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Archiver > GEN-MEDIEVAL > 1995-07 > 0805066801


From: Elias Halldor Agustsson< >
Subject: Re: CONTINUING TO KICK AROUND POOR OLD ROLLO
Date: 6 Jul 1995 21:40:01 GMT


In <> (Tom Camfield) writes:

>In article <3tet9c$>, (Elias Halldor
>Agustsson) wrote:

>> In <> (Tom Camfield) writes:
>>
>> >In article <3te0pf$>, Ulf Larsson
>> ><> wrote:

>> >I also have a typo in the case of Are Frode/Fode. Is it spelled with or
>> >without the R? and does Are have an accent over the A?
>>
>> Abolutely and emphatically NO!! He himself probably spelled it Are, but
>> modern conventions (that are based on grammatical works written a
>> generation after him) spell it as Ari. His full name would be Ari (or
>> Are) "fri" orgilsson (if you don't get Icelandic characters, I will
>> transliterate it as "froodhi" Thorgilsson). Froodhi is a byname so you
>> can just translate it as "the wise".

>So, then: My best bet is Ari Thorgilsson "the Wise."
>I can replicate here on my computer the o-with-slash, the
>a-with-tiny-o-on-top, umlauts (which I always thought were more Germanic),
>tildes in case you are a Spanish Icelander :-)) etc.

Yep, Ari Thorgilsson, "the Wise" (or Ari "the Wise" Thorgilsson) is your
best bet.

>So with these available alternatives, how would Snorri Sturluson and Ari
>"froodhi" Thorgilsson appear in my text? The worst thing a writer can do is
>misspell someone's name--be it in Chinese, English, Swedish or
>what-have-you.

Feel free to translate any part of a name that you see in lowercase in
Icelandic ... for example "froodhi". Now, about Torf-Einar, there is the
question whether you could translate that to Turf-Einar ...

>I see from your list to Yngvi, King of Turks that we end up with the name
>"Are" (??)

Yes, the last goes thus: .xxxvi. Gellir, the father of Thorkell (father of
Brandr) and of Thorgils, my father, but my name is Ari"

Ari was the first person to write in Icelandic (although there is an
eternal debate going on whether The Homily Book or even Postola Sgor
(stories of the Apostles, from the Legenda Aurea, probably, although the
original latin versions have never been found) were earlier. He seems to
have used the rune-letter thorn () for both th and dh and a c instead of
a k. The foundations of the modern alphabeth were laid a generation after
his death. I do not think that we are in any way bound to spell his name
as he did, not anymore than the English spell "Shakespeare" because he
spelled it that way, on the contrary, in fact.

>Anyhow, your Yngui Tyrkia conungr looks suspiciously like the Yngvi-Frey I
>have down as having succeeded his father as king of the Swedes.
>Next you have Nirr, where I have Njo:rdur
>Next you have Freyr, where I have Freyr Njardrson.
>Next you have Filner, where I have Fjo:lnir Freysson.
>Etc.

Nirr= Nio:rdhr Filner= Fio:lner etc.

However, you should go with standardized Old-Norse spelling, which is
different from Modern Icelandic and from the one Ari uses.

examples:

Spelling of Ari:Nio:rdhr
Standardized Old Norse:Njo:rdhr
Modern Icelandic:Njo:rdhur
Modern Norwegian:Njo:rd


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