Runes and Other Topics with Dr Jackson Crawford

[@JacksonCrawford]

Always a pleasure to talk to you Simon!

[@spooderman9122]

Always love seeing you two collab

[@alexanderleitner6270]

would love to see a collab with your professor Dr. Jonathan Evans as well

[@nikburisson9-pissedoffpeasant-]

Video pitch.. An Old English speaking person is talking with an Old Norse speaking person. A Old(?) Roman speaking soldier walks up to them and tries to converse with them. Maybe asking for directions. And then..... Out of no hwhere..... A Native American walks to them and says, something spiritual and meaningful in an Old(?)Native American language, then walks away.

[@jus_sanguinis]

Do you consider yourself a free speech enthusiast? If so, why did you shado wbaned me. I wrote an innocent comment* under "The Northman" video, but the next day I couldnt see it when Im not in my account. Why did you create a drama ex nihilo?! I have only one guess: you saw my channel and now you are thinking Im far right or something. But Im not far right, Im actually right center (right center aka moderate conservative in social issues and left center in economics) even according to that most famous political compass test. *"Havent seen this film yet. Btw there are three descendants of medieval Rus, not two. Belarus, Russia, Ukraine. "Belarus" literally translates as "white Rus"".

[@Galenus1234]

As a native speaker of German my first idea on "raihan" was that it might be an adjective formed with the what is the -en ending in later stages of English. Compare modern earthen ( = litterally made of earth), golden (= made of gold), oaken, woolen, and so on...

[@weepingscorpion8739]

"Simon Roper reads The Lord of the Rings" is definitely a series I would follow religiously. And of course featuring Dr. Jackson Crawford as Gollum/Sméagol (who is NOT pronounced Smígol!!!). Great video as always, guys.

[@johnfenn3188]

How about Luke Ranieri as Frodo?

[@weepingscorpion8739]

@A S Roughly, yes. In IPA, I would write it something like: /'sme:.a.ɡɔl/

[@decimusausoniusmagnus5719]

I can't ever get enough of these two lads' chit-chat.

[@covenantalist]

I've adapted the Anglo-Frisian Futhorc for use with modern English and I use it regularly, mostly when I don't want people reading over my shoulder. It took many iterations and plenty of practice, but I think I've gotten to a point where the system works well with modern English phonology and I can write relatively quickly in runes.

[@user-gj1np9rp4d]

Did you create a phonetic system or a transliteration of how things are spelled in English in the Latin Alphabet. I would like to see how you adapted it.

[@laamonftiboren4236]

Do tell 🙂.

[@covenantalist]

​@ᛚᚢᛞᚹᛁᚸ This is now the 5th time in 3 days that I've tried to leave this reply. I suspect my replies might have been automatically deleted because they contained a link to an image showing the Anglo-Frisian Futhorc with my suggested phonetic values in modern English. If you know of a way I could send you the image, I'd be happy to share it. I wanted to keep the original function of the runes as an alphabet, so my adaptation is a phonetic system for my variety of English (General Australian with influences from several others). That said, I did try to make it flexible enough to be used with other dialects of English and still be clearly understood. But of course in a phonetic system, changes in pronunciation result in some changes in spelling, and some specific IPA values would have to be modified slightly for different accents.

[@yes_head]

"Simon Casually Strolls Through Lord of the Rings" would be awesome (as long as Gollum makes regular appearances!)

[@theloafabread4341]

Man I wish my grain brain could perform at this level… absolutely fascinating stuff!! Thanks for taking time to do these and collaborate with other stellar creators. Always a nourishing treat, like a nice loaf of bread

[@stargazer5585]

I would absolutely be here for a Simon Reads Tolkien series!

[@FuelFire]

Simon casually swearing is something I didn't know I needed to hear

[@gruu]

This is my favorite collabs, thanks once again for an interesting video. I prefer the "jam" method to the strict point by point ones. Simon doing silmarillion or LOTR would be EPIC

[@benedyktjaworski9877]

+1 for the “Simon Roper reads LotR / Silmarillion” series from me. That’d be great!

[@celtofcanaanesurix2245]

these discussions are always the most insightful and entertaining, both the scholarly and the tangent conversations

[@meadish]

Ah, two of my favourite KZbinrs at it again. What a treat!

[@pabloalvez915]

Simon Roper is like the David Attenborough of Linguistics. I just can't get enough of these fine videos. 💐

[@L-mo]

Divergence in facial hair grooming practices in northern England and the US.

[@andrewcrampton3433]

The Hobbit has the biggest runic content so that might be a good place to start. It got me started on old English runes as my first runes.

[@Matty002]

been subbed to simon for ages but only just discovered jackson. this is a great crossover!

[@jkoperski9925]

It's like old lost brothers who got to know about each other again via KZbin. I love both of your ways, works and charisma. Stay as cool as you are and keep yourself getting out there. Love and greetings from Germany

[@domsjuk]

Very interesting conversation as always! And a special thanks for the careful written annotations.

[@seamussc]

I grew up in the Southern US, and although I don't have much of a Southern accent, I had no idea cuss and curse were the same word until I was a teenager. The non-rhotic Cuss to me was profanity, the rhotic Curse referring to magic/bad luck.

[@mitzvahgirl613]

I didn't realize they are the same word until today! Mind blown... And I'm nearly 40 😂

[@Ramngrim]

Some Norwegian dialects have the non-rhoticity before s. Of course, fors>foss is common in all Norwegian, but the traditional dialect where I grew up in rural Trøndelag, also has verst>væst, fyrst>føst, størst>støst and others. I still have the non-rhotic features, and so do many others around my age, but it's disappearing among younger speakers.

[@meadish]

Is the 's' in 'væst'/føst/støst in your dialect exactly the same as if it occurs at the beginning of a word (tip of the tongue located under the alveolar ridge), or is the tongue located further inside the mouth and slightly curled (as it is in "fors" and "störst" in my dialect of Swedish)?

[@Ramngrim]

@@meadish , it's an alveolar/dental sibilant, same as the s in "fast", "sol". We have the sound you describe, too, like in the name "Lars", and in "vers". The rs>s change occurs mostly before t.

[@KevDaly]

The partial non-rhotacism thing is interesting - that's presumably why Americans have "ass" for "arse" (and old-timers in Westerns say "cuss" for "curse" and "hoss" for "horse") (whereas in more comprehensively non-rhotic dialects the "r" is retained in writing but disappears from speech with something like compensatory lengthening, so still remains useful for marking the pronunciation of the vowel)

[@iykury]

i still hear people say "cuss" but specifically when referring to swear words and not "curses" in general

[@denntombstone7004]

great channels, definite gifts that we have Linguists like these two on the platform 🥃

[@neilog747]

Fascinating. From the little research I did, I found that the English wives of incoming Norman-French were dropping their English names and adopting French ones from the get go, while the Normans were also known for mocking English dress. The lack of knowledge about the affect of the Norman Conquest on English culture is weird, because historical tracts, though sparse, are there. William of Malmesbury wrote that it was a 'shame to be English' after the conquest, so it can make sense to posit that the Conquest shamed the English into dropping some of their cultural traditions, such as the use of their own ethnic English names, or maybe runes. Also, I don't think the Saxons adopted Runes, even on the continent, whereas the Frisians did. The Saxons were illiterate!!

[@yeahboy2277]

Love these vids with you and jackson crawford so much! Always very interesting

[@AutoReport1]

So do a meet up in Scandinavia. Almost a day trip.

[@geoffgjof]

Are there other options for what the second word on the broach is? Could it be Luda gebo te? Like "give" ? Or what about the old dutch word "gebete" which is the dative form of "gebet" meaning "prayer" ? Or what about the word "gebode" meaning "commanded" ? Didn't they sometimes just use t's instead of d's? Also, were the languages more pitched in the past? Norwegian has their different pitch stress and Dutch is very sing songy in the way it sounds. Pitch is still used in English to indicate a question is being asked, and other subtle differences when saying similar words. Perhaps a lost pitch system is why we have so many similar words that mean similar things, that branched off into different vowels once we started using that innovation in writing. Weren't a lot of the really older languages just written in consonants? (ie Hebrew)

[@erikawhelan4673]

The only known abjads were used by the West Semitic languages, some Iranian languages, and languages in areas where Islam is the dominant religion. Sumero-Akkadian cuneiform, which is older, was a logosyllabary. Egyptian hieroglyphs, which are also older, were mostly logographic with some alphabetic and syllabic characters.

[@melissamybubbles6139]

You guys are adorable!

[@robthetraveler1099]

Wholeheartedly agree on Simon taking a casual stroll through LOTR!!

[@Aeslyth]

I'm surprised around the 35 minutes mark when discussing why Anglo-Frisian fuþorc went out of fashion the influence of Abrahamism wasn't taken into consideration, as usually the Fuþorc was associated with an old Pagan past.

[@johngavin1175]

Abrahamism? Now that's a word I haven't heard before. Certain Abrahamists love using the word "evolutionism" which irritates some people.

[@Aeslyth]

@@johngavin1175 it's a useful catch all term when wanting to talk about all of Christianity, Catholicism, Judaism and Islam.

[@johngavin1175]

@@Aeslyth It's very useful. But I still think "bullshit" would be a more fitting term,ha ha.

[@demi3115]

Just for the future, but Frisian was spoken from the Zwin to the Wezer, aka the north sea coast. And Dorestad was an important city, so the trade between the communities is there.

[@KevDaly]

When there are only few inscriptions does that suggest that they were often written on perishable materials, since there presumably needed to be enough in circulation for runic literacy to survive even as long as it did in England? Or (perhaps as a reaction to the Norse invasions) was there a period of active destruction because they were regarded as heathen?

[@AutoReport1]

In West Saxon oId English OE goes to E Ethel, patrimony, fortune. In Scandinavia Latin oddly becomes the language of law and education, while in England Old English survived in legal terms and language.

[@mikeholt2112]

I need roper and crawford and raineri to spend an hour+ talking various American dialects.

[@jctothel]

Yes!! Fucking love your videos Simon!

[@uncleglasses6115]

yessss

[@katiekelly5369]

Simon is great

[@bendthebow]

I would buy that the Germanic languages have drifted in parallel without necessarily interacting. So becoming more analytical, non-rhoticity, certain vowel shifts. It makes sense that similar languages in similar conditions would evolve in parallel

[@advancedwatcher]

Joy! Swear all you like Simon. And don't wash your hair. You rebel.

[@AnnaAnna-uc2ff]

Thanks.

[@MarkRosa]

14:57 When talking about the word "raihan", you guys had me totally confused with "roe as in roe deer", because in German "Reihe" means a *row* (of items or people). I had never thought about that pair of English homonyms before.

[@Galenus1234]

Roe (deer) is cognate with German Reh

[@DaKotaCole]

Such an interesting video. I have to say though, I am loving your hair and beard, Simon. Your good looks kept distracting me 💗

[@eindummkopf2970]

I wonder if the drop in the use of runes after the Norman conquest could have something to do with harald hardradas invasion during the same period

[@johnfenn3188]

Hartford is actually very close to Caistor by Norwich / Caistor St Edmond

[@johnfenn3188]

Sorry, I meant Harford!

[@syystomu]

I would say palatalisations are very common in languages in general. To me at least, although I'm not a phonetician by any means, it seems like one of the more common sound changes. ETA: Although my guess is that [t] is more likely to be affected than [k], but I've still run into the [k] palatalisation often enough. Of the languages I've studied (some more thoroughly than others but all enough to know about this particular sound change) there's French, Votic and Mandarin at least, none of which are related or had any significant contact with each other but all of which went through a palatalisation of the [k] phoneme at some point in their history. Those are just the ones that I can name off the top of my head that are non-Germanic. I know it's a limited sample size but at least I think it demonstrates that it's not a particularly unusual kind of change.

[@empyrionin]

Standard Italian, Romanian, Faroese, etc

[@gertrudlehmann4869]

Thank you!

[@KevDaly]

As for the scrpt on coins - could royal inscriptions on coins use the Roman alphabet because of an intentional desire to express romanitas, reinforcing authority by associating it with the the former great power?

[@antonyreyn]

Or a personal thing on coins with the monier using his own name in runes as he had always done and the higher status name in latin cheers

[@AutoReport1]

There are Germanic inscriptions from the Roman era in Britain.

[@katiekelly5369]

i think i like to be friends with him. he seems like a long lost cousin

[@adam.bolivar]

Regarding runes abruptly not being used after the Normal Conquest, it may have been for the same reason that the Anglo-Saxon lyre suddenly disappeared. To quote Wikipedia: "Being used as a vehicle for English culture, the lyre became associated with English nationalism and anti-Norman sentiment and was outlawed by the Normans in the 12th century." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Saxon_Lyre

[@Aeslyth]

This is an amazing rabbit hole. Thank you.

[@BobSarobe]

Yaay

[@AnnaAnna-uc2ff]

Tarsals are near the Toes

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

If an icelander came to my land and wrote down that in his travels he met a Gunthar Erikson you would be forgiven for mistakenly thinking that I am a germanic person (even tho in reality Im pure baltic).

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

I always have a hard time deciding how many sounds latviešu language has. I for example make a difference between v, w and u, but our writing system has only v and u and most people dont even notice that they are not saying v in words like nav and dievs. But everyone well educated knows that one of our grate writers wrote nau so this so nav not having a real v it is somewhat known where as n making a different sound if g is in the same silable right after n is something basically no one knows but I do since I realized that king has a different sound than kin and then realize this too happens in my native tongue with kungs having a different than normal n (funilly enough our loan word for that titule is ķēniņš so clearly who ever was loaning that centuries ago realized that germans arent saying n before the g and so used our different n which is ņ making me think that n if followed by g made the same n sound back in those days in our language).

[@micayahritchie7158]

58:26 on that point there. I'm Jamaican. Jamaican Patwa is largely non rhotic when it borrows English Lexicon. R is pronounced after a vowel only in world final position burn is something like bɔn corn like kɐːn but car like kʲɐːr Jamaican English however is entirely rhotic and since I started taking an interest in linguistics I've never really understood this phenomenon

[@Correctrix]

Ooh, Simon with long hair.

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

When I spell the same word different ways in the same text its because I dont view english as being phonetic but rather hieroglyphic, and if I dont know the hieroglyph Ill just make a guess as to how it might be so thats why it end up different because it has no connection to the way I speak what so ever. In my native tongue you will never find me writing the same word in to different ways unless it was sayed in too differet ways, this is because we write phonetically so I just write down the prefix-root-sufex-ending based on how I would say it.

[@micayahritchie7158]

The thing is English is big. It's hard to be both phonetic and inclusive if you have a small language with a relatively young script or regular spelling reforms staying phonetic shouldn't be that bad. Even Spanish spelling or breaking down in consistency due to the large variety of dialects. I wouldn't say I see English words as heiroglyphic even if they rarely reflect my pronunciation I see it of more of a spectrum. As you can imagine a large speech community with no centralized body controlling spelling can end up with competing spelling paradigms on sound splits and multiple correct spellings on mergers so it can easily become guesswork from that point. The problem English had is that they picked from that soup almost randomly which words became the standard. If you know the standard you'll only ever write it but if you know the soup and are unsure of the standard then it becomes easy to do the multiple spellings thing with your writing being partially phonetic but not one to one. Not even necessarily a function (in the mathematical sense) from sounds to characters

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

Tu is singular and jūs is plural. To latvieši there is no formal informal destincton in language its just that what the english would consider formal is more often than not a speach adressed to many.

[@beepboop204]

[@davinheagertans4275]

These guys are pretty fucking cool. I like swear words. I'm wondering about the etymology of swear words throughout the history of English and all languages.

[@AutoReport1]

There's more archaic English in the Silmarillion

[@johnfenn3188]

Caistor = /ceiste (the last e being a schwa).

[@Excommunicated-ei1ep]

The Old English (“Northumbrian”) Runic Alphabet, should replace the English Roman Alphabet, especially since we Type more than Write these days . . . which would also get rid of the Doubling up of the English Roman Alphabet, by getting rid of both Lower and Upper Case Letter’s.

[@jacobandrews2663]

Haha I wouldn't go that far but it sure would be nice to be able to download a version of the Qwerty keyboard in that alphabet... y'know as oposed to having to go online and copy/paste each individual character you want

[@Excommunicated-ei1ep]

@@jacobandrews2663 It would save on the Paper (if Printing), that’s for sure, a more streamlined Alphabet, that doesn’t use so many Characters, therefore you’re not typing so much or using up so much space, either on Screen or on Print? It might even make both Learning to Read and Write easier too? With things like Dyslexia for example?

[@weepingscorpion8739]

Sounds like an interesting concept. But you'd need to "solve" the problem of loan words. It's pretty straight forward though I guess like ch would be k ch or sh depending on the use, so kaos (chaos), shef (chef), and chief.

[@Excommunicated-ei1ep]

@@weepingscorpion8739 It would cut out most those Unnecessary Letters especially the Silent ones . . . it would also address those Imposed “Loan” Words too? Because it would be a more Phonetic Spelling in Runic, these “Loan” Words are often spelt in a more Franco-Latin way, but are more pronounced in a more Anglo-Saxon(?) English way? Runic would also end this Conflicting Spelling vs Pronunciation with these Foreign Loan Words too.

[@weepingscorpion8739]

@@Excommunicated-ei1ep Cool. Because a 1:1 remapping from Latin to Runic would make very little sense. So it's cool that you're taking this from a phonetic side rather than an orthographic side.

[@montealegreluis5983]

Genial 😍😍

[@scott3013]

Pardon me while I dumb down this comments section a bit. Does studying runes and old Scandinavian languages help one preserve an impeccable hairline?

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

I for one refuse to say that the english write in the latin alphabet I say the english write in english hieroglyps.

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

Im a Tolkien fan. Make the videos.

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

There are no place names I cant pronounce because I say spelling = pronounciation.

[@Bravactkins]

Simon is way cooler, with love from England

[@baltulielkungsgunarsmiezis9714]

All my comments in one If an icelander came to my land and wrote down that in his travels he met a Gunthar Erikson you would be forgiven for mistakenly thinking that I am a germanic person (even tho in reality Im pure baltic). I for one refuse to say that the english write in the latin alphabet I say the english write in english hieroglyps. There are no place names I cant pronounce because I say spelling = pronounciation. Id say being able to write kanji among the japanese its seen as you being more educated. Also I personally jokingly say that the ones who cant atleast read gothic are uncultured swine. And to anyone who cant write cursive well I actually look down on those. Tu is singular and jūs is plural. To latvieši there is no formal informal destincton in language its just that what the english would consider formal is more often than not a speach adressed to many. I always have a hard time deciding how many sounds latviešu language has. I for example make a difference between v, w and u, but our writing system has only v and u and most people dont even notice that they are not saying v in words like nav and dievs. But everyone well educated knows that one of our grate writers wrote nau so this so nav not having a real v it is somewhat known where as n making a different sound if g is in the same silable right after n is something basically no one knows but I do since I realized that king has a different sound than kin and then realize this too happens in my native tongue with kungs having a different than normal n (funilly enough our loan word for that titule is ķēniņš so clearly who ever was loaning that centuries ago realized that germans arent saying n before the g and so used our different n which is ņ making me think that n if followed by g made the same n sound back in those days in our language). When I spell the same word different ways in the same text its because I dont view english as being phonetic but rather hieroglyphic, and if I dont know the hieroglyph Ill just make a guess as to how it might be so thats why it end up different because it has no connection to the way I speak what so ever. In my native tongue you will never find me writing the same word in to different ways unless it was sayed in too differet ways, this is because we write phonetically so I just write down the prefix-root-sufex-ending based on how I would say it. Im a Tolkien fan. Make the videos.

[@williamcooke5627]

'hronaes ban' = 'whalebone'.

[@jus_sanguinis]

Simon, can you ask him why did he shado wban me. I wrote an innocent comment* under "The Northman" video, but the next day I couldnt see it when Im not in my account. Why did he create a drama ex nihilo?! I have only one guess: he saw my channel and now thinking Im far right or something. But Im not far right, Im actually right center (right center aka moderate conservative in social issues and left center in economics) even according to that most famous political compass test. Also can you ask him does he consider himself a free speech enthusiast? *"Havent seen this film yet. Btw there are three descendants of medieval Rus, not two. Belarus, Russia, Ukraine. "Belarus" literally translates as "white Rus"".

[@livmarlin4259]

Simon Raper.

[@zacharytan3912]

this profile is wild

[@oLunch]

I believe it's Simon Rapper, his stage name for his alternate rapper career

[@micayahritchie7158]

Did Simon do something to you ma'am?

[@livmarlin4259]

@@micayahritchie7158 Sadly he didn't!

[@micayahritchie7158]

@@livmarlin4259 Sadly?