TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby David1917 » Tue Dec 17, 2019 4:58 pm

LunaMoonsilver wrote:
David1917 wrote:In addition to earlier comments I made on the expansion of this volume with the extra chapters, it seems that more reading passages are interspersed, beginning with this first lesson. The section labeled "Reading 2" which begins with "Her wæs Eadgar..." is not in the previous iteration of the book. Exciting!


Ah, no! I got the kindle version so looks like it's a slightly older edition and doesn't have this :(

Still, will have to work with what I've got, I guess!


It's somewhat frustrating because, while it gives an appropriate translation below, the individual words are not in the glossary so if you're unsure about which word means what - you're kinda stuck. So, you've got that going for ya!
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby IronMike » Tue Dec 17, 2019 10:41 pm

So Unit 1 went well, it seems. Hope all are good and ready for Unit 2.

I started Unit 2. I'll just say if you hear something that's not on the page, no worries, as it comes up later, in full.
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby iguanamon » Tue Dec 17, 2019 10:45 pm

Started Unit 2 here too. I love how the course gets right into reading. The audio is a big help.
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby Querneus » Wed Dec 18, 2019 1:43 am

lavengro wrote:Quick question: to reproduce the squiggly characters, what would you recommend for a Windows 10 user? I have the Icelandic font available which provides most of them, but would you recommend Unicode, word numeric ALT codes, a third party supplier or something else?. Bear in mind that pretty much all I know about computers is that mine mostly starts up when I hit the "On" button, and that when one of the cats decides the keyboard is a good nap spot, the screen display becomes even more gibberishy than when I am using it without a cat.

I'd suggest using the Lexilogos Old English keyboard. It's just a webpage with a little program that translates some character sequences into other characters. If you're on a phone or tablet, use the buttons, and if you're on a laptop or desktop, use the shortcuts listed below the buttons.
https://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/english.htm

(Note that "a+e" means literally entering the "+" character. So you type "a", then "+", then "e", and then a space.)
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby sfuqua » Wed Dec 18, 2019 4:17 am

I'm using a Windows International keyboard, and right alt z = æ, right alt t =þ and right alt d = ð. I'm using the Icelandic keyboard for my android phone.

I hear there is an easy way on mac too. I wonder about Linux...

I'm starting Chapter 2 also. Everything isn't sticking at all yet, so I have been making anki cards. I wish I had all of the new reading passages from the new book, but I want to do cards fast. The deck is a mess, with repetition and messy parts, but it may help me...

I also do stupid stuff with anki cards, to make drilling the deck more fun. Right now I'm using a couple of fonts from the Lord of the Rings movies for the cards, and I'm using some pictures of Anglo Saxon artifacts to identify what type of card I am working with. A sort of a waste of time for learning, but sort of fun.

With a language like Old English, for someone that knows nothing of any other Germanic language, it is important for me to recognize cognates. I've found it useful to look at the sound changes in the Great Vowel Shift.

It's interesting that the speakers on the recordings don't trill R's, at least to my ears. Many people seem to think that they were all trilled. I've listened a lot to Michael Drout at
http://mdrout.webspace.wheatoncollege.edu/
, who trills everything.

I love it that there is variation and mystery to the whole thing. Every morning, before dawn, I go out and walk (and freeze) for a couple of miles. Lately, I have been listening to different history books about the Anglo-Saxon period. It's interesting how much of the details have been lost, even if the main points are obvioius.

Anyway, I'm chuggin along...
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby lavengro » Wed Dec 18, 2019 6:21 am

In case anyone may be interested, there is a Memrise Decks course which covers some of the early vocabulary in the text, though it is not completed and there is no audio.

https://decks.memrise.com/course/58761/teach-yourself-old-english-mark-atherton-vocab/
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby lavengro » Wed Dec 18, 2019 6:49 am

Mista wrote:Since the dates are given in Latin, and the Latin way saying the date is a little unusual from a modern point of view, here is a short explanation of how it works:

https://www.answers.com/Q/How_do_you_write_dates_in_Latin wrote:Each Roman month only has names for three days: the kalends of the 1st day, the nones of the 9th, and the ides of the 15th. In the rest of the month, the days are given numbers according to how far away they are from the particular day. So after the kalends, the numbers count the number of days before the nones. After the nones, the countdown is to the ides. After the ides, the countdown is to the kalends of the next month.

This means that the date given in the first text, .iii. nonas Aprelis, is the sixth of April. Unless they count like the Greeks did, in which case it is the seventh. I know I have a thorough explanation of the Latin date system in a book somewhere, but unfortunately, I can't remember where.

Super interesting Mista, thanks!

Here is a link to a reddit thread discussing dates in Old English:

https://www.reddit.com/r/OldEnglish/comments/d95gc9/question_about_dates_in_old_english/
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby Nicola » Wed Dec 18, 2019 10:58 am

I've also finished the first chapter and am about to start the second and I have to admit that, apart from the first sentence, not much vocabulary is sticking and I'm having problems identifying the various word forms and cases etc. But I assume that will all come clearer later.

I'm using the Kindle version as well - the one with embedded audio, which on one hand is very useful as I just have to click on a link to hear the audio, but on the other hand is frustrating as it is not easy to go back and forth between the lessons and the word list at the back. For this reason, I'm seriously considering buying the latest version in book form.

Looking briefly at chapter 2, there seems to be a lot more grammar, which I'm looking forward to. :D
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby Querneus » Thu Dec 19, 2019 3:45 am

sfuqua wrote:I'm using a Windows International keyboard, and right alt z = æ, right alt t =þ and right alt d = ð. I'm using the Icelandic keyboard for my android phone.

I hear there is an easy way on mac too. I wonder about Linux...

I'm on Linux and it's rather okay with the "English (US, intl., with dead keys)" keyboard layout available in X environments.

- "æ" is AltGr+z
- "Æ" is AltGr+Shift+z
- "þ" is AltGr+t
- "ð" is AltGr+d
- "ċ" is AltGr+. then c
- "ġ" is AltGr+. then g
- macrons are AltGr+Shift+3 then lift then enter the vowel (e.g. AltGr+Shift+3 then "y" for "ȳ", or AltGr+Shift+3 then AltGr+z for "ǣ")

The letter wynn, "ƿ", is not readily available, but then again you can easily replace it with "w", just like many scholars do. (If you really must, it can be typed with the generic Unicode input: Ctrl+Shift+u then "1" then "b" then "f" then space, because its codepoint is U+1bf.)
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Re: TY Complete Old English Holiday Mini-Challenge

Postby lavengro » Fri Dec 20, 2019 6:17 am

I am working through Chapter 2 and thought I was losing my brain trying to match the poem extract from Maxims II (top of page 16 in the latest edition) with the audio at Track 9, but then realized there is some material missing from the text but spoken on the audio (set out in bold below -from the more complete excerpt at the bottom of page 19):

" ............................... Fyrd sceal ætsomne,
tirfæstra getrum. ........ Treow sceal on eorle,
wisdom on were.

"Loyalty belongs in a nobleman, wisdom in a man" - I suppose the sentiment is open to debate.

not sure how awkward the spacing will present, I was not sure how to tab or indent
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