Translation Techniques

Crash Course: Old English Inflections

This page is a crash course for translating Old English verb, adjective, and noun inflections. It provides some quick Present Day English (PDE) equivalents so that you can “hear” what each case sounds like in PDE. This is only meant to get you started in the first week or two. We’ll return to them more formally and analytically later.

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Old English Cases

Old English has four main cases (and a fifth, very limited in distribution, that we’ll deal with later):

OE Case	PDE function	Example	PDE translation	PDE Personal Pronoun equivalent (ignoring gender)
Nominative	Subject	dæg	the day	he / they
Accusative	Object	naman	the name	him / them
Genitive	Possessive	stanes	the stone’s	of him (his) / of them (their)
Dative	“by/with/to/for”	Gode	by/with/to/for God	by/with/to/for him / by/with/to/for them

Note: The cases in OE (and PDE) have additional uses, meanings, and nuances. These are the core functions you need to translate.

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Old English Persons

Person	Number	PDE example (pronouns)	PDE example (verbs)
First	Singular	I, me, my	I run / I ran
	Plural	we, us, our	we run / we ran
Second	Singular	you, you, your	you run / you ran
	Plural	you (y’all), you (y’all), your (y’all’s)	y’all run / y’all ran
Third	Singular	he, him, his	he runs / he ran
		she, her, her	she runs / she ran
		it, it, its	it runs / it ran
	Plural	they, them, their	they run / they ran

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How to Use This Guide

1. Set up your paper

   • Write out the Old English on the recto (odd-numbered) side of a lined piece of paper.
   • Keep four lines between each line of Old English.

2. Gloss each word

   • Look up each word in the glossary.
   • Copy down the OE form and the PDE form on the verso (even-numbered page) opposite the Old English.
   • Example: god, m, “god”

3. Annotate the OE text

   • Above (or below) each word in the Old English on the recto, copy out the information from your glossary about the same word:
     • Number: sg. / pl.
     • and either:
       • Gender: m / f / n, and Case: nom / gen / acc / dat
       • or Tense: past / pres, and Person: first / second / third

4. Add PDE equivalents

   • Look up the PDE equivalents from the tables above and write them in.
   • Example:
     • sg, nom, masc → he
     • pres, 1p sg → I run

5. Substitute with meaning

   • Replace the placeholder pronoun with the actual meaning of the word from the glossary.
   • Example:
     • Gloss: cnapum (wk masc noun, dat pl): servants
     • On the verso: “Cnapum, wk masc noun ‘servants’”
     • Above cnapum in your OE text: “by/with/to/for them”
     • Final substitution: “by/with/to/for servants”

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How to Use A Glossary (Specifically for Mitchell and Robinson)

This glossary is your main reference tool when reading Old English texts. Each entry gives you:

• The Old English form — e.g. abbod
• The part of speech or class — e.g. n. (noun), V (verb)
• Grammatical information — case, number, gender, or verb class
• The Present Day English meaning — a quick translation equivalent
• References to texts and line numbers — showing where the word occurs in the anthology or exercises

When you use the glossary:

1. Look up the OE word exactly as it appears in the text (Watch out for prefixes like ge-. The word may be listed without the prefix).
2. Note the form information: whether it is a noun, verb, adjective, or something else, plus any gender, case, or number markers.
3. Check the PDE equivalent to get the meaning in context.
4. Apply the grammar — don’t just copy the PDE translation. Use the case/number/tense info to fit the word properly into your sentence.

How to Read a Glossary Entry

Here’s an example, broken down into parts:

Glossary entry:

abbod m. abbot 7/1, 7/19; ds abbode 4/136

Explanation:

Part of entry	What it means
abbod	The Old English headword (the form you look up)
m.	Part of speech and gender → here, noun, masculine
abbot	Present Day English meaning (quick translation)
7/1, 7/19	References to text and line numbers where the word occurs in your anthology
ds abbode 4/136	A specific example of the word in use: dative singular form abbode, at line 4/136

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Common Abbreviations

Here are some of the most common abbreviations you’ll see in entries:

• m., f., n. → masculine, feminine, neuter
• sg., pl. → singular, plural
• nom., acc., gen., dat. → nominative, accusative, genitive, dative (cases)
• V → verb
• adj. → adjective
• pers. n. → personal name
• ds, ns, gp, etc. → case + number abbreviations (e.g. ds = dative singular, gp = genitive plural)

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