While the Oxford English Dictionary is not a specialized tool for Middle English, it does preserve some archaic words and spellings, so it might also be useful (the link takes you to the UBC Library connection page if you are visiting this page from elsewhere, you can go directly to the OED site, or see whether your institution has institutional access).īelow are the opening lines of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, with a range of translations to give you a sense of how different people have approached the task of translating this complex alliterative verse. Make lavish use of truncation, since spelling can be quite variable. Be sure to select Headwords (with alternate spellings) in the pull-down menu on the left. The Middle English Dictionary is full of information, but can be difficult to figure out at first. There are some online resource that can help you translate Middle English. To fix a spear or lance in its rest ( the fewter) Here, then, is a list of common (and/ or commonly mistranslated) Middle English words: First, while translation is not simply a matter of substituting modern words for Middle English ones, both the task and your reading of Middle English in general will go more smoothly if you learn some Middle English vocabulary by heart. This page also offers a few tools to help you as you work on translating Middle English. Chaucer’s Middle English: Don’t be Intimidated is a brief video introducing Middle English.I have recorded myself reading The Alliterative Morte Arthur aloud, in its entirety: visit The Alliterative Morte Arthur Aloud.Peter Robinson has made an app of the General Prologue of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales that takes you through the text with images, sound files, and translation (also available in a web-based version, here).Harvard has a Geoffrey Chaucer page that includes a section called How to Read Chaucer.Marry those sounds to some kind of regional British accent, and you’re on your way… Other Resourcesįollow these links for a more precise account of Middle English pronunciation: Many people find they can at least start the process by using vowel-sound equivalents from various European languages: you’ll notice that French and German are both used in the simplified outline on this page. As with other languages, you need to have the nerve to make mistakes in order to progress in oral reading. While I encourage you to use the other resources listed here to learn to pronounce Middle English more precisely, what I’m most interested in is that you should get some sense of how a poem like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight or the Alliterative Morte Arthur works through its sounds. Ou, ow, ough – rather like know: use this sound when the modern word has a similar sound, or, before -ght, a sound as in law Faking It Ou, ow, ough – as in moon: use this sound when the modern word is like house, course, or through There are exceptions to these notes about long vowels: these include the fact that a and o are usually short when followed by f, s, th, and r.Īi, ay, ei, ey – aim for something between the sounds in lake and likeĮu, ew – rather like few while there is another, somewhat different sound also corresponding to this spelling, this sound should get you started Words spelled with -oo today are always long, even if we now pronounce them with short vowels. When is a vowel long? Single vowels and digraphs (a combination of two letters to represent one sound, as in sea or see) are long if the modern word has a long vowel or a diphthong. O, oo – as in law: use this sound when the modern word is like most, stone, throat O, oo – as in German Sohn, French chose: use this sound when the modern word is like food, good, blood, other Long VowelsĮ, ee, ie – as in German sehen, French été: use this sound when the modern word has a sound like he, seeĮ, ee – as in there: use this sound when the modern word has -ea, as in speak, dream, and also head, bread Exceptions are words like bread, breath, dead, heaven, where the vowel is like French père and gone and hot, where the vowel is like law. When is a vowel short? Single vowels before single or double consonants usually are short if the same word has a short vowel today.
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