This Week's Requests (03/27) (Patreon)

It’s spring break at the University of Colorado (“break” in the sense that I at least don’t have classes to teach, not that anything else slows down). Stella caught a photo of me in the middle of my filming process in case you ever wondered just how strange that might in fact look like to the casual observer.

If you missed the past week’s videos, I talked about two questions I get pretty often: Why does Snorri talk about Trojans in the Prose Edda? And: Why aren’t the myths consistent? 

Below are this week's translation requests, as provided to me by Stella. If you have a request, send it to Stella at admin@jacksonwcrawford.com and I'll answer in a weekly digest post like this.

As always, folks, thank you for your support on Patreon and have a great one.

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—> Miss Tiffins requests “hygge” in Old Norse. This has come to mean something pretty different in Modern Danish and Norwegian than it meant in Old Norse, as Danish/Norwegian “hygge” is close to English “comfort” while Old Norse “hyggja” is “thought, knowledge, mind” in Old Norse. The semantic change is apparently something like “thought, mind” > “something that pleases the thought, mind.” Old Norse “hyggja” would be ᚼᚢᚴᛁᛅ in Younger Futhark.

—> Aurélien Nacrour requests Óðinn’s name Gangleri in Younger Futhark, which would be: ᚴᛅᚴ ᛚᛅᛦᛁ probably, if -leri really is related to lær “thigh, leg.”

—> David Finwall requests this blessing translated into Old Norse:

"I Jesu navn går vi til bords

Og spiser, drikker på ditt ord

Deg, Gud, til ære, oss til gavn

Så får vi mat i Jesu navn.

Amen.”

Which I’d render (keeping as much as possible to cognates):

Í Jesú nafni gǫngum vér til borðs

ok etum, drekkum á þínu órði

þik, Guð, til æru, oss til gjafar

svá fáum vér mat í Jesú nafni.

Amen.

“Amen” in Old Norse is, like in most languages, “amen.” 

—> R. J. Wood requests the Younger Futhark for “drykkjumaðr” (“a man of drink”), which Þórr boasts about being in his encounter with Útgarða-Loki, and that’s ᛏᚱᚢᚴᛁᚢ ᛘᛅᚦᛦ

—> Alex Manning requests “You are home” and “fare well” in Old Norse. “You are home” is Þú ert heima ᚦᚢ  ᛁᚱᛏ  ᚼᛅᛁᛘᛅ if you’re talking to one person or ér eruð heima ᛁᛦ  ᛁᛦᚢᚦ  ᚼᛅᛁᛘᛅ to multiple. “Fare well” is very similar: farvel ᚠᛅᚱᚢᛁᛚ

—> Daniel Tyson requests "A wolf is no less a wolf because a whim of fate caused him to run with the watch-dogs” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark. I’d render that: úlfr es eigi minni úlfr þótt brigð Urðar veldr því at hann hleypr með varðhundum. ᚢᛚᚠᛦ  ᛁᛋ  ᛅᛁᚴᛁ  ᛘᛁᚾᛁ  ᚢᛚᚠᛦ  ᚦᚢᛏ  ᛒᚱᛁᚴᚦ  ᚢᚱᚦᛅᛦ  ᚢᛅᛚᛏᛦ  ᚦᚢᛁ  ᛅᛏ  ᚼᛅᚾ  ᚼᛚᛅᚢᛒᛦ  ᛘᛁᚦ  ᚢᛅᚱᚦ ᚼᚢᛏᚢᛘ