Genesis 1:26-31
26 Ond cwæð, "Uton wyrcan man to anlicnysse ond to ure gelicnysse, ond he sy ofer ða fixas ond ofer ða fugelas ond ofer ða deor ond ofer ealle gesceafta ond ofer ealle creopende, ðe styriað on eorðan."
27 God gesceop ða man
to his anlicnysse,
to Godes anlicnysse
he gesceop hine;
werhades ond wifhades
he gesceop hi.
28 Ond God hi bletsode ond cwæð, "Weaxað ond beoð gemenifylde ond gefyllað ða eorðan ond gewyldað hi, ond habbað on eowrum gewealde ðære sæ fixas ond ðære lyfte fugelas ond ealle nytenu, ðe styriað ofer eorðan." 29 God cwæð ða, "Efne ic forgyfe eow eall gærs ond wyrta sæd berende ofer eorðan ond ealle treowa, ða ðe habbað sæd on him sylfum heora agenes cynnes, ðæt hi beon eow to mete, 30 ond eallum nytenum ond eallum fugelcynne ond eallum ðam ðe styriað on eorðan, on ðam ðe is libbende lif, ðæt hi habbon him to gereordigenne." Hit wæs ða swa gedon.
31 Ond God geseah ealle ða ðingc ðe he geworhte ond hi wæron swyðe gode. Wæs ða geworden æfen ond merien se sixta dæg.
The above is from the Bible in Anglo-Saxon. I could not find the Guðbrandur þorlaksson translation on the internet, though Bible Gateways does have a contemporary Icelandic translation online. But Anglo-Saxon (or Old English, as we say in the English biz) is so close to it that anyone who can read the one can read the other.
The alphabet: English at one time had four more letters, ash, yogh, eth and thorn. “Eth” or “ð” is the voiced “th” as in “then” “Thorn, “or “þ” is the unvoiced “th” as in “thin.” Let’s look at verse 27 above.
Gesceop. If you know German, you’ll recognize the “ge” as a sign of a past tense. In England circa 800 CE the “eo” diphthong would have been pronounced “eh-oh” which eventually morphed into “a” as in “shape.” The sound we represent with “sh” used to be written “sc”
Ða. You get to see a capital eth here, so you might deduce that this is the precursor of “the.”
"Man" should be self-evident, a common Germanic word. Anglo-Saxon has many words for “man,” most of them referring to humans of the male gender, and the subset of warriors.
Hine. I won’t bore you with accounts of how this morphed in “him” but it did.
Anlicnysse. Figure: “an” becomes “own,” “lic” is not far from “like” (not lice) and “nysse” isn’t far off from “-ness.” As a suffix, it still means "a kind or quality of," though as a noun a “ness” is a landform, a spit or point going out into the ocean.
Werhades. “Wer” is one of those words for “man” I was talking about. It’s the equivalent of the Latin vir or “guy” as opposed to homo or “human.”* Many languages make a similar distinction, such as Mann and Mensch, anhr and anthrwpos Greek transliterated. (“h” for the long “e” or “eta,” “w” for the long “o” or omega)
Wifhades. “Wif” lacks an “e” of its present spelling, though it is interesting that woman is seen in this language and culture in terms of her role. I’m not sure about “hades” because I don’t have an A-S textbook handy, but “had” is related to either “head” or “hood,” and therefore seems to allude to a social status more than a biological one.
Hi. See “hine” above. This is the plural, and it’s an accusative, therefore “them.” Similarly, “God” is nominative and “Godes” is genitive.
I won’t go through the whole passage, but will drop a few hints. Would you associate “cwæð” with “quoth”? That “ae” run together is the letter “ash” and usually has the sound of “a” as in “had.” (Couldn't find a yogh, but it looks sort of like the numeral 3 and we have a vestige of it in words like "enough" and "though." Nothing soft and Latinate about those A-S cats, except they loved Vergil and St. Augustine! “Creopende” is a present participle that should give you a laugh.
I’ll be interested to hear how you make out with this. Meanwhile, just for comparison I’ll try to find a Wycliffe text for this passage, but most available Wycliffes are New Testament only.
Acknowledgment:
http://wordhord.org/nasb:
The Bible Book Genesis is here represented in the translation by Ælfric. It has been transcribed and converted to HTML from the following edition:
The Old English Version of the Heptateuch, Ælfric’s Treatise on the Old and New Testament and his Preface to Genesis. Edited by S.J. Crawford. London: Early English Text Society/Humphrey Milford, OUP, 1922
*There has been some confusion about the noun “homo” meaning “man” and “homo– as a prefix meaning same. In the word “homosexual” it means “same” and can apply to either gender.
