Modern German & Old English + Diachrony1

The Lord's Prayer Vater unser im Himmel, geheiligt werde dein Name; dein Reich komme; dein Wille geschehe, wie im Himmel so auf Erden. Unser tägliches Brot gib uns heute. Und vergib uns unsere Schuld, wie auch wir vergeben unsern Schuldigern; und führe uns nicht in Versuchung, sondern erlöse uns von dem Bösen. Denn dein ist das Reich und die Kraft und die Herrlichkeit in Ewigkeit.

Amen.

(German)

(old English) [1] Fæder ure þu þe eart on heofonum, [2] Si þin nama gehalgod. [3] To becume þin rice, [4] gewurþe ðin willa, on eorðan swa swa on heofonum. [5] Urne gedæghwamlican hlaf syle us todæg, [6] and forgyf us ure gyltas, swa swa we forgyfað urum gyltendum. [7] And ne gelæd þu us on costnunge, ac alys us of yfele. [8] Soþlice.

      



Father ours, thou that art in heaven, Be thy name hallowed. Come thy rich (kingdom), Worth (manifest) thy will, on earth also as in heaven. Our daily loaf sell (give) us today, And forgive us our guilts as also we forgive our guilty And lead thou us not in temptation, but loose (release) us of evil. Soothly.

Talking

about the words, there are some of them that are too similar. Example: Name (German), Nama (Old English). Wille (German), willa (Old English). Unser (German), ure (Old English).

Analysis The Lord’s Prayer was taken as example to see some similarities between the Old English and the German Language

Also,

it can be said that the word order, in some cases, is the same.

Vater

unser im Himmel (German)

Fæder

ure þu þe eart on heofonum (Old English)

In this word order, the German nouns are in capital letter. The subjects are at the beginning of the sentences following by the verbs and finally the complements.

In

Old English, we can see the metathesis process because there is a reversal in the /r/ sound.

Old English Ure: “our” German Unser: our

In

the vocabulary, Old English has two ways to say “our” and in German, there is just one way.

Old English Ure: “our” Urne: “our”

German Unser: our

GERMAN geheiligt

Name

OLD

werde dein

ENGLISH Si þin nama gehalgod

In this sentences, the word order is different, the noun Name / Nama. In German, this noun is written at the end while in Old English is in the middle of the sentence.

German  hast  Bitte  Nein

Old English  Hath: equivalent of modern has  Bidde: Please 

Nese: No

We can see that in the first example there is a chance in the final sound. In the second example, the sound /d/, in Old English, is changed for the sound /t/in German.

SINGLE WORDS

OLD ENGLISH

GERMAN  Mein

Name ist

 guten

Morgen

 guten

Abend

 "Mīn

nama is..." or "Nama mīn is...“  Good morning. Gōdne morgen.  Good evening. Gōdne Ǣfen.

In these examples, we can say that the similarity between them is the pronunciation in some words such as “is” and “ist”, Morgen. And “Mein” and “Min” has the delition of the sound /e/.