Old Norse Language Phonemes Vowels Stops Fricatives

Its modern descendants are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic, Norwegian, Faroese and the extinct Norn languageThe Norn language was an offshoot of Old Norse. It was spoken in the Shetland Islands and Orkney Islands of Scotland. After the islands were ceded to the Kingdom of Scotland in the 15th century, its use was discouraged by the Scottish government and The K of the Orkney and the Shetland IslandsThe Shetland Islands (sometimes historically spelled Zetland formerly Hjaltland are one of 32 unitary council regions in Scotland and a Lieutenancy Area. It is a Scottish island group between the Orkney Islands and the Faroe Islands, north of mainland Sco as well as the East Scandinavian languages of Swedish and DanishDanish is one of the Scandinavian languages, a sub-group of the Germanic group of the Indo-European language family. History Most Danish words are derived from the Old Norse language, with new words formed by compounding. A large percentage of Danish word. Norwegian was later heavily influenced by East Scandinavian.

Among these, Icelandic and the closely related Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years, although with Danish rule of the Faroe IslandsThe Faroe Islands ( Faroese: Foroyar meaning "Sheep Islands") are a group of islands in the north Atlantic Ocean between Scotland and Iceland. They are an autonomous region of the kingdom of Denmark. Since 1948 they have had self-government in almost all Faroese has also been influenced by Danish. Old Norse also had an influence on English dialects and particularly Scots which contains many Old Norse loanwords. It also influenced the development of the Norman language.

The earliest inscriptions are runic, from the 1st century, and runes continued to be used for a thousand years. The main literary texts are in the Latin alphabet, the great sagas and eddas of medieval Iceland.

1 Phonemes

The standardized Old Norse spelling is for the most part phonemic. The most notable deviation is that the non-phonemic difference between the voiced and the unvoiced dental fricatives is marked.

1.1 Vowels

The vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The orthography marks the long vowels with an acute accent. The short counterpart of /æ/ is not a phoneme but an allophone of /e/. The long counterpart of /ö/ has merged with /á/ in the classical (13th century) language. All phonemes have, more or less, the expected phonetic realization.

Back vowels:

/a/ /á/

/ǫ/ /ǭ/ (pronounced as Sampa [O]; the latter should be o with an ogonek and an acute accent, but Unicode doesn't allow for that.)

/o/ /ó/

/u/ /ú/

Front unrounded vowels:

/æ/

/e/ /é/

/i/ /í/

Front rounded vowels:

/ø/ /œ/ (properly oe-ligature)

/y/ /ý/

1.2 Stops

Old Norse has six stop phonemes. Of these /p/ is rare word-initially and /d/ and /b/ do not occur between vowels. The /g/ phoneme is realized as a voiced fricative between vowels.

/t/ /d/

/k/ /g/

/p/ /b/

1.3 Fricatives

/f/

/θ/ (< þ>) /ð/

/s/

/h/

1.4 Liquids

/l/ /r/

1.5 Semi-vowels

/j/ /v/

2 Text Example

The following text is from Egils saga. The manuscript is the oldest known for that saga, the so called θ-fragment from the 13th century. The text clearly shows, how little Icelandic has changed structurally. The last version is legitimate Modern Icelandic, although nothing has been altered but the spelling. The text also demonstrates, however, that a modern reader might have difficulties with the unaltered manuscript text, to say nothing of the lettering.

The manuscript text, letter for letter	The same text in normalized, Old Icelandic spelling	The same text in Modern Icelandic
ÞgeiR blundr systor s egils v þar aþingino & hafði gengit hart at liþueizlo við þst. h bað egil & þa þstein coma ser t staðfesto ut þangat a myrar h bio aðr fyr suNan huit a fyr neþan blundz vatn Egill toc uel aþui. oc fysti þst at þr leti h þangat fa ra. Egill setti þorgeir blund niðr at ana brecko En stein fǫrði bustað siN ut yf lang á. & settiz niðr at leiro lǫk. En egill reið hei suðr anes ept þingit m flocc siN. & skilðoz þr feðgar m kerleic	Þorgeirr blundr, systursonr Egils, var þar á þinginu ok hafði gengit hart at liðveizlu við Þorstein. Hann bað Egil ok þá Þorstein koma sér til staðfestu út þangat á Mýrar; hann bjó áðr fyrir sunnan Hvítá, fyrir neðan Blundsvatn. Egill tók vel á því ok fýsti Þorstein, at þeir léti hann þangat fara. Egill setti Þorgeir blund niðr at Ánabrekku, en Steinarr fœrði bústað sinn út yfir Langá ok settisk niðr at Leirulæk. En Egill reið heim suðr á Nes eptir þingit með flokk sinn, ok skildusk þeir feðgar með kærleik.	Þorgeir blundur, systursonur Egils, var þar á þinginu og hafði gengið hart að liðveislu við Þorstein. Hann bað Egil og þá Þorstein koma sér til staðfestu út þangað á Mýrar; hann bjó áður fyrir sunnan Hvítá, fyrir neðan Blundsvatn. Egill tók vel á því og fýsti Þorstein, að þeir létu hann þangað fara. Egill setti Þorgeir blund niður að Ánabrekku, en Steinar færði bústað sinn út yfir Langá og settist niður að Leirulæk. En Egill reið heim suður á Nes eftir þingið með flokk sinn, og skildust þeir feðgar með kærleik.

3 See also

4 References

Gordon, Eric V. and A. R. Taylor. Introduction to Old Norse. Second. ed. Oxford: Clarenden Press, 1981.

5 External links

Indo-European Language Resources The resources in question are mostly Germanic, including two dictionaries of Old Icelandic (in English), two grammars of Old Icelandic (one in English, one in German) and a grammar of Old Swedish (in German).
soundsample
Old Norse for Beginners

Extinct languages North Germanic languages

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