This Week's Requests (04/24) (Patreon)

This week in videos, I talked about what the title 'Hávamál' possibly means and about the variants of the myth of Thor fishing for the world-serpent Jǫrmungandr.

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 next Wednesday    (please get requests to Stella before 9:00 a.m. Tuesday Mountain  Time). To try to make it easier for you to get what you want out of your translation requests, I'm also attaching a new unlisted video I made for Patreon supporters with some tips on what to think about when you're sending them.

All the best for now,

Jackson Crawford

*

—> Brian D requests “[name] made me” and “I belong to [name]” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark.

[name] ᚴᛅᚱᚦᛁ  ᛘᛁᚴ
[name] gerði mik
“[name] made me”

“I belong to” is difficult as you basically have to phrase this as 1) “I am [name]’s,” in which instance you need the genitive form of the name, 2) “I belong to [name],” in which case you need either the genitive or dative form of the name depending on the phrase you use, or 3) “[name] owns me” which is the easiest to do and actually occurs in runic inscriptions, so I’ll write it this way:

[name] ᛅ  ᛘᛁᚴ
[name] á mik
“[name] owns me”

—> Jay Soesbee requests “on my honor” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark. 

This phrase is usually used in English to strengthen a promise; Old Norse has no closely equivalent phrase. I think the closest you’d get to the sense of this is something like “I pledge my honor,” which I’d render this way:

ᛁᚴ  ᛚᛅᚴ  ᚢᛁᚦ  ᛋᚢᛘᚦ  ᛘᛁᚾᛅ
Ek legg við sǿmð mína.
“I pledge my honor.”

—> Alexander Fritz requests “the owls are not what they seem” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark.

ᚢᚴᛚᚢᛦᚾᛅᛦ  ᛁᛦᚢ  ᛁᚴᛁ  ᛋᛁᛘ  ᚦᛅᛦ  ᛚᛁᛏᛅᛋᚴ
Uglurnar eru eigi sem þær lítask.
The owls are not what they seem

—> Stella Bostwick requests “the night-driving avenger” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark.

“Avenger” is pretty easy. For “drive,” the modern Scandinavian languages use derivatives of Old Norse “keyra,” which means “to drive an animal” in Old Norse (but can also be used in extended senses similar to English “drive,” like “motivate,” which adds to the appropriateness of the choice). 

ᛁᚾ  ᚾᚬᛏᚴᛅᚢᚱᛅᛏᛁ  ᚼᛅᚠᚾᛁᛦ
Inn nóttkeyrandi hefnir.
The night-driving avenger.

—> Nicholas Armstrong requests “I remain unvanquished” in Old Norse and Younger Futhark.

This is relatively difficult given how different it is than how Old Norse phrases anything; there is no Old Norse verb that is closely equivalent to English “remain” or Latin “manere,” i.e. no verb that means “stay in a state,” since Old Norse is usually more specific about the states that verbs indicate. Probably the most natural Old Norse rephrasing would be to make it positive; “I am still favored by victory,” or to use an Old Norse idiom for avoiding being vanquished, “I still await (meaning “endure” or “expect”) no defeat.” I’ll give both of those.

ᛁᚴ  ᛁᛘ  ᛋᛁᚴᚱᛋᛅᛚ  ᛅᚾ
Ek em sigrsæll enn.
"I am still favored by victory."

ᛁᚴ  ᛒᛁᚦ  ᛅᚾ  ᛁᚴᛁ  ᚢᛋᛁᚴᚱ
Ek bíð enn engi ósigr.
"I still endure no defeat."