Old Norse: Word Order Basics

A look at some of the basic facts about word order to keep in mind when translating Old Norse prose (or translating into it).
Dr. Jackson Crawford is Instructor of Nordic Studies and Nordic Program Coordinator at the University of Colorado Boulder (formerly UC Berkeley and UCLA). He is a historical linguist and an experienced teacher and translator of Old Norse, Modern Icelandic, and Norwegian.
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Latest FAQs: • Video (updated Nov. 2018).
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Audiobook: www.audible.com/pd/The-Poetic...
Jackson Crawford’s translation of The Saga of the Volsungs: www.amazon.com/gp/product/162...
Audiobook: www.audible.com/pd/The-Saga-o...

[@Fridrik-]

This still holds up in modern Icelandic. These all work to a different degree and create a different affect. - I drove the car (most common, everyday) - I the car drove (sound poetic) - The car I drove (sounds poetic) - The car drove I (sounds old style, could also be an old style question) - Drove the car I (least functional, but understandable) - Drove I the car (a question, but can function as a statement if one puts a time reference at the beginning - Then drove I the car)

[@Tina06019]

Friðrik Bjarnason And all of those sentences can at least sort of get the meaning across, because the car cannot drive us. At least, thank heavens, not yet.

[@Fridrik-]

@@Tina06019 I would change to me if the car was driving.

[@LolTollhurst]

Same rules apply to Swedish coincidentally

[@AlotOfSunInHeaven]

I got interested in comparing to modern Norwegian: - Eg køyrde bilen = normal way of saying it - Eg bilen køyrde = only works in poetry - Bilen eg køyrde = only works in poetry - Bilen køyrde eg = works very well in many instances - Køyrde bilen eg = does not work, not really understandable - (Då) køyrde eg bilen = this is, as you say, a question without the other word in the beginning. This is because it becomes a dependent clause with it, and in Norwegian at least this word order is obligatory in dependant clauses.

[@Fridrik-]

@@AlotOfSunInHeaven it's almost like they are related languages :D

[@Tina06019]

I enjoy the grammar lessons, even though I’ll never remember the information.

[@Darvit_Nu]

I'm good with Shakespeare and "strange" word order. I'm working on figuring out which words fall into the cases in a sentence. Some are distinctly easier than others to sort out! I'll get it eventually because I am determined to learn this! ^_^

[@sirseigan]

It is interesting to see how similar the word order is to older Scandinavian dialects. The dialects of northern Swedish regulary use another word order then, at times almost opposite to, standard Swedish. This word order is often similar that of old norse.

[@fisherpeyton2824]

I realize it's kind of randomly asking but does anybody know of a good place to watch newly released movies online ?

[@lukaelliot4830]

@Fisher Peyton i would suggest FlixZone. Just google for it =)

[@hezekiahtripp2711]

@Luka Elliot Yea, I've been watching on flixzone for years myself :)

[@fisherpeyton2824]

@Luka Elliot thanks, I signed up and it seems to work :) I appreciate it !!

[@lukaelliot4830]

@Fisher Peyton Happy to help =)

[@MisterTipp]

I'm Scandinavian and it sounds poetic with some of the word orders!

[@natemarx4999]

Professor Crawford is the Longmire of Norse literature.

[@clayton895]

Hey Crawford! Smiles from Texas! I love your videos, and I really hope you keep growing as fast as you have been. You deserve it -- you're one of the only good academics on this platform. The information you are spreading is largely unknown to most people, especially outside of European groups. All the interest I've had prior regarding the Norse and Scandinavia as a region has only been heightened by your videos and your ability to interpret them with rigorous logic. You're doing a significant service not only to the people that view your content but also to the long-dead Norse people as well. I'm sure they'd feel more than honored to see that folks so different from their own are interested in their culture, so many centuries later. Your content inspired me heavily to explore the countries of Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark on my own -- both physically and in personal research. This part of the world remains important to me largely because of my Scandinavian ancestry, but your videos have also driven me to try to understand the histories of the Sami and Finnish peoples. Personally, I think these countries are just as interesting and diverse today as they were back then. It seems that a lot of the culture has stuck around, especially in Iceland and in rural Norway, possibly reflecting some of what we know today about the Norse and the greater Germanic peoples. Your interpretations of these ancient times are thorough, logical, and rigorously scientific. I respect your cautious nature when dealing with what is fact and what is speculation, especially considering just how little information we have regarding these fair-haired ocean trekkers. p.s.: Don't leave the speech corrections dangling too long... for example, at 1:30. The text becomes a bit of an eye-sore after awhile. A lot of your speech corrections seem a little unnecessary as well, but I totally understand your need to convey correct and proper information to your viewers. Keep it up!!

[@reddeath7997]

Off topic of the video, I bought The Saga of the Volsungs and in process of reading it, it is very enjoyable! Thanks alot plan on buying the others soon.

[@aaronaltizer3288]

Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of York. When the sentence begins with an adverb in German (I've read) the order is verb-object. As it used to be in English.

[@sunshinesilverarrow5292]

Thank you! 🌞

[@shadialomari1634]

Arabic has a free word order because the syntactic endings determine the function of the word in the sentence.

[@faramund9865]

11:04 "Hvat vill þú af oss þiggja?" Has the same order in Dutch: "Wat wil je van ons krijgen?". Note that Dutch is one of the few Germanic languages where "du" has been replaced by "je/jij/ghij", which I think originally was the way to say "you (people)". Which then became the polite way to say "you", a bit like "Sie" is the polite form for "you" in German. But after a while it became the norm and now "u" is the polite form.

[@faramund9865]

@@FrozenMermaid666 You are different fam. I don't know why but I kind of like it. I was just doing some research on inferiority complex, and I'm seeing some superiority complex signs I think. Don't worry, we all have our problems.

[@flugit]

Could I build sentences to speak in the same word orders as english and have it be understandable?

[@anotherelvis]

So in the sentence "Deyr fe" the verb is placed in front of the subject. How can the reader determine that this sentence is not a question? Would that require a different ending of the word fe?

[@user-sy6oj1ii7e]

Hi if you could help me out that would be great. I want to get a tattoo of AEethRASBANI. I think I translated it correctly. It should be Bane of Fear or Slayer of Despair. I don't want something mistranslated tattooed on me so if you could make sure I did it right that would be great

[@frostflaggermus]

this makes me realize norwegian is also a little more lax about world order than english. like... while odd word orders may sound old to me, it still doesn't sound wrong.

[@paulkarch3318]

"I trust them not." is legal I believe.

[@meadowbailey8957]

So if you were to say "flower of the mountain" Would it be Blóm ór Fjall? Or "field of stars" bjǫð ór stjarnas? These don't have actions/verbs in them and I'm quite confused

[@AlotOfSunInHeaven]

I would suggest "fjallblómið" for the first one. "of the" isn't really a common structure in Old Norse while just saying "the mountain flower" is.

[@robinviden9148]

Put the possessor in the possessive case. blóm (flower) fjallsins (of the mountain) bjǫð (field) stjǫrnunnar (of the stars) - or perhaps akr stjǫrnunnar? Or make compound words of them, as suggested by AlotOfSunInHeaven. But I think blómið is the definite form of blóm, isn't it?

[@robinviden9148]

The preposition ór means more like out of (as in "I'm out of bed" or "made out of clay").

[@anotherelvis]

BTW Modern Norwegian and Icelandic sometimes have different word order than modern Swedish and Danish. Did the old Eastern and western Norse dialects also have different word order?

[@robinviden9148]

We have? In what sense? I've never thought about that, even though I speak both Norwegian and Swedish. The only instance I can think of is that it's more common for the possessive pronoun to come after the noun in Norwegian. It's still possible in Swedish, though, but not as common as in Norwegian.

[@InvisibleJiuJitsu]

how about a lesson on how to roll your R's?

[@brandonschubert7434]

Feel around in your mouth - if it's like mine, there should be a point where the roof shifts to a steeper incline. Lightly touch the tip of your tongue at the change point and vocalize.

[@evefreyasyrenathegoddessev4016]

Nah, all Rs should be pronounced softly in all languages - rolled / hard Rs sound harsh, while soft Rs sound pretty and refined!

[@GH-cy6fh]

I am debating whether or not to learn Norwegian or Old Norse first. What say ye, people of KZbin? Is Old Norse a good fondation for scandanavian languages?

[@hrafnkellhardarson9206]

If you learn Old Norse you are also learning modern Icelandic and a lot of the language spoken in the Faroese Islands. If you learn Norwegian you are also learning Danish and a lot of Swedish. Hope this helps.

[@AlotOfSunInHeaven]

If you do choose to learn Norwegian, which I highly recommend, teach yourself Nynorsk. As this is the actual Norwegian language, while Bokmål is a Dano-Norwegian koiné-language.

[@GH-cy6fh]

@@AlotOfSunInHeaven is Nynorsk the language that the song: "Heiemo" is in?

[@AlotOfSunInHeaven]

@@GH-cy6fh Well kind of. The song Heiemo is in a Norwegian dialect (we have many, but they are mutually intelligible) and Nynorsk is based on the Norwegian dialects. While Bokmål in the other hand is slightly Norwegianized Danish.

[@GH-cy6fh]

@@AlotOfSunInHeaven thanks!

[@arconofanarchy8707]

Looks cold...

[@TheRealThaenatos]

Almost seems like English got its word order from Old Norse! While some phrases sound "old school" they still make sense if you put it into a context of older English or Yoda lol.

[@willinnewhaven3285]

It disappointed me when I saw that the medieval Norse translators failed to capture the beauty of the English-language original by Poul Anderson

[@vibbe2525]

I love mythology and I love fantasy and that's the worst thing ever, both make up fake fakts about things that never happend and both claim that their truth is the only truth :D

[@robinviden9148]

I don't believe Fantasy has ever made such claims. :-D