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Old English | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| berabero89 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4643 days ago 101 posts - 137 votes  Speaks: English, Amharic* Studies: Spanish, Japanese, French | Message 1 of 14 14 August 2015 at 7:53am | IP Logged | ||
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I've recently began to study Old English. I saw that Dr. Arguelles had recommended
Sweet's Anglo-Saxon Primer, but I didn't realize it was a grammar and not really a course. Currently, I have the Cambridge Old English Reader, Sweet's Anglo-Saxon Reader, and the primer. My question is: do I have enough to learn the language? I am attempting to learn the conjugation and declension paradigms, but it's not working very well. It seems like my only other option is to jump into the Cambridge reader, but without grammatical explanations, it seems like I'll have huge gaps in my knowledge. Are there free, comprehensive courses that others here know of? Any advice? Thank you 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 14 14 August 2015 at 11:41am | IP Logged | ||
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There are a few videos on the internet, like the battle of Brunenberg (or something like that). Not much, but probably just enough to get the 'tone' ringing in your ears. And apart from that I have found the Anglosaxon chronicles much easier to deal with than Beowulf. Boring, but comprehensible.. Edited by Iversen on 14 August 2015 at 11:42am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5566 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 3 of 14 14 August 2015 at 11:44am | IP Logged | ||
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This is where Arguelles' recommendations can sometimes be slightly unhelpful.
Unlike lesser mortals he can learn from a primer (which in British English, at least, often means a grammar to be used with a teacher - e.g. Kennedy's Latin Primer). Most of us cannot achieve such a feat :-) When I had a foray into OE, I used Pollington to get going, with Sweet as a reference. I found it a useful introducion. http://www.amazon.co.uk/First-Steps-Old-English-Language/dp/ 1898281386/ref=sr_1_1? ie=UTF8&qid=1439544684&sr=8-1&keywords=Old+English http://www.amazon.co.uk/Old-English-Poems-Prose-Lessons/dp/1 898281467/ref=pd_sim_14_2? ie=UTF8&refRID=1SCY5MSPJHSYFHAPNXV3 Edited by Elexi on 14 August 2015 at 11:47am 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| akkadboy Triglot Senior Member France Joined 5409 days ago 264 posts - 497 votes Speaks: French*, English, Yiddish Studies: Latin, Ancient Egyptian, Welsh | Message 4 of 14 14 August 2015 at 12:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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I seem to recall that there's a Teach Yourself Old English (actually there might be two, one from the 60's maybe, and a more recent one).
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5566 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 5 of 14 14 August 2015 at 12:45pm | IP Logged | ||
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I have the new one TY (impulse buy, never used it) and it looks quite good and getting a
person started in OE. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Mork the Fiddle Senior Member United States Joined 3970 days ago 86 posts - 159 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian, Latin, Ancient Greek | Message 6 of 14 14 August 2015 at 8:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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As a grammar and an introduction, I used Peter Baker's Introduction to Old English, which I found serviceable. There is a free online version of the book Introduction to Old English, but which I have not used myself. Peter Baker created a Magic Sheet, which is a one-page, color-coded summary of declensions and conjugations. I found it quite helpful, and you might find it useful for learning the paradigms, too.
Murray McGillivray of The University of Calgary also has an online Introductory Course, which is another resource I discovered only too late. I took a look or two at Beowulf, but chose to work on the shorter lyrical poems first: "The Wanderer," "Deor" and so on, and to read some of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, as Iversen suggests above. There is a parallel text version of Beowulf by Benjamin Slade. Useful, just beware Slade has copyrighted his site. For what it is worth, I have more than a dozen bookmarks to sites about Old English on the web from a dozen or more years ago, but almost all of the links are now dead. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6704 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 7 of 14 16 August 2015 at 5:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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I actually have the old TY by Leslie Blakeley from 1964 in a reprint from 78, and it is a sleek little thing with just 193 pages, but it covers a lot of ground and also contain some good prose texts with translations. But I suppose it would be hard to find in the shops these days..
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Mork the Fiddle Senior Member United States Joined 3970 days ago 86 posts - 159 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian, Latin, Ancient Greek | Message 8 of 14 16 August 2015 at 7:22pm | IP Logged | ||
1 person has voted this message useful |
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