sounds like something my dad would say

[@athelonus]

As a Swedish speaker I find myself missing the word Overmorrow, meaning the day after tomorrow, as I use the Swedish equivalent a lot: övermorgon

[@OsZ_DJ]

Same in German with "Übermorgen" or likewise 2 days back "Vorgestern"

[@queenWillowwww3893]

There’s also ereyesterday; meaning the day before yesterday. This actually leads to two words that don’t technically exist, but are synonymous with ‘today’; overyesterday and eremorrow

[@thirzalebbink402]

W e have this in Dutch too, 'overmorgen' and 'eergisteren'

[@martijn3151]

@@thirzalebbink402 indeed "day after tomorrow" or "the day before yesterday" are just way too many words :)

[@TheZINGularity]

Finnish also has "Ylihuomenna" for Overmorrow & "Toissapäivänä" for the day before yesterday.

[@AriSolMorningstar]

I never realised how beautifully poetic Old English is, it's soooo cool

[@leowa399]

One of the reasons so many German poets became popular is the way you can put a lot of emotions into words through creating them yourself

[@Gertyutz]

Middle English is also beautiful. We read "The Canterbury Tales " in its original Middle English in college.

[@renerpho]

There is a bit of bias, because many of the words come from works of poetry, rather than transcripts of everyday conversations. But it definitely was a beautiful language, and many of the words in the video were probably "real".

[@RandomWandrer]

These words are almost Dutch. Closer to Dutch than English.

[@peggyjones3282]

My husband is a soldier. He liked the word "warfaith." It's a different type of bond and trust when you've served together in combat.

[@renerpho]

Old English's ability to form compound words like this rivals German!

[@brandall9481]

"Selfdom" is one of my favorites. It's your self-kingdom. The essence of one's self. Individuality. Independence.

[@TastingHistory]

Ah! Thanks for the shoutout! I love your channel 🎉

[@RobWords]

My pleasure! Given the context, it would have been mad not to mention Max Miller's marvellous medieval mead making. Keep up the fantastic work.

[@CodyRockLee13]

​@@RobWordsAstounding alliterative abundance on display, well done.

[@domaniac9119]

@@RobWords Old English poetry at its best.

[@Elesario]

One of my favourite quotes, "A good friend will help you move, but a true friend will help you move a body."

[@jumpierpie]

-jeffrey dhamer

[@naomilangevin3944]

I love that people are always people. Having friends, feeling deep emotions, naming foods after how obviously they look like body parts. Just like modern people.

[@rcrawford42]

The origin of "avocado" is hilarious.

[@halo7oo]

I think "wordhasty" & "wondersmith" are the best of the list, I could totally see using them without anyone asking questions.

[@mebamme]

My thoughts exactly! That and "earthfast".

[@hobi1kenobi112]

I read this somewhere else but a suitable OE word for a modern airport would be the far more charming 'flyhaven'.

[@RobWords]

Let's try it. Maybe see if we can slip a morrowsorrow past (I'm starting to think that word sounds more like a hangover).

[@RobWords]

@hobi1kenobi112 Sure would! Airport is Flughafen in German, which means "flight harbour", but haven and Hafen have the same root.

[@marryof995]

@@hobi1kenobi112 so basically the german word for airport, Flughafen.

[@dasgellendehorn1393]

I grew up in a very remote area in austria with an often outdated language. we used the word "aschling" for going backward. backward with the horses for instance. today we use "rückwärts" "backwards", but grandfather used "aschling", going backwards was "in aschling". he drove the car "in aschling"

[@chrisinnes2128]

Arselings is a word that I've heard used

[@RobWords]

Superb! That's it.

[@keyem4504]

I would have used "ärschlings". Not very common and sounds rude to me, but I guess Germans would understand what it means. The -lings suffix build adverbs and is still common like in "rücklings (from behind)", "bäuchlings (on your belly)"

[@chrisinnes2128]

No i have heard in used in English

[@Chris-mf1rm]

@@chrisinnes2128it was used by one of the Anglo-Saxon warriors in the TV series of the Last Kingdom. He used it to refer to a young prince. I assumed it was a play on Ætheling. Could be where you heard it.

[@bartrolloos4204]

Being a Dutch hobby philologist, I find Old English remarkably easy to follow. Fun!

[@JeeWeeD]

Yes, I recognise so much of our language in these words!

[@rattlehead9127]

As an English speaker, that makes me a bit jealous. I'm happy you're able to appreciate it, but to a modern English speaker, Old English may as well be a completely different language.

[@Handwithaface]

@@rattlehead9127 It *is* a completely different language than modern English.

[@ennbee]

“Wondersmith” is like the public domain word for “Imagineer.” I love it!

[@Ugly_German_Truths]

I find it actually kind of disrespectful as great art never comes from a miracle, but from finely honed talent and endless hours of improving your skills... mastercrafter or something in that vein would be more acknowledging on "there never fell a master from the heavens" as we like to say in Germany ;)

[@Fayanora]

Winegeomor is a great one. In our culture, we don't value friends as much as we should, or at least not in our vocabulary. I've long thought we need a word for grieving the loss of a friend, or for the loss of a friendship. I have mourned my best friend every day since she died in 2019.

OMG! A word to describe those placid beautiful dragons flying at dawn... as opposed to the pesky noisy ones who fly at dusk. Absolutely taking this one with me. So happy I can finally describe different flying dragons!

[@MarkDDG]

As a Dutch speaker, I often understand the words before they are explained. Many of these old English words are similar to old/middle Dutch or even modern Dutch words. It often fascinates me how similar English and Dutch are in certain aspects. Even with the Norman invasion of England and the way that the English language changed. The Dutch language was also influenced a lot by French, during this and later periods, often in the same way. There are also ways that Dutch was influenced by French but English wasn’t. Although Dutch and English are quite similar to each other nowadays, in the past they would’ve been even more similar, I suppose. 😊

[@neilog747]

I've read somewhere that English and Dutch were mutually understandable until about 700 years ago.🙂

[@thorstenjaspert9394]

Without the Normans English would be more similar to Dutch, Frisian Low Low German German .

[@capusvacans]

@@neilog747 A lot of it still is, often it's just about swapping or removing a vowel or a consonnant. Eg. the following dutch phrase should be pretty easy to understand for any english speaker with an IQ higher than that of a carrot: "Ik drink melk." And no, i'm not gonna write the translation, if you cannot figure it out, well, ...

[@glendodds3824]

@@capusvacans Hi. thanks for you comment. In addition to being closely related to Dutch, English is of course also closely related to Afrikaans. For example, 'I miss you' in Afrikaans is "Ek mis jou."

[@capusvacans]

@@glendodds3824 Yep, Afrikaans is derived directly from dutch. Apart from some words and grammar like the double negation Afrikaans is pretty much perfectly comprehensible for dutch speakers. I'm pretty sure it's going to be harder to understand for an english speaker. Eg. "Ek mis jou" in dutch is "Ik mis jou".

[@thedogfather5445]

Earthfast is still in use. We use it in archaeology to describe a rock or boulder that is immovably set into the ground.

[@Skeptimystic]

Earthfast is also a cantrip (spell) to bind a person or thing to one spot, unable to move until the spell is broken.

[@meadow-maker]

yeah, I thought so.

[@thorstenjaspert9394]

As German I derdrs erdfest. Fest in der Erde stehend ​@@Skeptimystic

[@mineccraftn00b]

As a dane it is interesting to hear these old english words as many of them are closer to modern danish than modern english. It reaaly shows the common germanic origin of the languages.

[@meadow-maker]

yeah, we gained French but lost a lot in return. Shame we can't have both in the way we have both 'begin' and 'commence'.

[@martonnemeth7348]

So much more valuable lost words and concepts behind Old English that are still available in Scandinavian languages (and a bit also in German and Dutch), than the benefits with french words. Loosing of origins vs getting sophisticated aristocratic expressions, not a good result in my view..

[@Ugly_German_Truths]

Well it's not that surprising as the tribes that went over to conquer Britain were Angles and Saxons from modern Schleswig Holstein and Jutes from the area nother of that in "Jütland" the danish Main... 1500 years ago that was pretty much all one culture with danes and at least nothern german tribes in what's now germany... more southerly and along the rhine they had interacted far more with romans and kelts...

[@migrantfamily]

I’m Swedish and many of these still get plenty of use in their Swedish versions - connecting two words to make a new one comes very naturally in Swedish . Earthfast would be jordfast meaning someone who is rooted in their home soil, but jordfästa means fasten to the earth or bury.

[@RobWords]

Both are beautiful.

[@NavnUkjent]

@@RobWords We also have "jordfast" in Norwegian. In addition we have "veggfast" or "wallfast". It's often used to describe everything that is installed in a house or flat, so that it's hard to remove when moving out. If you are buying a flat or house, it will often include all "veggfaste" things.

[@beorlingo]

Arselong - baklänges

[@meadow-maker]

we have grounded already which means the same as your second spelling, in a way.

[@Redhotsmasher]

@@Joakim7471 "unwine" is "ovän".

[@arkemiffo]

Fun fact. The word "Fastland" is still a Swedish word, regularly used. It doesn't mean fortified area though, but larger landmass. If you're on an island you could go to the "fastland", which would be the actual land. I also believe that Faest- is related to our "Fäste" which means firmament, or nest. It's most likely also related to "Fästning", which is a fortified building, like a caste.

[@08ruben69]

Same use of the word in Norway

[@walkir2662]

Yep, German uses Festland for the main land when islanders talk about it.

[@RealConstructor]

In Dutch the word is Vasteland, with the same meaning as in Swedish.

[@londongael414]

I suspect "mainland" has a similar deep meaning. If you think of "maintain" as something you tenir/hold firmly in your main/hand, and the importance of land tenure (there we go again) in history, you can see it. As someone from a small island, I like the idea that "mainland" might not mean "most important land", but simply the land which was easier to hang on to.

[@bartolomeothesatyr]

In English, the word 'fastness' has an archaic alternate definition with the same meaning as 'Fästning'. It usually carries the connotation of being not just fortified but also geographically elevated, as in a fort guarding a mountain pass, or at the top of an easily-defensible steep-sided hill.

[@gregwochlik9233]

Nice video. I am a "closet conlanger" (amateur constructed (fictional) language creator). This video feels like a conlang: different "logic" to our standard english. -- Which is nice. I am in the "bring back thor, eth, ash, ethyl" team (þ, ð, æ, œ). I use and abuse them in my conlang!

[@human_brian]

Asslong is a slang word in certain midwestern US dialects already and means exactly what you described, going butt first. In usage: 'Bob fell asslong into the creek last night after having too many beers.'

[@dillonramos760]

I lived in the South for a long while and it was used there too! I was wondering why it felt so familiar!

[@garryferrington811]

In Michigan, we had "ass first."

[@dillonramos760]

@@garryferrington811 I definitely use this one, too!

[@beorlingo]

The Swedish word for backwards is baklänges. Bak is synonymous to butt.

[@danielemmons412]

was coming here to make the same comment, my mother would use asslong a lot. She was from the Midwest.

[@addebesi]

Arselong was definitely a word we used at school back in the 1970s (25 miles northwest-ish of London, Hertfordshire/Essex border). Usually referring to falling or making a fool of oneself: kind of the opposite of headfirst

[@Fetherko]

"Seat of the pants pilot" translated badly to the cosmonauts.

[@swedneck]

my favourite poo fighters song

[@matthewmencel5978]

in America, we have "backassward" and "ass-backwards" to kind that sort of thing. When people are doing something completely wrong...

[@DawnDavidson]

@@matthewmencel5978we always said “bassackwards” 😂

[@malteseowl]

@EllieDYorks We did indeed 🙂.

[@alejandrovilla6565]

I think the word "overmorrow" would be a great addition as well!

[@doomsdayrabbit4398]

Ereyesterday and overmorrow need to be brought back.

[@alejandrovilla6565]

@@doomsdayrabbit4398 definitely, "bedwards" would also be a fun one (talks about when you are about to go sleep - I'm heading bedwards)

[@bentrig9128]

I absolutely love this. Theres a depth and sturdiness to these words that modern English often fails to capture. The merger with French added a unique dynamism and spontaneity to the language - but it was at a cost to these "earthfast" concepts which reach back to our cultural beginnings. I freaking love "earthfast" btw

[@hobi1kenobi112]

We sacrificed nature and life for courtly pomp. 😢

[@Lia-zw1ls7tz7o]

2:23 German still has that: Feindschaft. Actually, I wonder, as I'm starting this video, how many of those words can be perfectly translated into modern German...? In German, these terms would be: Freundestreue, worthastig, raunkräftig, Wunderschmied, Walweg, erdfest, Mettraum, arschlängs, uchtekar, (the last one I can't find an equivalent to). Although some of the words are only regional now or part of compounds, like kar, which we still use in Karfreitag (Good Friday).

[@limelorax]

Germans not making highly specific words for 5 minutes challenge (impossible).

[@Lia-zw1ls7tz7o]

@@limelorax 😂😂😂

[@pjalne]

We still have unwine in Norway. Well, "uvenn". And it does mean unfriend (n). Like, "we had an argument and now we're unfriends."

[@red.aries1444]

The term "hydig" could be very well translated into "sinnig" and you have "wahnsinnig", "leichtsinnig", "tiefsinnig", "trübsinnig", "feindsinnig". Even the word "kleinsinnig" most Germans would understand, but for this we prefer "kleingeistig".

[@red.aries1444]

@@limelorax We might not drinking a lot of mead anymore, but after some beer or wine we still become "bier/wein-selig" and create new words. 🙂

[@Cromeman82]

walrus, still means "horse whale" btw. In German, Walross, Ross is just a fancy name for horse...

[@brigidsingleton1596]

I've heard of 'hros' for horse - though I don't recall its origin. (?) 🤔🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿😏🇬🇧🙂❤️🖖

[@amandaburnham8626]

I'm not arguing here btw... but I only knew of pferd. I also only took a year of German am college, so I definitely don't know everything. I explain my knowledge as "if I'm dropped somewhere in Germany, I know enough to survive".

[@TheYuvimon]

​@@amandaburnham8626German here 👋 Pferd is the common word for horse, "Ross" is outdated if not exactly archaic; it is understood yet not used much. Ross has a certain prestige associated with it, like a Ross is going to be at least a decent horse.

[@amandaburnham8626]

@TheYuvimon that would make sense. We were studying modern German and not how the language evolved. The upper levels were apparently studying the way it changed over time based on the other class my professor said he was teaching. The only man I know who can pull off a bow tie better than Matt Smith lol

[@AJansenNL]

The Dutch still spell it 'walrus'.

[@tommunyon2874]

My 7th grade English teacher (back during the Kennedy administration) would quote to us in Old & Middle English. He never gave us a word-for-word translation, however. He gave a general gist of the subject matter. I like the analysis of the individual words given here.

[@davidjames6879]

I find it interesting, at least in my mind, old English seems quite removed from the English we use today, yet Rob always finds logical and interesting connections that help see how it has transformed and sometimes morphed into recognizable words and letters today.

[@77slevins_video_channel]

Feondscipe is still in our current Dutch as vijandschap.

[@danielimmortuos666]

Fiendship is such a cool word, I wish English still had that

[@eivindkaisen6838]

In Norwegian too: Fiendskap

[@brixidarc5427]

In German: Feindschaft

[@phygs]

@@danielimmortuos666 we do have "enmity"

[@user-ge8yn4ql4i]

@@danielimmortuos666 No reason not to bring it back :)

[@ciankeith3999]

In modern Gaeilge (Irish), the word for 'secret' is still 'rún' (pronounced like rune). I suspect it's also from the Vikings, but it's very cool to see the links between Old English, Norse and Gaelic languages that still somewhat exist!

[@talideon]

It's likely cognate, but not an Old Norse borrowing. It's recorded too early, IIRC, to be a borrowing. Mind you, Irish borrowed plenty of words from ON, but that was during the Middle Irish period mostly.

[@MaxHohenstaufen]

celtic languages have different roots of german ones.

[@agnidas5816]

Irish probably adopted the name of runes to mean unknown since they could not read the runes. It's a descriptor from interacting - not borrowing an existing meaning but making up a new one

[@christianwithers7335]

No. The Celts and the Scandis only went their separate says 5000 years ago, so there are plenty of cognate words, Dad and Taid for example, numbers etc.

[@christianwithers7335]

No Max

[@razvanmazilu6284]

I find this whole topic of re-anglicizing English quite fascinating because it mirrors something that already happened in my own language. While English is a Germanic language with a barely perceptible Celtic substratum and a sizeable Romance (primarily French and Latin) influence, my own language - Romanian - is a Romance language with a slight Dacian substratum and a sizeable Slavic influence. In the late 18th century and throughout the 19th century there was a strong movement among Romanian language scholars to re-latinize the Romanian language after a millennium of Slavic influence. While the effects of this movement are maybe exaggerated sometimes, there's no doubt there was a large influx of Romance words during that time. Some directly from Latin, many from other Romance languages, primarily French. Today only about 15% of the vocabulary is Slavic and probably around 80% Latin in origin. Doing something similar with English would be, I believe, much, much harder. At best you might see some words making a comeback. For one, the percentage of Latin origin words, including those that came from French, is huge in English. Some estimates put it close to 60%. So it's not a favourable stating position. I don't know exactly how large the Slavic origin vocabulary was in Romanian before the process started, but it was nowhere near as large. Then there's the issue that English has become so widespread, spoken by so many people as a primary language in so many countries across the world, that it makes it difficult for local changes to make their way across the English speaking world. It does happen even today, but not on the grand scale required by some of the more fanciful ideas I've seen. Romanian, on the other hand, was (and still is) a much more localized language making such changes easier and faster. Then there's the not exactly insignificant aspect of how desirable such an effort is. When this happened in the Romanian language, there was a favourable current not only locally, but across Europe: it was the time of birth for many European nation-states and of romantic nationalism. Today I could see the idea of re-anglicizing English being easily co-opted, if not outright taken over, by some more unsavoury groups. The sort of groups that would use it service of ethnic and racial purity agendas.

[@matthiuskoenig3378]

I have no interest in making English more germanic. But I like the idea of bringing back words that were lost without replacement

[@FriedeSeiMitDir]

"Arschling" is still used in some parts of Bavaria, same meaning as earsling.

[@michaelkelleypoetry]

Oh my goodness, the Max Miller recommendation made me jump because both Rob Words and Tasting History are two of my favorite channels. I never expected one to be in the other.

[@zsoltontube]

A crossover episode would be cool.

[@SassyyjuicyMaria]

@@zsoltontube Yes please

[@HLR4th]

It is great when our novel interests intersect!

[@i.b.640]

Yes! PLEASE!

[@DawnDavidson]

*raising my hand* for a Max Miller/Rob Words crossover! Medieval cooking words, perhaps?

[@glvarner]

Nord VPN has never had a classier advertisement. Well done.

[@delikatessbruhe9843]

You just made me go back to watch an ad and I'm not even mad.

[@jaapverhoeven422]

'full-thungen': see also modern Dutch 'voldongen' which means exactly that

[@colinjackson3662]

Great stuff Rob! I Too am a Brit living in Germany and am going to have alot of fun slipping some of these words into conversations and seeing what my friends do when they later try and find a translation 😂

[@simonkoster]

On Fullthungen: in Dutch we speak of a "Voldongen feit" refering to a fact that is established beyond doubt.

[@gracewenzel]

Thank you for this Rob! While watching, I tried guessing what the Old English words meant before you gave us the meaning- I was right more often than I’d expected to be! It’s so cool hearing Old English words casually spoken. They’re different yet very familiar.

[@RobWords]

YES! Strange, yet familiar. That's precisely it.

[@burg0110]

@@RobWords Is there an old English word for 'Strange yet familiar' us modern upstarts can flog?

[@ZestonN]

​​@@burg0110There's gotta be! Closest I can think, right now, is Surreal. But, that's probably not accurate.

[@DataLal]

​@@ZestonNAlas, "surreal" is absolutely from Latin, not Old English.

[@alexmckee4683]

Halfheimlich or halfcanny would be my suggestion, half familiar or half-known, strange yet familiar.

[@KingOfSciliy]

1. Wintrue (closer to the original and still conveys the right feeling with words that still hold similar meaning). "I like my friend, there is so much wintrue between us.") 2. Redword 3. Rouncrafty (Roun is an obscure but modern descendant of the word distinct from rune) 4. Wondersmith 5. Whaleway 6. Earthfast 7. Meaddream 8. Arselong 9. Utcare? (similar harken to "utmost") 10. Fullthrongen (maybe a bit too obtuse, but I feel it conveys the meaning still)

[@FenceThis]

but the ‘ut’ in utmost has got nothing to do with dawn, it’s derived from out, here as a superlative prefix; farthest, ultimate, highest degree of

[@AbWischBar]

In Danish, friend is still “ven” and “uvenner” are friends which temporarily have fallen out. For me as a German that was a nice new word, because it does not equal to enemy, which would be “fjend”. It just means the special bond isn’t there right now … or no more.

[@LuckeGabriel]

This channel has become one of those where you go back and watch every video and then never miss any new uploads. Love it!

[@Fortepiano666]

So cool that Max Miller mentioned you, and you mentioned Max!! I’m a big fan of you both .

[@Channel-zb1fi]

I'm from Denmark. And I can understand 90% of the words. In Danish we have ven meaning friend, fjende meaning foe, skab meaning ship. We also use the word uven to describe a person who you have had a falling out with, llatter means laughter in Danish. Some of the other words are not ones we use in spoken Danish however they make total sense.

[@bliblablu]

Great video. My personal favourites among Old English words are 'elfscyne', meaning 'elf-beautiful' (elfschön in German) and 'gebeorscipe', meaning 'beer-party' in English, although I find it funnier when 'etymologically' translated into German, which would give 'Gebierschaft'.

[@ramon_rcg]

As someone who likes to read Tolkien books, in which there are dozens and dozens of Old English (and Gothic) names, I'd love a video on Old English pronunciation. Have hou ever thought about making one? There seens to be too many different opinions on OE pronunciation on the internet and I wish there's was a more trustworthy video on the matter.

[@nHans]

Listening to the dozens of different ways Modern English is pronounced-I mean, there are so many regional accents just within England-I would assume there was no one standard dialect of Old English either. In fact, despite the Medieval period having less people overall, I'd conclude that there were _more_ varieties of dialects and accents. Communities were more insular, most people were illiterate, and they traveled and mixed far less than in later times. The truth is-absent any actual audio recordings from a thousand years ago-nobody knows for sure how people spoke in those days. Every expert's opinion is, at best, an educated guess-with a large margin of error.

[@kfrommirrorland]

Try Simon Roper. He has a lot on Old English.

[@RobWords]

I struggle with the pronunciation myself. I got one or two of these wrong (e.g. I said HAT-HYORT for hātheort when it should have had a long A). But I'm working on it! Once I get it nailed, I'll do a video.

[@ramon_rcg]

@@RobWords Thank you very much, I really appreciate it! I know there were more than just one OE "accent" (not sure that's the right word for it), like the W/G for Old French, but I guess there were also a lot of "universal rules" when it comes to OE pronunciation.

[@garryferrington811]

According to that somewhat unreliable source, wikipedia, the American south had 150 distinct dialects. These must have come from the British isles, so Britain must have had a lot of them. Today there are five. By the way, "y'all" didn't show up until the very late nineteenth century. Apparently some evangelical pastor was being cute, and it caught on.

[@leslieaustin151]

Aresling.. my Mum used to talk about “asscumfust” (arse come first) to mean “backwards” or misunderstood. “They’ve got it all asscumfust”. Sounds somewhat similar… maybe it’s a bit of Worcestershire dialect. I enjoyed the video Rob, thank you for continually reminding us of that which we’ve lost. Les

[@ages6592]

The last word still exists in Swedish, it’s ”Fullgången”, generally used only for babies/pregnancies which go to term. But it’s closely related to “Fulländad” which means absolutely perfect 🤩

[@genegreigh8913]

The countervailing criteria of wordcraft are clarity, brevity, and poetry. While "miracle-worker" contemporaneously enjoys precedence over "wondersmith," three syllables are usually preferable to five. On the other hand, for a poet, depending on the meter one means to meet... in re "any more old words": I've aggressively used both ravel and anon for decades now.

[@wes7600]

Love arselong. I know it’s very popular to say “ass backwards” in reference to something that is broken or convoluted, or my personal favorite, the spoonerized “back asswards.” Though “arselong” captures that sense of misplaced confidence in progressing forwards that “back asswards” does not.

[@Shadowkiller00]

I was going to say the phrase "ass backwards" means that it was basically by accident. If someone fell "ass backwards" into their wealth, they definitely didn't do it on purpose. It was more like they tripped and ended up there by pure luck. I hadn't really thought about it in the context of "convoluted" or "broken", but I feel that "convoluted" might be a good addition to help fill out my personal definition of "ass backwards". As in that it isn't enough for it to just be accidental, but it also must be kind of crazy how it all happened as well.

[@torstenmiertsch4267]

A very nice Old English word is acweorna, which was used for the squirrel, especially the red squirrel. The word acweorna directly corresponds to the German word for squirrel, which is “Eichhörnchen” or “Eichhorn”.

[@springhuhn2674]

In Southern Germany and Austria, it is "Eichkätzchen" or "Oachkatzerl", which is "Oak Kitten".

[@RealConstructor]

In Dutch it is eekhoorn

[@FenceThis]

Egern in danish

[@FrankDijkstra]

Treow looks a lot like the Dutch word trouw, which means faith in English. Gedyldig is the same word as geduldig, which is patient in Dutch.

[@ColinStyles]

Dream, Dreamy Dreamy has the connotation of Joy, Glee ... not such a leap.

[@leod-sigefast]

That is what I think. We use dream today as both meaning sleep dream and a hoped for joy/wish. The crossover is quite obvious I think. We often dream (sleep) of things we want or desire in life (joy). It was probably similarly ambiguous in Old English .. and they did like crossover and ambiguity in Old English verse and stories.

[@DanielNotDeadYetThomas]

Wondersmith; fits what you do on KZbin quite well.

[@wolfgangpaier3010]

Love your channel! In southern german and austrian dialects some of the descendants of these words are still in use today. This is why I'd like to add the meaning of "in the wrong order" or "having the wrong priorities" for earsling (in southern german dialects "arschlaengs") Also the word eardfaest ("bodenstaendig") describes people of "good judgement" or "not living in an ivory tower of the mind" , therefore "having a good and unshakeable sense of reality" ...like a rock on the ground.

[@torstenmiertsch4267]

In some lower German dialects there exists a word for dawn which is spelled „Ucht“ or „Uchte“. This directly corresponds to the uht in uhtceare. In Old Saxon this word exists as uhta.

[@jaspermolenaar1218]

In Dutch the words for morning are ‘Morgen’ but also ‘Ochtend’, which will be from the same origin

[@CuriousMoth]

Wondersmith sounds like a D&D prestige class.

[@dracodis]

When I first heard it, my mind immediately went to "magician" or "wizard" as meanings.

[@pennyfarting]

Sounds like it would be some kind of Artificer/Sorcerer combo

[@shanineedwards6894]

Ew. A freak.

[@fibanocci314]

Willy Wonka

[@justagreekhistorian]

Old English is just such a beautiful language It's such a shame how many words we lost due to the Norman invasions and how many words got replaced with Latin counterparts EDIT: I wanna point out that I love your pronouncation of Old English

[@matthewpersad8233]

Hey, it wasn't just a loss for English. English is a very unique language and wouldn't be so without the Norman conquest. Maybe in an alternate timeline we're a bunch of Anglic speakers complaining about how our language is just *another* Germanic language.

[@justagreekhistorian]

​@@matthewpersad8233 well yeah, that's a good point of view Germanic grammar, Latin vocab But yeah regardless, English would be sick regardless

[@stephenbaker7079]

Wanna! UGH ~ WANT TO please!

[@jean-claudewallard9309]

Can you imagine how many old words have been lost in French too? English lost some old words not just because of the Norman invasions. In the selection made by Rob here, I can't really see any replacement with Latin or French. The Normans aren't responsible for everything apparently. But you're right in saying that Old English was a beautiful language. Thank you Rob!

[@neilog747]

My dislike of many French words in English is really about not liking the (murderous) Norman Conquest. In themselves, many French words are really cool. The technical words, not so much the everyday ones though. A lot of French words have a nice rhythm to them, being compounds of word-concepts.

[@5hiftyL1v3a]

Rural Australia - Arselong is already a word used sorta like you describe. Sorta similar to 'Head over Heals' or 'Arse over Tit' - so if you fell over coming home from the pub you might say 'I fell arselong into the ditch'. Has a degree of 'ungraceful and chaotic' too it. Also used is 'Arsebackwards' - 'wrong but particularly so' - if you were making something from a drawing and you got it upside down AND mirrored, or followed an upside down wiring diagram you would say that you got it 'arsebackwards'.

[@OhadLutzky]

Wordhasty is absolutely gorgeous, works as a noun too! "We'd have gotten away with it, but for your wordhaste."

[@Piime667]

15:00 In Dutch we have 'aarzeling' meaning 'hesitation'. If you are without 'aarzeling' you are determined/without doubt and moving forwards (instead of going backwards). Same etymology as 'aersling'.

[@RusNad]

Both come from arse but the ling parts are not the same origin

[@meadow-maker]

oh, an arseling sounds very different to an English ear. I like it! 🤣That's on my list of new words for certain! We already say 'arsing', 'stop arsing around and get on with your work!' 'You're always arsing around, you!'

[@meadow-maker]

@@RusNad '-ling' in English is supposed to be diminutive but, to my ear it's always a person or thing, like 'Earthling'.

[@RusNad]

@@meadow-maker In this case I think Rob is right that it actually corresponds to the modern suffix -long instead of -ling, being the opposite of headlong. The Dutch suffix -ling modifies the verb into a noun. So aarzelen as a verb is literally arsing, and the corresponding noun aarzeling would be something like an arsening. But today it just means a doubt or hesitation and no one would ever suspect it to be vulgar in any way.

[@mesechabe]

And in American English probably you also have it in British English. There is the lovely “ass-backwards.”

[@meatmoneymilkmonogamyequal5583]

I feel like we've lost a lot of interesting words from Old English. Your video really makes this clear!

[@Yahntia]

Dutch has "voldongen", which means 'complete', but rather in the sense of 'complete beyond the possibility of being changed'. Like 'fait accompli', or 'een voldongen feit'.

[@jennepape2193]

As an archaeologist, I already use 'earthfast' on a regular basis - it is used for a post which has been dug into the ground so that it stands up without needing support. But I like the idea of it being used for people as well as posts!

[@TheSteveBoyd]

"Arselong" and "wondersmith" are two that I can see myself incorporating into my daily speech and/or writing.

[@RealConstructor]

In Dutch we have a nickname for a dentist called smoelensmid. Smoel is slang for mouth and smid is smith.

[@ChelleC33]

The word ‘arselong’ is used here (Adelaide, Australia)

[@DawnDavidson]

Arselong does sound like an Aussie word! Maybe why it sounded perfectly natural to my inner “ear.” I have Aussie friends who might plausible have used it!

[@JacobODell_]

The editor deserves a raise, the little details in this video is amazing, they're a true wondersmith

[@GarfieldRex]

Old English and Latin just sound so gooooood, they deserve to be taught at schools.

[@Polska_Edits]

Both are useless langauges. The only reason Latin has any value because we gave it value. In some years, Latin will probbaly be useless too Of course, they are cool to preserve, but the average person would be better off not being taught not only a third langauge in school, but a largely useless one...

[@callum7496]

Petition to bring back *overmorrow*

[@DankePrime]

People still think there isn't a word for "day after tomorrow," while overmorrow is standing right there

[@onikavelka]

I still use it

[@brandall9481]

"Oathling" is another favorite, meaning a person under oath--modern prince (borrowed from French). The arrow that killed King Harold Godwinson killed off all future English oathlings. They became princes and princesses.

[@danielimmortuos666]

English can always bring back old English words, and honestly I think it should

[@RobWords]

Glorious!

[@landsgevaer]

Not to be confused with oafling, I presume.

[@mortarconn]

​@@landsgevaerIs you handle Danish?

[@landsgevaer]

@@mortarconn Nei. It is an anagram.

[@ingramdw1]

Fun fact: we have a whaleway station in New Zealand - it's an old railway building in Kaikoura that has been renovated into the offices of a whale-watching company.

[@adam_selgeryd]

The Swedish word for friend is "vän", presumably related to "wine", and we have the word "ovän" (the o-prefix works the same as un- in english)

[@kitcutting]

Your explanation of “runecrafty” really hearkens back to the old days of RuneScape Classic for me. There was a quest in the game called “Rune Mysteries,” whose name could possibly allude to some of the connections you were making. Great video as always, and thanks for the memories, Rob.

[@sarameitner6770]

Thanks for this, Rob. Speaking both English and German, it's easy to see where the words came from -when you look at how they have developed into modern use in German and Scandinavian languages.

[@maewest719]

19:38 "Jordfast" exist in norwegian today. "Jord" means "soil"/"land". Jord=eard "Fast" in this context means "stuck" (in other contexts it can also mean "firm) Fast=fæst. "Jordfast" in norwegian means "stuck in soil/land"

[@pietmanz]

As a Dutchman, I especially like your videos on Old English, as there are so many words I recognise - not only the ones you highlighted as being similar to Dutch. Trouw (faithful), vast (fixed), gang (hallway/tunnel) to name a few... Thank you for your many interesting videos! ❤

[@DJKLProductions]

I have the feeling that you've taken a fancy to the Ænglish community. Since you made the first video on this topic, you even mentioned them explicitly because they helped you out. This is not a complaint, but a "keep it up"!

[@BatAskal]

Thank you for sharing this with us. It's sad that we lost these hearty and rich expressions. Borrowing so many foreign terms made English 'cold' and inhuman-like that we are literally 'loss at words' to describe experiences we all humans share. Reminds me of a New Yorker comedian George Carlin's take on the power of language of how terms evolved over time to become more cold and authoritative from the word 'shell-shocked' back in 1900's to 'Post traumatic stress disorder' in our present time.

[@Basilisks666]

Not a native speaker but I like germanic languages so it's very fun to always watch your enthusiastical videos❤

[@michaellumovich8325]

Always interesting, informative and entertaining, rare enough youtube. Also sincere, honest and genuine, even more uncommon. Truly enjoy, thanks.

[@waterandshovelgardening]

I love words and language. Your channel is so much fun watch. Keep up the good work!

[@wordytoed9887]

Thank you, sir Rob! Your vigor for etymology and linguistics inspires me continue my interests in the endless interests of language.

[@hermione3muller674]

German here, the German Traum for Old English dream still means both dream and joy.

[@zeragito]

In Swedish, the literal translation of earthfast would be jordfäst, which has a very different meaning: it's an old fashioned way of saying buried. The closest equivalent (in meaning) to earthfast in Swedish would be jordnära (earthnear) which means down to earth.

[@SilverBrumby165]

I watched this straight after a Tasting History (Max Miller) video.Two of my favourite channels. This was great - I particularly I loved earthfast and runecrafty.

[@GooberFace32]

I’m learning Icelandic and also learned some German a long time ago. It’s fun to pick out cognates between Old English, Icelandic, and German.

[@DavidSallge]

For the old word "dream", there is a nice way how it may have become what you experience in your sleep. The dreams you experience at night are usually joyful, because there is a word for unpleasent dreams: nightmares. But no word for pleasent dreams. Furthermore, daydreamers are people who kind of flee to a place of joy, and if you're hoping for something good like a vacation, you say "I dream of flying to Sidney".

[@mamarijke]

In Dutch, we have the word Vijand which is pronounced similar to Feond We also have the word Geduldig for patience We have the word Vast sounds like Faest, which means firm too. I am drawn to the word Dreamcraft...love it.

[@tdflky9944]

Could you teach us old and middle English? Like a mini series?

[@hobi1kenobi112]

That would be great. 🎉❤

[@FaithLikeAMustardSeed]

Αsslong is actually a word I made up myself to describe someone who (figuratively) leads with their αss. 5 out of 5 stars!

[@kesabby]

I love all the words that use "craft". They add the sense of artistry and accomplished skill back into the expression.

[@matriz_83]

You know, as an Italian living in UK, I do immensely appreciate your passion and hard work you put into these videos. I find them fascinating and even though your whimsical "crusades" might come across as dystopical at times (i.e. wanting to reintroduce lost words or alphabets) I personally think it's important that people like you still exist in today's world, where we tend to simplify everything and lose the beautiful richness of language (and making us every day closer to that nightmare Orson Welles described so vividly in 1984). So, well done Rob and keep that going! ❤

[@neomigato]

A lot of these words are great but my favorite is Earthfast by far. It is so versatile that I feel it can be used to describe anything literally or figuratively stuck to the ground. Personally, I feel it could describe someone who is so stubborn and closeminded that they're like an immovable rock stuck to the ground.

[@gusloader123]

Actually, no. Eardfaest (Earthfast) means that the earth is NOT moving. "Fast" as in "fastened" / glued tight, not moving. Psalm 96:10 in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer has it correct. {The Psalms / Psalter in the 1662 B.O.C.P. use the Psalms from "The Great Bible" of 1539.}

[@kahlilbt]

I think Wondersmith has great appeal as a kind of tongue-in-cheek. You said it and I immediately got vibes of Willy Wonka and Elon Musk: people celebrated as industrial "miracle-worker" "geniuses" but whose truths are much more goofy and troubling. I think anything with hasty is going to have trouble catching on my side of the pond!

[@fibanocci314]

Willy Wonka is troubling?

[@kahlilbt]

@@fibanocci314 Willy Wonka uses slave labor and turned his company over to a child who won a battle royale lol

[@michaelprohr]

Wow, seeing dream as joy in Old English makes a lot of sense into how it could have made it's way into many of the modern uses. A person can sleep and have a dream, but if someone were to ask, "do you have any dreams?" Usually that means do you have anything you aspire to or hopes you have to make yourself feel happy or content with life.

[@ivohilderink8221]

As a Dutch speaker there are a lot of words I recognize, as some people have already pointed out (voldongen, feondscipe). I want to add that 'uht' in the meaning of dawn looks remarkably similar to 'ocht' in the modern dutch word ochtend, which means morning.

[@alexandrzarezin7765]

Great words! Why not bring them back? We definitely can do it. But, you, sir Rob, give me real Norman Bates vibes and I like it! Keep doing your great work! Much appreciation, much love from Voronezh, Russia.

[@auldfouter8661]

Such a good video. When cattle were still stalled in byres in Scotland , the raised walkway ( between the two grips or dung channels on either side ) was called the gang. When I looked it up before it was said to be also used in Scottish deep mining terminology. So earsgang is not such a stretch.

[@PNM_79]

I love this channel! For someone who failed English in high school I love to learn about these Olde English words

[@jamiesteiner4454]

Thank you so much for these videos. My family is bilingual, and I am often asked to explain the many oddities and inconsistencies of English. In the most entertaining but detailed fashion, RobWords has gifted me so many of the answers. I feel like an armchair etymologist, and I like it. Bravo!