Top Schools that offer Old English?

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<p>Princeton usually offers one class in old english, and then there are several classes focused on old english literature-- I took one where we learned a bit of the old english, although we were reading in translation. There are also chaucer/middle english classes and some history classes that are relevant.</p>

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<p>coureur, I had a similar encounter with The Jabberwocky. :slight_smile: Not quite the same as Old English, but enough to make you go, “Wait, what?”</p>

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<p>Here is one of my favorite passages in Old English that illustrates both its differences and similarities to modern Englsih. It is taken from Aelfric’s “Homily on St. Gregory the Great”. It relates the story of how the Pope came to send missionaries to convert the heathen of England to Christianity after seeing some Anglo-Saxon boys for sale as slaves in Rome:</p>

<p>Old English:
Eft he axode, hu thaere theode nama waere the hi of comon. Him waes geandwyrd, thaet hi Angle genemnode waeron. Tha cwaeth he, “Rihtlice hi sind Angle gehatene, for than the hi engla wlite habbath, and swilcum gedafenath thaet hi on heofonum engla geferan beon.”</p>

<p>Modern English
Again he (St. Gregory) asked what might be the name of the people from which they came. It was answered to him that they were named Angles. Then he said. “Rightly are they called Angles because they have the beauty of angels, and it is fitting that such as they should be the angels’ companions in heaven.”</p>

<p>I had to transliterate the few Anglo-Saxon letters, such as “thorn” and “wynn” that do not exist on my Roman keyboard. But as you can see, a few words such as “he”, “him”, “of”, and “for” are exactly the same in modern and old English. And more have survived in altered form:
nama = name
comon = came
waere = were
waes = was
axode = asked
rihtlice = rightly
engla = angels</p>

<p>But others have vanished from modern English, often without even leaving a trace:
eft = again
theode = people or nation
cwaeth - said
gehatene = called or named
wlite = appearance
swilcum = such
geferan = companions</p>

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<p>Thanks, coureur. I super enjoyed your little “lesson.” I love how literature builds such bridges across time. Anglo-Saxon is so vivid, and we are blessed that modern English maintains some of that vividness.</p>

<p>Some Middle English (Mallory for one, and on occasion Chaucer) has so much French that the French words are more familiar to me than many of the words still in Anglo-Saxon.</p>

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<p>I’m also happy that English has managed to remain as rich as it has despite maintaining so many words from the Norman conquest 1000 years ago.</p>

<p>Thanks, coureur.</p>

<p>Also, am I the only one that things Anglo-Saxon is one of the most beautiful written languages (after it adopted some of the Latin script)? (Might have to squint) <a href=“http://withgoodreasonradio.org/files/2008/12/beowulf.jpg[/url]”>http://withgoodreasonradio.org/files/2008/12/beowulf.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>My 98 year old mom can still recite Chaucer…and my D is minoring in pre-modern history. Must be the genes.</p>

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<p>Yale .</p>

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<p>I was actually digging on the Yale website (it’s a bit unintuitive) and it appears as though they have something called Directed Independent Language Study for motivated students who want to learn languages not normally taught at the university. This might be a good path to take. It also looks like they offer Dutch through the program, which I want to learn as well.</p>

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<p>Cwaeth made it into “modern” English (at least the modern English of the Renaissance) as “quoth”. Eft I suspect is in the lineage of “oft”. And the root of geferan I believe shows up in “wayfarers” and “farewell”.</p>

<p>I think you’ll find that the program Yale has represents sticking a nice name on something that exists at every first-rank university. Or at least I hope it does. I would certainly hope that at a leading university a student would be able to learn Dutch! (Or Old English, for that matter.)</p>

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<p>Just remember that even if you are able to do a special studies for some of your courses, or do the directed independent language study (and I would be careful with that, they might mean languages like Swahili and Urdu and Bengali rather than old languages) you will need to find something to major in (German studies perhaps). </p>

<p>But most undergrad courses at top universities and LACs teach the epics like Beowulf and Canterbury Tales in the original, even if they don’t teach Old English as it’s own course. It’s unusual to find a course at a top university where they teach these in translation.</p>

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<p>

This. Any English (or linguistics) department worth its salt is going to have at least one professor conversant with the historical phases of the English language. </p>

<p>A quick google search reveals that Old English has been taught in the past at UVA, Towson, NYU, WVU, Notre Dame, the College of Charleston, Iowa State, Loyola U Chicago, UCSB, SIUC, and many more that I haven’t bothered to mention. </p>

<p>Since you don’t plan to pursue this at the graduate level, I’d simply check to see if one or two professors at a college of interest are familiar with Old/Middle English. Elamite is difficult to find - Old English, not so much. ;)</p>

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<p>Plymeth: Why despite the French word borrowings? I think the French enlivens the mix a good deal, as do the Latin, Greek, Spanish, Dutch, Yiddish etc etc word borrowings.</p>

<p>And I agree with you. The script is beautiful.</p>

<p>I am always tickled by the knowledge that we have cookies and the British biscuits because cookie is a version of a Dutch word for little cakes. Of course, most Dutch word borrowings in the US come from NY.</p>

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<p>I didn’t realize how German Angle-Saxon was. Syntax, word order, all those ge’s in front of verbs.</p>

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<p>mythmom: Just by comparing Modern English with Old, the Anglo-Saxon just seems richer in my opinion. Word borrowings are fine, but I guess I’d just rather be speaking something closer to the original. Old English just seems so epic, and I don’t get that feeling with its modern half. Maybe I’m just weird though.</p>

<p>JHS: I actually haven’t found a big name school that offers Dutch… I guess the universities feel its become a dying breed, in the vein of some of some Eastern European languages. Although I have to admit that if it weren’t for my particular interest in the history of the Unified Provinces I probably wouldn’t consider Dutch to be too incredibly worthwhile either.</p>

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<p>JHS, I don’t think Middle English needs to be “taught” as if it were a foreign language; it really isn’t one. Just about anyone can manage it with a dictionary (or the footnotes!) Unless, of course, you want to learn how to read manuscripts, but those are difficult to read without training even in early Modern English.</p>

<p>Old English, however, might as well be Greek – or Old Serbian, for that matter – for all the sense it makes to me.</p>

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<p>You may find Dutch instruction in colleges affiliated with the Reformed Church of America or the Christian Reformed Church, both descendants of the Dutch Reformed Church. But none of them fit the qualifier of “Top Schools” as I think it was meant by the OP.</p>

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<p>Plymeth: It may be that Anglo-Saxon is more heroic because it describes a more heroic age. Then again, you may be right. It may just be the language that appeals to you.</p>

<p>I like the fact that Modern English has twice as many words than other modern languages. As I poet, I really appreciate it. When I had a poem published in an anthology that was later translated into French I did the translation myself, and it was extremely difficult finding enough French words to do this.</p>

<p>Mathmom: Anglo-Saxon is basically a form of German. They were Germanic tribes who pushed the Celtic languages perviously spoken to the edges (Ireland, Scotland, Wales) and just started speaking their “German.” English is supposed to be closest to Dutch according to my linguist friends and Old English closest to Swedish.</p>

<p>I totally agree with Donna. Anyone with any advanced degree in English is expected to read Middle English and not Old English unless they are specializing in that area.</p>

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<p>Check this out - daily readings aloud of Anglo-Saxon.</p>

<p>[Anglo-Saxon</a> Aloud](<a href=“http://fred.wheatonma.edu/wordpressmu/mdrout]Anglo-Saxon”>http://fred.wheatonma.edu/wordpressmu/mdrout)</p>

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<p>Mythmom, I’d sort of known that Anglo-Saxon was German in theory - I knew pork, beef came from the French and swine and cow from Anglo-Saxon. I just hadn’t ever seen a whole sentence of it!</p>

<p>Interestingly this thread came up in our dinner table conversation today as S2 needs to start a new language in college for his proposed International Studies major. He’s leaning toward Arabic now, but some how the conversation was about how many words different languages have and what makes one vs another harder or easier to learn.</p>

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<p>nemom, Thanks a lot. That’s a very cool find. I’m not familiar with Wheaton College but perhaps it wouldn’t hurt to give it a look.</p>

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