s***@gmail.com
2017-07-22 19:17:46 UTC
I think that as a linguist JRR would have been interested. "Anglish"
is a proposed form of modern English taken closer to its Anglo-Saxon roots.
That is, it's a form of linguistic purity, with non-Germanic words replaced
with Germanic ones. The few examples I've seen/heard aren't all that immediately
clear, but easier than, say, Early Modern English (the language of Shakespeare).
See YouTube "Anglish - What if English Were 100% Germanic" which describes
four basic translation strategies:
1. Choose Germanic English words in current use rather than their Romance
(or other) equivalents.
Example: adj "sundry" in place of "various".
2. Revive rarely used or obsolete English words of Germanic or
Anglo-Saxon origin.
The LotR has many of these. See http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/words.php
Example: ME n "besom" - A broom made of twigs tied round a stick.
From the TT: "...his [Treebeard's] beard stood out stiff as a great besom."
3. Adopt words from Old English or other Germanic languages and
adapt them if necessary.
Example: n "farseeer" for "television" (from German "Fernseher", literally
"remote seer", one who sees from afar. Might also be a better word for
a Palantir than "crystal-ball".)
4. Create new words based on Old English or other Germanic roots.
Examples: adj "nameknown" instead of "famous" and
adj "dwimmer-crafty" - skilled in the arts of magic, especially the power
of illusion. From ME n "dwimmer" ("illusion, delusion, sleight, magic").
Another interesting example is "Ymirstuff" for Uranium.
I wonder how close the LotR text is to Anglish. Probably closer than most
modern writing as JRR was not only highly skilled with words and chose them
with care, he held Anglo-Saxon culture in high regard.
And yet the book was so highly readable that I never stumbled over words
new to me such as "weapontake", even if the meaning I assumed from
the context was technically wrong (issuing weapons) it still made sense
in the story line.
But imagine the whole story translated into pure Anglish; that would be some
achievement. I wonder if I'll ever see it.
Meanwhile here's a summary of the LotR in Anglish:
The Lord of the Rings is a three-part high wonder saga written
by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien between 1937 and 1949 in the English tongue,
and forlayed (published) between 1954 and 1955.
The three forlayed books are: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Keeps,
and The Coming-back of the King.
The plot follows the tale of The Hobbit, also by Tolkien. Wizard Gandalf
finds out that Bilbo's ring is in truth a well-known witchly ring which
holds the might of dark lord Sauron. The ring is given to Frodo,
who takes it to elvish town Rivendell, where a moot is held to choose
what to do with it. It is chosen that Frodo must throw the ring into
Berg Doom, and sets out together with a fellowship of hobbits Samwise,
Pippin and Merry, dwarf Gimli, elf Legolas, and men Boromir and Aragorn.
At the beginning of The Two Keeps, the fellowship breaks up while
in a fight against Orcs in which Boromir dies. Frodo and Samwise go
on to Berg Doom alone, while the other fellows go on other errands
akin to the war, such as warding the Orcish strikes on the Burgs
of Minas Tirith in the Kingdom of Gondor, and Hornburg in the Kingdom
of Rohan.
http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings
ps. My own lexical knowledge isn't anywhere near adequate to have even tried
writing this article in Anglish.
--SPQ--
is a proposed form of modern English taken closer to its Anglo-Saxon roots.
That is, it's a form of linguistic purity, with non-Germanic words replaced
with Germanic ones. The few examples I've seen/heard aren't all that immediately
clear, but easier than, say, Early Modern English (the language of Shakespeare).
See YouTube "Anglish - What if English Were 100% Germanic" which describes
four basic translation strategies:
1. Choose Germanic English words in current use rather than their Romance
(or other) equivalents.
Example: adj "sundry" in place of "various".
2. Revive rarely used or obsolete English words of Germanic or
Anglo-Saxon origin.
The LotR has many of these. See http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/words.php
Example: ME n "besom" - A broom made of twigs tied round a stick.
From the TT: "...his [Treebeard's] beard stood out stiff as a great besom."
3. Adopt words from Old English or other Germanic languages and
adapt them if necessary.
Example: n "farseeer" for "television" (from German "Fernseher", literally
"remote seer", one who sees from afar. Might also be a better word for
a Palantir than "crystal-ball".)
4. Create new words based on Old English or other Germanic roots.
Examples: adj "nameknown" instead of "famous" and
adj "dwimmer-crafty" - skilled in the arts of magic, especially the power
of illusion. From ME n "dwimmer" ("illusion, delusion, sleight, magic").
Another interesting example is "Ymirstuff" for Uranium.
I wonder how close the LotR text is to Anglish. Probably closer than most
modern writing as JRR was not only highly skilled with words and chose them
with care, he held Anglo-Saxon culture in high regard.
And yet the book was so highly readable that I never stumbled over words
new to me such as "weapontake", even if the meaning I assumed from
the context was technically wrong (issuing weapons) it still made sense
in the story line.
But imagine the whole story translated into pure Anglish; that would be some
achievement. I wonder if I'll ever see it.
Meanwhile here's a summary of the LotR in Anglish:
The Lord of the Rings is a three-part high wonder saga written
by John Ronald Reuel Tolkien between 1937 and 1949 in the English tongue,
and forlayed (published) between 1954 and 1955.
The three forlayed books are: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Keeps,
and The Coming-back of the King.
The plot follows the tale of The Hobbit, also by Tolkien. Wizard Gandalf
finds out that Bilbo's ring is in truth a well-known witchly ring which
holds the might of dark lord Sauron. The ring is given to Frodo,
who takes it to elvish town Rivendell, where a moot is held to choose
what to do with it. It is chosen that Frodo must throw the ring into
Berg Doom, and sets out together with a fellowship of hobbits Samwise,
Pippin and Merry, dwarf Gimli, elf Legolas, and men Boromir and Aragorn.
At the beginning of The Two Keeps, the fellowship breaks up while
in a fight against Orcs in which Boromir dies. Frodo and Samwise go
on to Berg Doom alone, while the other fellows go on other errands
akin to the war, such as warding the Orcish strikes on the Burgs
of Minas Tirith in the Kingdom of Gondor, and Hornburg in the Kingdom
of Rohan.
http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings
ps. My own lexical knowledge isn't anywhere near adequate to have even tried
writing this article in Anglish.
--SPQ--