“Anglish”

"Ēadƿeard se Andettere (c. 1004–5 Æfterra Ȝēola 1066) sunu Æðelredes Unrǣdes, ƿæs se ǣrendenīehsta Seaxisca cyning Englalande, and endenīehsta cyning of Hūse Ƿestseaxna."--http://ang.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C4%92ad%C6%BFeard_se_Andettere

@AnWulf: "Today's challenges/tasks for playing instead of Latin ... the word challenge itself"

BEARD > to oppose boldly; defy: "It took courage for the mayor to beard the pressure groups." >> Mid. Eng. had the phrase, rennen in berd "oppose openly" (today's English > to get in someone's beard).

Others are "to call out", "to make/take a stand", " to seek out", "stand up to", "try" (O.Fr. "tirer" < Gothic "tiran")

BODY LANGUAGE >> Bodytalk (-ing) (cf. http://books.google.com/books/about/Bodytalk.html?id=tI0YAAAAIAAJ , it's science). Or, Bodyspeak (-ing)/ Bodyspeech.

"I'm constantly surprised at some of the more basic sounding words that turn out to be Latinates ... like task. "

Me, too, but this is one of the ways English (and Anglo-Norman and Old French) shows its "Teutonicness". Words like disk, desk, risk, musk, kiosk, asf., match up with Teutonic/Norse words like husk, flask, dusk, cusk, and busk.

If the borrowed loans speak and feel English ( the words integrated), then maybe they should stay in. Words such as "concupiscence" (lust) need to be thrown out without ever looking back!!

The "challenge" was for the noun form ... as in the challenge is ... I just finished an Anglish translation of blurb that I saw in the Wall Street Journal.

Bodytalk sounds pretty good. I'll see how it fits.

I agree ... Any word like concupiscence should be tossed at once!

Since this thread has gotten so long ... I posted a translation of a blurb that I saw in the WSJ on my typepad blog. You can comment here or there.

http://lupussolus.typepad.com/blog/2011/08/sun-blasts-slam-into-earth-anglishanglo-saxon.html

The Facebook links are at the bottom of the blog for anyone who wants to comment there as well.

And if anyone posts something on their own blog, post it here and I'll go read it when I get the email.

Today's challenge: translation ... rendition, rendering, conversion; transcription, transliteration are all Latinates! Maybe "tongue-shift" or "tongue-rework"?

Remembering your latin: terre, tuli, latum meaning to bear or carry, translation could be brought across as "bringing across" or "bringing over".....

To say ... Using "bearingacross" just sounding like throwing words together, doesn't really convey anything and crossover is already another word. If we calque German it would an "oversitting" which doesn't convey anything. That could be be another world for babysitting or sitting with an elderly person.

For the verb, I can just say I want to put this in Anglish and get around it. But the noun is a different creature. Might as well bring the OE noun getheode (geþeode) out of retirement and use it. It's close to Icelandic þýða (v) and
þýðing (n). The "eo" was often a "ü" like the "y" in OE or "u" sound. So I would be good with that.

In the getheode that I did, I also used ken, craft, and dight are in the wordbook.

For scientist: kenkrafter (ken+kraft+er) - ken (knowledge) ... word from OE cennian.

For national administration, I used: theod-dight - OE þeod (national)+dight (from OE diht - administration office ... pre-Norman Latinate dictare - dictate).

I got a little a little creative with satellite (from Latin for attendant): The options were: OE - fylgend (m) or fylgestre (f) - follower or observer / geneat - companion follower (esp. in war) dependant vassal tenant who works for a lord / gesith - companion / gethofta - comrade, mate, follower.

I picked fylgestre (f).

For communication system, I used broadcast network ... in the OE getheode, I used sprecungnett. I guess that I could have used "speaking/talking network" for Anglish but broadcast is already widely known in that field.

"The "challenge" was for the noun form ... as in the challenge is ..."

CHALLENGE, "something that by its nature or character serves as a call to battle, contest, special effort, etc.", "difficulty in a job or undertaking that is stimulating to one engaged in it." < 1175–1225, Mid.Eng. chalenge < Old French chalonge < Latin calumnia "trickery, slander, deception". Akin to English calumny.

French is weird in the way it changes C [k] to CH [sch] before "a". Ex. Latin castellus (castle in English) became château in French. Same for the word 'challenge' above.

So, one could say the following, which rests on one's meaning:

* struggle > "It was a struggle for me to do it."

* gauntlet, gant(e)let (from Frankish *want-) > "He was always willing to take up the gauntlet for a good cause."

* ordeal > "Recovering from the crash was a big ordeal for me."

* trying (from Frankish *tiran < Old Saxon *téiran < Gothic taíran) > "Boxing with a professional was very trying."; "I had a trying day at the office"; "2011 was a trying year."

* tough > "The test was tough."

* hard-won > "The Norman's win over England was hard-won."

* hard > "It was hard for the jury to make decision."

Others to think about: wearisome, wearying, wearing, burdening, burdensome, asf. The English words seem to be more fitting to the thing talked about, whereas the Latin-French seems to have a more wonted, broader bearing. There is no one-to-one swap word on hand, nor is it needed. IMHO.

@AnWulf: "Today's challenge: translation ... "

In German, "übersetzen" can mean many things: to put over, to cross over, to translate, to render, to interpret, to decode, and on and on. It, word-for-word, means "over setting".

Old English has oferlǣden, ārecc(e)an, āwendan, as well as, geþēodan. Why not say the good old, "to English [something]" ? > to translate or adapt into English: "Alfred the Great wanted to English the bible." Then there is always "Anglicize", with the Englished Greek suffix that could be said to mean "translate".

Viel Spaß beim Übersetzen!

@AnWulf: "For national administration..."

Why use the Latin-rooted 'dight', when þēnung. þēning "f service, ministration, office; attendants; service of a meal; book of a service" is direct from Ænglisc? >> þēod/þīod-þēnung/þēning.

May I put forth my word for Satellite >> āsmiþodmōna (lit. "a moon made from metal")

Also, the Icelandic þýða < ON þýða, þióð < Teutonic *þiud(d)ijanan. "Gætirðu þýtt þetta fyrir mig?" >> "Could you translate (lit. 'nationalize in our tongue') for me?" Whence also German 'deuten, deutbar, deutlich, Deutung', asf.

Cf. þēodþrēa "national disaster", þēodġestrēon "national wealth, treasure", *þiudiskaz "of the folks, popular", þēodcyning "national king". Middle English still used þēod(e)/ theod(e), too.

I thought that we had settled that pre-Norman Latinates are OK.

Þenung could be used. I chose dight because the word is short, in the nowadays wordbook, and it is a pre-Norman Latinate. Thus the Saxons must have found the word useful enuff to have chosen to use it. But hey, there is always bendability among users. One is not bound to use one or the other.

Your suggestion for satellite certainly covers artificial satellites if there is a need to be specific ... and would be a good choice as well but it's kind of long (five syllables). Satellite is three syllables (artificial satellite - seven) whereas fylgend, geneat, and gesith are two syllables and fylgestre and gethofta are three syllables.

I'm not sure whether to change to spelling to match the nowadays use of the letters or change the pronunciation to match the old use ...

y=ü and in many cases has mutated to the long i as in fire (OE fyr)
g=y before e.

eo=oo or u or ou (as in you)

Thus fulyestre, yeneat, yesith, and yethofta ... and yetheode or yethude

geol = yule; geong = yeong = young (yung?) ... BTW, knowing this then it become clear that yeoman is the contraction of yeong+man.

My tendency is to pronounce the leading g hard as in get. Tho there are instances of pronouncing it as j as in general ... What the heck ... people (Anglo-Saxon spelling of peupel similar to þeod?), could just accept it the way it is and let the pronunciation find its own worth.

I wouldn't mind bring back the thorn þ or at least having it has a choice again. I'v gotten used to using it!

My first stake in Anglish is to use fewer Latinates. If there is a nowadays English word, unmistakable blend shaping of the word itself, then I'll use that before I start thinking about bringing back an OE word.

That said, there is no reason not to look back to the OE stock if a new word needs to be created ... like satellite. If you're not happy with an OE word, look around at ON ... still not happy ... ok, maybe then try to create one from Greek. If there is an outland word for a thing like a kayak ... then just use kayak. I have no problem with that.

Yesterday I had an outland friend ask me what is academic writing. She needed something for her English class. So I told her:

Academic writing is basically one researcher writing for other researcher. That may be a student doing a simple research paper for his professor or it may be the professor writing a research paper for publication. And since it is meant to impress other academicians, then it requires that the writer find the longest, most multi-syllable Latinates that can be found! Even better if you can string several of them together along with a Latin quote from some long-dead scholar.

AnWulf: Yourr take on academic writing is not wrong; however outlanders sometimes have more basic problems with "academic" style eg using "I" and "you" instead of writing more objectively; some from non-European cultures may have trouble understanding paragraphs: it really depends on what you were taught at school. We like to have a systematic approach to a topic; in some cultures it's more like a spiral and one may have no clue what the real topic is until the end (or at all!). For example:
"Korean no paragraph.
Each sentence next line."
if you see what i mean.....

@AnWulf: "I thought that we had settled that pre-Norman Latinates are OK."

I think they are okay, but if there is a Germanic English word in the wordstock, why not work with it instead?

"Your suggestion for satellite certainly covers artificial satellites if there is a need to be specific ... and would be a good choice as well but it's kind of long (five syllables)."

Yes, it is a long word...have you looked at the German tongue lately?!

Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz >> "Cattle marking and beef labeling supervision duties delegation law"

Anyway, great BLOG...I liked your Ænglisc geþeode!

@AnWulf: "Tho there are instances of pronouncing it as j as in general ... "

Do you mean in latter-day English? Or, that there are times in Old English? The only "g" sounds I know of in Old English are:

ġ > soft 'g' said /j/ >> Old English ġeoc 'yoke'

g > hard 'g' said [ɡ] >> Old English gōd 'good'; Also, as the voiced velar spirant said [ɣ] >> dagas 'days' (cf. Danish jeg "I" > /jaj/, [jɑj])

Loan-words brought in the [ʤ] as in enġel 'angel' < PWGmc. *angil

A) "American inflows are far too widespread and not always of themselves helpful..
B) "We are swamped with input from the USA, which is not of itself a good thyng.
You may vote ....

B) "We are swamped with input from the USA, which is not of itself a good thyng.

"American might is far too over reaching, and is by no means always taken as a good thing."

My 2 Marks... ;-)

Instead of Academic >> Learned, Enlightened, Knowledged ?

1)"Enlightened" !!! I think not! (Bedimmed would be more truthful)
2) The nice thing about "influence" is it covers military and economics AND rock and roll and culture in general; so "might" is only half of what I want. (It is in fact a title for a very broad open-ended essay). "Influence" might also include the way in which American values, the american dream, baseball caps, and hollywood have crept into lives around the world. It is a great shame we don't use "inflow" - it has the same roots as influence I think.
3) On being asked off the cuff what the noun from "fat" was; I thought of "fatness" but wasn't sure if it existed, so had to say "obesity". "Despite her obesity I loved her well".
It's like aliens came and wiped out half the common tongue.

I would like to requicken the word "earnest" in the meaning of serious as an adjective, and "serious intent" as a noun. "In earnest" is a "fossil" phrase, but in the KJV bible there is the phrase "an earnest of his inheritance". Earnestly.

"academic" varies in meaning from "learned", "studious", "theoretical" according to the context. There seem to be many "academic" words for which there is no readymade standin, for instance: theoretical/empirical/practical/pragmatic.I think even German has greek borrowings for most of them too. "in a thinking way"/"in a working way" ??? Or is there some AS that could be requickened??

@Jayles ... Very true. I'm reviewing a paper from a Tunsian woman. She has plenty of paragraphs but she seems to have trouble knowing when to end a sentence ... It's not unusual for her sentences to be four or five lines long in Word. It drives me nuts. She also tends to say "you" a lot. She doesn't have the grasp of writing in 3rd person. It makes me wonder if they write papers that way in A

OK, it cut off my answer ... Let's pick this up where I left off.

It makes me wonder if they write papers that way in Arabic.

Fatness is a noun. But we're back to that hate/despise thing again. Fatness sounds less polite than obesity.

@Ængelfolc ... I'm trying to post a rewrite/update of the blog now with changes and more notes but I'm having a lot of trouble with my internet connection (binding?) today. I have a Part II almost ready to post. I'v done the whole article now in Anglish. I'm working on the Saxon now.

LOL ... Yes, I'm well aware of the German tendency to draw together many words to make one long word but English has the opposite goal. It's ok to draw together one or two ... maybe even three ... words, but not after that. Most of the long, multi-syllable words in English are Latinates.

Sometimes it's hard to choose between keeping a long-used, short Latinate like space (Old French espace from Latin spatium) or reviving an OE word in nowadays form like rume (OE rum) Spelled rume to make it unlike room in spelling (also from OE rum) ... similar to Raum. I'm ok with the word space ... short and simple ... but if I'm really trying to cut out the Latinates, then I should go with rume just to offer up the choice. I'm ok with either.

But that brought me to thinking about that most of our aerospace (greek+latin) and aeronautical (greek+greek) words are mostly fremd-words.

I'm also ok with most Greek-based words because many of them were coined by non-Greeks for scientific terms. The Greeks didn't invent the word electricity ... Englishman William Gilbert brought it into being in 1600 for a paper that he wrote in Latin. So he chose a Greek word, changed it, then Latinized it, then Anglicized it ... so, aside from the Icelanders who calqued Gilbert's word, the word electric, or some form of it, is used in other Germanic tungs and many other tungs as well. So in reality ... It's not really a Greek word. Sociolinguists will say that makes it an English word.

Having said that, the well-used word in English ... place (from Greek plateia, fem. of platys "broad," ... replaced O.E. stow and stede as locations (tho one still sees them in place-names). Keep using place or use stow and sted(e)? Nowadays use of stead has dropped the location meaning.

Yes, I was referring to nowadays speaking of OE words. Geþeode could be written as yetheude to better show the Saxon way of saying it or left as geþeode (getheode) and let the speaking fall where it will.

I'm torn on that. I know enuff OE to say it the right way ... but most people would probably say the ge hard as in get and say ... ge-THEY-ode or maybe ge-they-OH-day ... just as they say BAY-oh-wolf or even Bay-OH-wolf for Beowulf which is really should be said as two (not three) syllables.

Another word that I discovered that was used in the middle ages but was replaced by a French word ... Fremd! Yes, just as in German. Used as both a noun and an adjective frem, fremd, fremde, fremþe - strange(r), foreign(er) ... used in OE and ME ... fremd, fremder, fremdest. But then you can't say "stranger danger!" lol

AnWulf: "I'm reviewing a paper from a Tunsian woman." A model Euro-style academic paragraph usually goes like this:
1) A short sentence to introduce the topic of the paragraph.
2) A longer sentence that clarifies the exact point that you wish to make.
3) More sentences, each one dealing with evidence to support your view/assertion/point.
4) Sentences weighing the evidence or arguing you view.
5) A final sentence summarizing and/or linking to the next paragraph.
We do this almost unconsciously but people from other cultures/traditions need to learn and stick to this schema.
And Good Luck!!!

FATNESS (n.) < Old English fǣtnes (before 1000 AD); Can mean "obesity" or "the fatness (richness) of the land"

Other ways to say it >> overweight, big, hefty, stout, heavyset, heavy, husky, overfed among others.

Besides, "obesity" doesn't mean simply fat, it's really fat, very overweight!

The English words are much more truthful, maybe because they are better understood? Pseudo-scientific complexes are named with awful words like plenitudinous, distended, corpulent, avoirdupois, asf.

@jayles:

Inflow and inflowing are in the English wordbook. Feel free to say them!

Theoretical > German 'rein gedanklich'

Empirical > German 'erfahrungsgemäß'

Practical > German 'angewandt'

Sadly, we do say 'pragmatisch' and 'praktisch'...;-(

I'm still having binding (connectivity) problems. At last! It updated. So check out þe whole þing in Anglish: http://lupussolus.typepad.com/blog/2011/08/sun-blasts-slam-into-earth-anglishanglo-saxon.html

Anyway, for þe word agency, I took your suggestion and used þenung (thenung). I'm not sure if þat is a great choice since it shares þe root wiþ þegn (thane).

I was þinking earlier today þat if I were creating a word, would I just an anglo word or using a word from anoðer tung. For example, let's say þe word for rocket didn't exist and I needed a word to describe it. Well, it kind of looks like a sharpened pencil. Can't really call it "pencil" ... I would probably call a "karandaash". Why, because þat word means pencil in Russian and it sounds pretty cool. In tung-school, we would say, "ochen' karandaash!" (geþeode: very pencil) for "very cool" which bewildered our Russian instructors. One asked us ... "What does þis mean ... very pencil?" So maybe þe Greeks were initially bewildered as well by þe "amber power"!

I found a couple of more out-of-date words þat could be requickened. Frain ... question boð as a noun and a verb. Used up þru Middle English.

Huru ... I really like þis word. It's OE and has several meanings: at least, at all events, at any rate, in any case, however, even, yet, only, indeed, certainly, especially ... And it's just fun to say! lol

Þis will make Ængelfolc happy ... as it turns out ... þe word "touch" is not a Latinate but Frankish! - tokkōn, tukkōn (to knock, strike, touch)

I was pretty tired last night ... sorry for all the typos!

Touch is listed at Germanic but since it came to English thru French ... I'm guessing it was from the Franks.

@AnWulf:

Yes, TOUCH is Germanic from Old (Low) Frankish! It is akin to TUCK and TAKE, too. There are many Frankish words, like this one, warped by French spelling and way of speaking.

As for 'þenung', see here: http://bosworth.ff.cuni.cz/031636

No worries!

Challenge of the day - curious ... As in, I'm curious to know. Why is he asking? He's just curious. Curiosity killed the cat. ... intrigued, interested, inquisitive ... All Latinates.

frymdig and fyrwit (vorwitzig in German) show up in Anglo-Saxon. I know that I can say, "I'd like to know." However, I'm looking for just one or two words to put in its place.

@AnWulf: "U.S. (United States) - J.L. (Joined Lands) / America(n)"

United States of America >> Geáned Landes of Nīewe Middaneard (or Nīewe Weorold)

@AnWulf: "karandaash"

Russian Karandash

I'm glad that you caught that ... I thought that I had changed it to WL ... Welded Lands. Now I'll have the check the FB page and the wiki page. Recall that is for the Anglish bit. I go back to Anglo-Saxon only when there is no other words that are fresher.

When I get to ending the AS bit, I'll need that but isn't it "Geanlæht (united) or Gegeanlæced (joined together)"? Either the abbreviation would be GL or some have offered Ricu (Reichs) so it would be GR. I'll have to think about that.

But not tonight, it's already late and I'm very tired. Early day tomorrow!

@AnWulf:

Geánlǽcan >> 1. To make one, join, unite 2. to unite one person to another, unite persons as associates 3. (Intrans.) To join together in an undertaking

Also ...Gædertang >> adj. Continuous, connected with, united.

Geáned >> Made one, united (cf. German vereint).

Gemód >> united, having the same purpose.

Samrád >> (adj.) Harmonious, united, "Se cræftga geférscipas fæste gesamnaþ ðæt hí hiora freóndscipe forþ on symbel untweófealde treówa gehealdaþ sibbe samráde."

(?) Rīcu

Take your pick...

I woke up this morning with the answer to "curious" ... wonder.

I am curious - I wonder
He is just curious - He is just wondering
Curiosity killed the cat - Wondering killed the cat

Ricu is the plural of rice.

Here's my new AS word of the day: líhtingnes - Strong Feminine Noun - lightness of taxation ... Taxes were an issue even back then! lol

I'll look into the other words. Thanks for the tips on those. But for now ... gotta get moving!

@AnWulf: "Ricu is the plural of rice."

Yes, I know. What I meant was, "(fill in the O.E. word for "united") + Rīcu. That's what (?)Rīcu meant.

I was just wondering why was the cat wondering???

I think the cat was wondering about snooping about.

I am curious - I am snooping/nosy
He is just curious - He is just nosy/snooping
Curiosity killed the cat - Snooping/Snoopiness killed the cat

"curious" does not suggest any underhand earnest whereas being snoopy or nosey really does. On the other hand one can wonder to one's heart's fullness without a smidgen of evilmindedness

This week's challenge: to teach how to teach the sounds and spelling of English in fifteen hours flat, hopefully without mentioning "articulation", "phonemes", "glottal stops", "labiodentals"(ie 't''d'), or "fricatives" (those effing sounds); can't see a way round "vowels" and "consonants" though.
BTW Cats only wonder about food food food....

""curious" does not suggest any underhand earnest whereas being snoopy or nosey really does.""

CURIOUS
1. eager to learn; inquisitive
2. overinquisitive; prying; spying, peeping, meddlesome, prying refer to taking an
undue (and petty) interest in others' affairs.
3. interesting because of oddness or novelty; strange; unexpected

Ængelfolc: 1) Some dictionaries give all possible meanings. Some are based on a statistical corpus of written and spoken English and give the most common meanings first and (depending on size) exclude uncommon meanings. 2) There are some "different" varieties of "English" around the world in places like Quebec, Jamaica, Australia, and so on; quite what is "standard" English today is a real question; BBC, CNN or ? Sometimes it is like when they put subtitles on Deutsche Welle when interviewing Austrians. I have learnt not to be too dogmatic.

Wonder - verb [ intrans. ]
1 desire or be curious to know something; be curious about

--

On another note ... I'v about made up my that the word "state" as in a political entity (The State of Texas) is ok. The word has been so anglicized from its Latin root from which we also have status and estate. I think the English meaning is a pretty clear break from the Latin origin.

@Jayles ... Do you really mention all that when teaching English? I barely understand what those words mean. I just demonstrate the various sounds that letters can make.

Really? Do you need to mention the word labiodental (lips and teeth) to teach the f and v sounds and how they relate? If you do, just say "lips and teeth words" and you still have fewer syllables and it is much clearer than "labiodental".

fricative |ˈfrikətiv| Phonetics -adjective -denoting a type of consonant made by the friction of breath in a narrow opening, producing a turbulent air flow. ... WTF! That is about as clear as mud.

A phoneme is just a distinct sound ... so say ... distinct sound.

As I read over the novel I'm writing ... I look at all the Latinates! It would literally take a whole rewrite to take them out and then I'm sure how it would come across. It would need a yetheode (translation)! Just writing the short story that I began just to see if I could not use Latinates, not counting where I used them intentionally, has been hard ...

AnWulf: I wrote "to teach how to teach": this means teaching trainee teachers so we have to cover everything. Most of these words fall into the category of technical jargon.....

@jayles: "1) Some dictionaries give all possible meanings. Some are based on a statistical corpus of written and spoken English and give the most common meanings first and (depending on size) exclude uncommon meanings... I have learnt not to be too dogmatic."

Yes, i understand all of these things. My thought was that the word 'curious' can "suggest any underhand earnest" just like snoopy and nosy. Deutsche Welle sub-titles Austrians, Bavarians, Franconians, Tyrolians... any one who doesn't speak standard German. It is sad really. Half of Germany has forgotten how to speak real German! Frisian, Plattdeutsch, asf, are in danger of being lost forever! I agree with my Swabian cousins...""Wir können alles außer Hochdeutsch"!

BTW...I wasn't being dogmatic. I am not an absolutist. I do like all things considered, though. Here, that means all meanings of 'curious' should be acknowledged. That's all.

MfG

Ængelfolc: well done for picking up on my oh so English remark about not being dogmatic! In my world we promote special dictionaries like Longmans Advanced Learners' which show word frequencies and indicate Br and Am usage and specify the most common meanings first. I consider them far far superior to old fashioned dictionaries which just explain one word with another eg obgleich = obwohl. One really needs to know that/if obgleich is slightly more quaint or unusual. (?? Just off the cuff!).
Not worth arguing over your sources but to me "snoopy" smacks of Murdoch's apparatchiki hacking into your mobile phone messages; it goes far beyond innocent curiousity and good taste; but who knows? someone somewhere may have used it like that.
mfG

@jayles: "In my world we promote special dictionaries like Longmans Advanced Learners' which show word frequencies and indicate Br and Am usage and specify the most common meanings first."

No worries! I think Longman's in pretty good. Does this mean that other meaning or usages should be forgotten, down-played, or flatly ignored?

You described curiosity as innocent, which seems to say that there could be more than one kind of meaning for curiosity? ;-p

Cheers!

Ængelfolc: from www.thefreedictionary.com/curious:
"curious, inquisitive, snoopy, nosy
These adjectives apply to persons who show a marked desire for information or knowledge. Curious most often implies an avid desire to know or learn, though it can suggest prying: A curious child is a teacher's delight. A curious neighbor can be a nuisance.
Inquisitive frequently suggests excessive curiosity and the asking of many questions: "Remember, no revolvers. The police are, I believe, proverbially inquisitive" (Lord Dunsany).
Snoopy suggests underhanded prying: The snoopy hotel detective spied on guests in the lobby.
Nosy implies impertinent curiosity likened to that of an animal using its nose to examine or probe: My nosy colleague went through my mail."
Words are rarely complete synonyms in English; they may overlap to a small or large extent in meaning but are often separated in terms of formality (see second post on this thread), usage, or collocations (ie usual words that go with them eg eine Entscheidung treffen cf make a decision, not "do" or "hit"). This is one of the hurdles for Anglish; real English words have different nuances or just sound rustic to the modern ear; maybe this can be changed over time, we shall see.

Today I watched someone trying to explain the difference between
a) I will come with you
b) I am coming with you
c) I am going to come with you
and I thought how buggered English has become. Bit hard to tidy it all up though.

Sounds like an aspiring lover's list of sample sentences!
I wonder what one would get if one asked for one Anglish Muffin. Methinks me will anter a diner and ask them to anlist a cook to prepare one for me. Then I shall come back to this blog and post what has happened.

@Jayles, it all depends on the situation and the times frame. But there's not much of a difference to argue about.

If you want to split hairs on "a" ... I might say that the use of will instead of shall is emphatic. I was taught I shall, you will, he will, we shall, you will, they will and to reverse them for emphasis but maybe that is old school.

Otherwise, "a" and "c" are synonymous with a possible nuance to the time frame. "A" is definitely future tense with a slight nod towards a longer time period ... but could be anywhere from a few second from now to any point in the future: I'll come with you with you (at some undefined point in the future), just tell me when you're ready. Or I'll come with you tomorrow.

"C" is nearer in the time frame: I'm going to come with you when if you're leaving in the next hour.

Without a time reference "c" means right now. Wait a moment, I'm coming with you. But you could put a time reference on it and make it future tense, I'm coming with you tomorrow.

So they could pretty much be mixed and match if said correctly.

AnWulf: yes - the tricky bit is why "What are you doing this weekend?" asks about plans; and why "What will you do this weekend?" doesn't - it is either rhetorical or awfulizes the outlook.
My vote would be to get rid of "I'm going to" ; it is longwinded (periphrastic) and unneeded in Anglish.

@Jayles ... Here's one for ya.

From a comment on another board: http://realgrammar.posterous.com/subjunctive-JIlhA

The authors of the ‘The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language’ distinguish three types of mandative:

the subjunctive mandative,
the ‘should’ mandative
the covert mandtive.

The examples they give, in order, are:
‘It is essential that he be told immediately’,
‘It is essential that he should be told immediately’
‘It is essential that he is told immediately’.

They comment that the second is more common in British English than in American English.

Crucially, they say ‘they are all similar in meaning to "He must be told immediately." In other words, they do not distinguish, as you do, An Wulf, between a subjunctive order and a non-subjunctive recommendation.

My own view on that is that the force of the mandative depends on the meaning of the verb in the main clause rather than the mood of the verb in the subordinate clause.

My reply:

True that the idea will be conveyed with any of them. But to nit-pick:

‘It is essential that he be told immediately’ - If you said this to me, then I would think that you're giving me your opinion that it is essential but the final decision is mine. Thus the subjunctive.

‘It is essential that he should be told immediately’ - To me this is very awkward ... actually almost contradictory. The "should" really softens it up ... almost to the point that it isn't "essential". It's not likely that I would ever say it this way. In fact, if I were editing somebody's writing, I'd cross the should out.

‘It is essential that he is told immediately’ - With this one, you're telling me that it must be done (essential) and done now. The choice or decision to tell him isn't mine.

AnWulf: I'm with you; the "should" version sounds odd to me despite my Brit childhood.
I love the subjunctive version; it sounds so beautiful to me; but then I love subjunctives in Hungarian, French and German too...
The "past" simple tense in English is identical to past subjunctive (except for "if I were you"), so it either betokens a real event in the past OR an unreal event. Compare:
1) If I have time I will call you. > real ; present/future
2) If I had time I would call you > well it's not going to happen so unreal present/future
3) If I had had time I would have called your > didn't happen > unreal past
so in (2) and (3) "had" and "would" are "subjunctive" betokening a non-event.
That's how I teach it.... because we can then go on to:
"I wish I had time to call you" > but I don't so again "had" (subjunctive" is used
"If only I had time to call you" > same story.
I teach it this way because it makes consistent cohesive sense, whether or not it is etymologically true or not.
"O je, wenn ich nur die Zeit haette, Dich anzurufen"
"Azt ajanlom, hogy idejojjon!"
Bugger the french,,,,

I've just spent a great deal of time trying to come up with something for "suggestion" ... All the choices seem to be Latinates. All the Germanic languages seem to be a variation of forschlagen so Jayles' idea of "forelay" ... I'm guessing from "lay forth" or "put forth" looks good.

OE has a matching meaning for the original meaning of suggestion: "a prompting to evil" and that is "mislar" (Incitement to evil, suggestion, bad teaching). Gespan - prompting; tyhting seems likely.

But I'm open to ... suggestions ...

If I may put an idea forward.....

And I'm open to your input

mislār >> this word meant "suggestion" among several others (fōresetnes, cwyðe, asf.). Good word!

put forth, forward >> suggest (lit. "bring from under" < sub + gerere)

Norwegian and Danish foreslå, Swedish föreslå

fōremearcung "title, chapter"

fōrerīm "prologue"

I did another blog ... "Anglo-Saxon" names for the Modern Military" http://lupussolus.typepad.com/blog/2011/08/anglo-saxon-names-for-the-modern-military.html

For the noun suggestion, there is also tyhting - Persuasion, exhortation, encouragement, incitement, instigation, allurement, suggestion. I'm not sure that calquing German works for this. My "foreslam" or "forslap" ... I guess if I said it enuff times, it might start to make sense. I like forelay ... to lay it out ... or foreput.

Forerim doesn't tell me anything. Foretell is already being used. Foresay would be my next choice. Maybe foretale or foresaga. But prolog is Greek, so I don't have a heartache with that. If I were going to change it, I'd just use the whole Greek word - prologos.

I'm looking for a simple, short replacement for "quote".

@Jayles ... The world input could double up as suggestion. I have a suggestion becomes I have input. The word is already used and fits. I suggest could be "I put in" or "I put forth". Works for me ...

I didn't get a chance to fully read this massive thread, but from the small bit I did get a chance to read so far, I am surprised nobody made the point that to a speaker of German or Dutch, they would understand far more Old English words than we would. Everyone involved in that argument kept acting like English was the only surviving language with Germanic roots. It sounded to me like Douglas was implying that these OE words were dead, when that's simply not true. You can observe these words descendants just fine in other modern Germanic languages.

@yarpdigger ... You can ask Ængelfolc since he is German. But as an English speaker who also knows German, I think both would have an equally hard time. Now if you had said Icelanders, I might have agreed with you. About the time of the Norman Invasion in 1066, the Scandinavian tongues were still mutually understandable ... Likely similar to UK, US, and Aussie ... and Indian ... and black English. I happened across an Icelandic website the other day and found that I could actually understand bits of it. As my knowledge of OE grows, I bet that my understanding of Icelandic will grow a bit too ... without trying. When I get stuck for a word, Icelandic is now the first tongue that I look at.

The thing about Anglish isn't to turn back to OE ... especially not to the grammar frame! For those of us who love words, it's fun. However,there is an earnest side. English has been and still is today discriminated against ... without thought ... by its own speakers. Many good and "fornytlic" (very useful) Anglo-Saxon words were pushed out by not only a snobbish, elitist French-speaking nobility, but those English speakers who, even to this day, treat English as a third-class tongue behind French and Latin ... Maybe fourth-class if you put Greek ahead of English as many did and still do.

An example ... In 1600, William Gilbert, an Englishman struck the word electricity. He knew of about amber. Rather than going to the Anglo-Saxon (OE) word, stær, he when to Latin. Amber in Latin is electrum (from Greek, ήλεκτρο (ilektro)) and then made a Latin word electricus ... badda boom! To be fair to him, scientific texts were usually written in Latin, he probably knew the Latin word or had a Latin wordbook, and it was unlikely that he knew of the OE word. Which highlights the how lowly English was treated.

This comment is already too long but I hope you get the idea. I think I need to write another blog! ... But not tonight.

I put to you to try spending a day in your net cruising to brook (use) as few Latinates as you can ... You'll find it hard.

There! and I thought electricity was named in honor of some Greek princess who helped kill her own mother in an electrifying tale of incest and insecticide....

@Jayles ... It would make a much more entertaining story! But alas, while I do write fiction, sometimes one must just put the dry facts out there.

@Jayles ... It's odd that it is England that has dropped 'gotten' for 'got' and seems to be dropping the subjective more often (and faster) than the US. The good thing about the less use of the subjunctive in English is that it is, more often than not, easier to explain to an outlander because the fremd tung uses it more often!

Spanish drives me nuts because it uses it more often ... the verb itself changes and sometimes a lot ... especially the stem changing verbs.

I only have a few pet peeves and one of them is the incorrect use of the reflexive pronoun when a someone THINKS it is the correct way and is overcorrecting ... Send an email to John or myself ... arggghhhh! I had a director once send out an email that was soooo bad grammatically that I printed it out; corrected it; and took it to his secretary. She shook her head and said she hadn't sent but that he had done it himself. So sad that someone that high up could butcher a simple email so badly.

"Bad writers, and especially scientific, political, and sociological writers, are nearly always haunted by the notion that Latin or Greek words are grander than Saxon ones, and unnecessary words like expedite, ameliorate, predict, extraneous, deracinated, clandestine, subaqueous, and hundreds of others constantly gain ground from their Anglo-Saxon numbers." George Orwell "Politics and the English Language" (1946)

AnWulf: yes Orwell was right. The real question is what to do about it - how to reverse the process. While we tinker here, the rest of the world carries on without us. We may
encourage 1) simpler language in business; 2) children to learn Dutch in school; 3) target the most common latinate words first. Against this, we would need to recognise a) that there is now so much global academic, medical, and technical jargon from latin, it would be hard to shift, and 2) we would need to have ready answers for the gaps, that is, those holes left when we take out common latinate words like "experience".
Nearest standin would be "fare"
For instance: "So how did you fare?" "a well-fared man"
However what about the muddling with "airfare" "affair" "unfair" "market/fair" ???
Or should we take in "experience" as it has become a verb too in English, and as a countable noun means "happening" and uncountably means, well, er, "Erfarhrung" which is where the hole is.
In short no good putting forward getting rid of latinate borrowings if we cannot come up with good well-understood standins; and by well-understood I mean understood by someone who hasn't studied OE first.

@jayles ... We all know that, in truth, we cannot pull out all the Latinates. We're not living on small, iland with a small tale of folks like Iceland. As I said before, I find some Latinates to be "fornytlic" (very useful). My goal isn't to pull them out but to shove them aside.

It is sad that the OE wordstock was shoved to the wayside to make room for the Latinates or Greek-root words. We didn't need 'astronomy' when we already had 'starcraft'. That's an OE word that the folk would probably know. But in the long run, other OE words would need to brought back ... slowly ... but the unbrooked OE wordstock is rich!

In gainsaying (there's an old word still in the wordbook!), yet another inrush (another word in the wordbook) of inkhorn words in the 1800s, William Barnes struck the word 'starlore' for astronomy, 'speechcraft' for grammar, and birdlore for ornithology which all sound OK to me. Sir John Cheke wrote the gospel of Matthew without Latinates. I'm trying to find it. I'd like to read it.

As for experience ... What is experience but skill, knowledge, or wisdom? A bad experience is an ordeal. A good experience could be a bliss. As a verb ... when you experience something, you go thru it; meet it; undergo ... and you learn. And experienced man might be learned or skilled or both!

I found a downloadable copy of Cheke's "Gospel of Matthews", I'v only redd a bit but it is easy to understand once yu ar used to the spelling!

@Ængelfolc ... Yu seem to hav better etymological sources than me ... Here is what I found for "stop":

stop (v.)
O.E. -stoppian (in forstoppian "to stop up, stifle"), along with M.L.G. stoppen, O.H.G. stopfon (Ger. stopfen) a W.Gmc. borrowing from V.L. *stuppare "to stop or stuff with tow or oakum" (cf. It. stoppare, Fr. étouper "to stop with tow"), from L. stuppa "coarse part of flax, tow." Plugs made of tow were used from ancient times in Rhine valley.

BTW, stopfon is listed as the root word for "stuff" (German Stoff) which comes to English thru French ... It may have entered French thru stopfon ... but then the source puts stopfon as from vulgar Latin.

***Now I would think that vulgar Latin along the Rhine would betoken that the Romans picked it up from the Teutons/Germans rather than the Germans picked it up from the Romans.

Similar with the meaning of "tale" as number (German Zahl; OE tæl).

But yet, under tally, there is this: mid-15c., "stick marked with notches to indicate amount owed or paid," from Anglo-Fr. tallie (early 14c.), Anglo-L. talea (late 12c.), from M.L. tallia, from L. talea "a cutting, rod, stick"

The Anglo-L in the late 12c is clearly post-Norman yet "tæl" shows up in several kennings in OE so it had to be there pre-Norman and it isn't listed as Latin in the sources that I'v read. The Anglo-Saxons came after the Romans left Britain ... so who took it from whom? What is the root of Zahl? If you have a source I'll pass it along.

Wanted: teacher with minimum ten years' industry ordeal..
Wanted: teacher with at least ten years' craft skill
Wanted: teacher with more than ten years' wisdo

Wanted teacher with at least ten years' experience..
The previous ones don't make sense

Wanted: teacher with a background of at least ten years ...

Or, if you'r willing to accept the Greek root of history ... with a history of at least ten years.

I have a background in accounting and software; this is quite different from my teaching experience. Everyone has a background - it includes being raised in the Bronx or wherever, your education and so on. Even saying "teaching background" is not quite the same as teaching experience; the meaning do overlap but not 100%. And therein lies the rub. (Hamlet!). Another example I had today was "extinct" "extinction" but the verb is "die out"; one might say "dying out" for the noun but there is no real English adjective which matches extinct. Looking back thru this thread there are few "Grade I " matches; most are "Grade II" overlapping but not 100%.However there is hope: when I started teaching everyone talked about "vocabulary" but about ten years ago suddenly the jargon "in" word became "lexis" (Gk="word") - why I don't know, perhaps because someone wanted to promote the "lexical method". Anyway what is does mean is that academics (at least) can start and push change through. Now we have a new word "wordstock" that I would describe as "Grade III" that is it is understandable but not in the dictionary yet, but change is at least do-able, the real ask is what, when, and how much?
predict >>> forecast (Grade I) ?
prophesy >>> foretell (Grade II)
information >>> tidings (grade II)
experience >>> afaring (Grade IV) !!!

Wanted: teacher with ten years' jobfare.
Wanted: captain with ten years' seafaring as deck officer.
Understandable? Clear? precise? ???

@jayles: "Looking back thru this thread there are few "Grade I " matches; most are "Grade II" overlapping but not 100%."

Do you think that the grading tiers have something to do with how a words meaning has shifted throughout its use in a tongue? In German, we say "ausgestorben", which means 'extinct' (lit. 'died out'). How could that not become an adjective? >> "The died-out Do Do Bird". Why couldn't it work?

predict >>> bespeak; bode; foretell; foreshadow; forebode; foresee; forespeak; forecast; soothsay, asf.
prophesy >>> forecast; foresee; foretell; forewarn; soothsay
information >>> knowledge; news. I like the word "tidings" >> What tidings do you bring?
experience >>> worldliness; doing

Take heed that we say these words every day, so they are well-known and well-worn.

Wanted: teacher with at least ten years' teaching.
Wanted: teacher with at least ten years' doing the job.
Wanted: teacher with more than ten years' on the job.
Wanted: teacher with more than ten years' teaching.
Wanted: teacher with at least/more than ten years' time teaching.

Experience >>> O.E. Gewissung

Sorry!

experience >> O.E. andwīsnes
information >> O.E. gewissung

@AnWulf: "What is the root of Zahl?"

The root of Zahl > "English etymology: a select glossary serving as an introduction to the Histroy of the English Language" by Friedrich Kluge and Frederick Lutz

"And some grow rich by telling lies, and some by telling money."

If one doesn't understand, think of a 'bank teller' (one who tells (counts) money in a bank). Do votes in Parliament still get told (counted) in Britain?

TELL has two meanings, but TALLY is, to my knowledge, from Latin-French < Latin. Fr. taillé (pp. of tailler) accounts for the 'y' ending in English. I have not come across a Teutonic link as of yet.

Stop, Stuff

Also, see >> The Rhine Franconian element in old French by Paul W. Brosman, Jr., pg. 72

@Jayles ... I see what you're saying ... but I'm not sure if that nuance is really there.

I looked at an online thesaurus:
background: experience, accomplishments, history, education, qualification, asf
experience: background, accomplishments, history, education, training, asf

I think that the rub is that often background and experience are qualified by work or education ... The frain, "What is your experience in computing" could cover anything from self-taught to university to work. OTOH, if I ask what is your work experience then it is narrowed. I can also ask what is your work background with computers ... or your education background. If you don't put the qualifier, which is a good way to be ambiguous, then it's open to interpretation. I have a background in aerospace ... Does that mean that I have work experience? A degree? Or that I'm a self-taught space nut? It's open!

But if you want to strike afaring as a new word to give that little bit of unlikeness, I'm ok with that!

An extinct species ... A lost species; wiped out species, dead species, fallen species, doused species, offed, forgone.

The dinosaurs are a dead sett/group/kind that were wiped out by a spacerock! (Or rumerock, rumestone).
It is a dead volcano ... lifeless volcano.

That's a gripping scale that you have there!

@Ængelfolc ... Thanks for the info. Since I'm living as an expat, I can't go to a local library to find an etymological source. It's either online or nothing for me! lol

First I saw stuff being related to stop and then stop was credited as having come from vulgate Latin probably from along the Rhine ... I thought to myself, that can't be right!

As for tally ... I thought it was a natural to go from OE tæl to tally ... tal+ly ... the source was kind of murky and I think I misread it since it mentioned Anglo-Latin talea 12c. I still think they're related since the Frankish would have have something like tal for number and it would have been known in Old French. Zahl, tal, tæl ... But then tallier supposedly comes from talea. Why not from PGmc tala? I can't say and it just may be coincidence.

@jayles

The word 'wordstock' isn't very new. I found it brooked on blog back in 2006 ... If I tried, I could likely find it being brooked earlier. As a teacher, maybe you should take Wordstock for Teachers! http://www.wordstockfestival.com/education/workstock-for-teachers/

Yes the point about a thesaurus is it does not provide words which are a 100% match; it just provides words that have some overlap in meaning and/or usage, so we can't just use words from a thesaurus as stand-ins willy-nilly. Most words in a Thesaurus are a grade II match only. It's much the same when translating to a foreign tongue; the words just don't match up 100%. For example "wiped out" is not exactly the same as "died out" because it introduces the idea of someone or something killing them. To provide a more homely example: were native american bison almost wiped out or almost died out??

Ængelfolc: "In German, we say "ausgestorben", which means 'extinct' (lit. 'died out'). How could that not become an adjective? >> die out is intransitive so we cannot make up an adjective from the past participle in English, as the past participle is essentially passive in meaning which presupposes a transitive verb. There are one or two verbs such as drink >> drunken; shrink>>> shrunken which have a special form for the adjective even though the original verb has no object.

This: "a given name"

@jayles:"were native american bison almost wiped out or almost died out??"

Trade with the Europeans nearly wiped out the American Buffalo (Bison). It has been estimated that American Indians were eating only four out of every 100 bison they killed. The rest was sold as buffalo robes, coats, meat, asf. Of course, they almost died out, too.

@jayles: "we cannot make up an adjective from the past participle in English... There are one or two verbs...have a special form for the adjective even though the original verb has no object."

Why can't the rules be changed? ;-)

@jayles: "we cannot make up an adjective from the past participle in English... There are one or two verbs...have a special form for the adjective even though the original verb has no object."

Why can't the rules be changed? ;-)

AEngelfolc: There are no rules; it's just a description of what happens. I do try to teach students how to write "normal" English but trying to explain why you can say "the risen Christ"; a "stricken" man; "an unexploded bomb" but not "a decided question"; "a happened accident". It's not too bad for Europeans but students from SE Asia often come up with the weirdest "English". The essential point is to be aware that "to increase" either means to become bigger or to make something bigger - that is rise or raise. As you must already know Hungarian is very picky with regard to transitive and intransitive verbs for instance keszul / keszit and often adds the causitive tat/tet suffix. English does neither except for rise/raise; fall/fell; lie/lay; sit/set and ???
I end up saying "you cannot use a passive unless the verb is transitive" , which is not quite true as there are a few verbs in English which break this "rule"; but students need some guideline to help them root out the mistakes.
Quite frankly, in my experience (!!!!) it is rare for people from SE Asia to write sound English unless they have been brought up on it from an early age; the languages and way of thinking are so different.

Or maybe I'm just a poor teacher!!

I gave you the option of wiped out because I didn't know if you wanted to be clear-cut. Otherwise use 'dead'. The word 'extinct' doesn't tell us how the species died ... whether natural or by man or by accident ... just that it no longer is. In that case, it is a dead species.

No doubt that there are Latinates that are clearer and likely would have been borrowed. Just as English as taken in Scandinavian and Dutch words ... like trip. Some of the Germanic words made there way to English thru France like 'drug' likely because of the intense relationship between England and France after the Conquest.

Gotta get moving for the day but I'll leave with a series of kennings from OE that will have to be left in the dustbin.

leecher - docter
leechbook - book of prescriptions
leechcraft - practice of medicine
leechcraftig - skilled in medicine
leechchest - medicine box
leechfee - doctoer's fee ... OK, maybe we can keep that one and apply it lawyers as well! lol
leechhouse - hospital
leechwort - medicinal herb, drug

@AnWulf:

If "Leech" would be brought back into the wordstock to mean "doctor", it should probably be spelled the OE way >> lǣce (lœce) or lȳce (ȳ = ü), cf. Old Saxon lāki, Old High German lāhhi, Gothic lēkeis, Old Norse lǣknir.

The "bloodsucking worm" meaning of lǣce is from before the year 900; The "doctor, physician" meaning is from the mid 11 hundreds.

The medical sense is from " [one who] draws blood, or is skilled at 'bleeding' patients", which was a common medical technique using leeches.

The other less common O.E. word for 'doctor' was lācnystre, which only has been found once in an O.E. glossary, and only one time in a written work.

@jayles: "...but not "a decided question"; "a happened accident"."

These are understandable...it might sound a little awkward...it is said that a "question has already been decided upon"...why not make it shorter? >> that question has been decided >> that is a decided question.

Alphabet = O.E. ābēcēdē (lit. saying the 1st four letters), stæfrǣw(e), stæfrōf "letter set".

Ængelfolc: yes "decided" can take an object so it is okay; I would suggest "an already-decided question" or "a yet-to-be-decided question" would make more sense though.
I googled "happened accident" and all I got was some Chinese chappie whose English needs a brush-up. Secondly "It might sound a little awkward" - that is the point - it is not normal English nor should it be. I am shielding English from outlandish inflows.

I think healer would be a good word for physician. Leech made it into ME as leche with the meaning of physican. OE lâcnian - to heal, cure, treat, look after; lacnung - healing, cure: medicament, remedy; lacnigendlic - surgical. Still, the best word is healer I think ... It could be used by a physician as well as a shaman!

I've hit a couple of tuffies ... OK ... I'm looking for an OE ... or even a non-Latinate Middle English word for "trait" or "feature" ... As in, "His height, his strength, and his wit are traits wanted by many."

I've found nothing in OE; I found "alit' in Old Norse for feature; I found "trekk" and "trekket" in nowadays Norwegian for trait and "trek" in Dutch (meaning feature).

Trait is from Latin tractus ... the same root for "tract" (OE traht). I'm about to give up and accept it since it shares a root a pre-conquest Latinate or use "trekk" ... I like the extra k to make it unlike "trek" which is used for a hard trip.

I've thought about making a noun from hligan (to attribute to) ... that would kind of go with "alit" from ON.

---

The next one is 'communications' ... as in 'He is the communications officer.' Only Icelandic has a different word than a form of communication: samskipti which is similar to OE samodspræc.

Samod is an OE adverb and forefast (prefix) meaning 'at the same time' (simultaneously) also seen as sama and samo. A good forefast to bring back!

samodgang = continuous; communication between rooms (an open door?).

Update spræc to sprac or speak; thus a nowadays turning/writing of it could be:

samespeak (don't like), samespeaking, samodspeak, samodspeaking, samodsprac, samodsprak, samsprack, samsprek, samsprec ... I like the last two but I think that's my knowledge of German seeping thru.

Maybe thruspeak or thruhspeak ... thrutalk ... to speak thru or talk thru?