It's a sword, honest

[nineveh_uk]

I was reading some Anglo-Saxon poetry the other day, reminded of its existence by a friend complaining about teaching The Dream of the Rood. I rather like The Dream, which is basically HC Andersen’s The Fir Tree, but with added religion.

Anyway, I found myself in the riddles section, reflecting on the noble tradition of knob jokes in English literature, so in the interest of keeping literary tradition alive, I give you a modern version. I can’t compose in Old English, so this one is in the style of Anglo-Saxon translators.

Long and hard I lie by the leg of a man. Sometimes that hairy young man takes me from my hiding place to hold me in his hand. He fiddles me with his fingers. He would not be without me – I give him great joy!



A mobile phone. What else could it be, you filthy fanperson, you!

Question – what the hell is the dark-haired Welsh girl doing in the clean interpretation of Riddle XII? As she’s a slave, I am wondering something like a leather a bucket used in cleaning, but really I’m baffled.

And because once you start, you can't stop...

I tell you of a wondrous thing. A young woman drew me from beneath the covering cloth, took my round length firmly in her hand. That jolly girl inserted me into that hole I was made to fit, plunged and twisted me firmly in my place. I set up a great roaring! She was transported with delight.

A: A car key.

Comments

[phoebe_zeitgeist]

You know, it's been a couple of decades since I had any illusions of being able to compose in Anglo-Saxon, but your riddle makes me wish I still had a hope of doing it. Somebody should totally translate this back to its notional original, anachronistic answer and all. It's glorious.

Þis lif læne on londe

[nineveh_uk]

Thanks! Had I but world enough and time (and, perhaps more importantly, could be bothered), I could probably work out something tolerable, but I wouldn't answer for my case endings!

[quillori]

Your modern version is a delight.

As to Riddle XXII, I had a vague memory of some sort of leather curing process? A quick google provides this, starting a bit down the page with "instigated an investigation into Anglo-Saxon leather-working technology" and stopping when he starts going on about Freud (unless you like that sort of thing, obviously). But this is very, very much Not My Period, and any vague knowledge I have about it comes only from a fondness for riddles, so I have no idea at all how reliable or accurate either Wilcox or his interpretion is.

[ellen_fremedon]

Wilcox was my OE professor in undergrad! I would say he's extremely reliable, especially on the riddles.

[quillori]

Oh, I'm so pleased to have that confirmed. The problem with wandering around randomly picking up bits of subjects in which one has absolutely no formal training whatsoever is that it's damnably hard to be quite sure where one is being led true and where one has stumbled on something superficially convincing but ultimately worthless, or now superseded.

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[phoebe_zeitgeist]

The second one may be even better -- the transported with delight is so very glittery. I wonder whether the double meaning translates -- it could, you never know, after all it is pretty much the same language . . .

Boggles at icon

[nineveh_uk]

*Grump* Google won't let me read it, but it looks an interesting book so I shall have to go to the library - thanks for the link.

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[antisoppist]

but I wouldn't answer for my case endings
The advantage of case endings is that once you've got them sorted you get to put all the words in any order you like. At least if Anglo-Saxon is anything like Finnish, which it isn't really.

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[nineveh_uk]

I admit that "transport of delight" is nicked from Flanders and Swann, but I think it would work in Old English (even if you had to say "moved").

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[nineveh_uk]

Anglo-Saxon has 5 cases (one of which doesn't seem to have much impact because I had to check as I 'd forgotten it) so it does a lot of putting the words in any order it likes, usually in the interest of some sort of poetic effect.

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[antisoppist]

It is this sort of poetic effect that the Finn complains I have failed to reproduce in my translations of people's powerpoint presentations.

Fred Karlsson's Finnish Grammar says there are 15 Finnish cases but then he only gives you inflection tables for 11 of them.

Re: Þis lif læne on londe

[nineveh_uk]

Anyone using poetic effect in powerpoint has too much time on their hands!

15 Finnish cases but then he only gives you inflection tables for 11 of them

I once again marvel that anyone is capable of learning Finnish as a second language.

[elise-wanderer.livejournal.com]

What's long and hard, shaped like a cigar and full of se(a)men? (This really only works as a spoken riddle, because the answer, of course, is a submarine.)

[tree_and_leaf]

I believe the usual explanation is that she's making something with leather, possibly a bottle.

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

I think it's a leather hot water bottle but as to what she might be doing with it, not if you want a clean interpretation, no.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

*applause*

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

As Basil Fox would put it, Boom! Boom!

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

It seems rather inefficient to spend all night making one bottle! But making something would make sense.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

DOes a hot water bottle count as a luxury item for Welsh slave girls? Honestly, you'd think they had nothing better to do than tell dirty jokes!

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I loved Old English, though it was a long time ago.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

*Bows*

[azdak.livejournal.com]

I know that one as the answer to "Why is the camel called the ship of the desert?"!

[azdak.livejournal.com]

The car key one is particularly brilliant ("transported with delight" - GROAN!) but they're both very clever and both sound convincingly like Anglo-Saxon translators.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I like to think Flanders and Swann would be glad to have their work stolen for this purpose.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Nineveh! I am shocked!

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

I can't think why! Clearly you have a dirty mind to think such things of harmless riddles.