stumped (OE translations)

[k_navit]

This is from a confessional prayer.

Ic ondette æfste & tælnesse, twyspræcnesse & leasunge, ellenhete & nið, unnyttes gylpes bigong & idle glengas, uncyste & idelre oferhygde, orgello þe to mines lichoman unræde æfre gelumpe oððe ic agælde þæt to minre sawle frætwum belumpe & me to eces lifes earnunge gegan sceolde.

The first part is simple enough: "I

Comments

[lapsus_lingue]

don't know how helpful this will be, but here goes. (not sure you have access to BT where you are, etc.)

BT says: "orgello." v. orgel: or-gilde. Add: v. un-gilde : or-hlet. v. or-hlyte: orhlíce. v. orgellíce.

for "orgel," BT even cites your prayer here:

orgel pride: -- Hwǽr is heora prass and orgol buton on moldan bebeaht and on wftum gecyrred? Wulfst. 148, 32. [Woreldes richeise wechetf orgel on mannes heorte, O. E. Homl. ii. 43, 17. The form orguil occurs, p. 63. Heó leapeðintohorel (orhel, MS. T. : orjel, MS. C. ), A. R. 224, 2. Cf. French orgeuil (to which Bracket assigns a German origin): Ital. orgoglio.] v. orgel-lic.

orgel. Add: orgello; f. :-- Ic ondette . . . unnyttes gylpes bigong, and idle glengas, uncyste and idelre oferhygde orgello, Angl. xi. 98, 28. [v. N. E. D. orgel.]

It might matter that there's no comma before orgello in the BT citation? that way you might translate oferhygde as something like "arrogance" or...some other synonym for pride. Would this help you? I don't know what case "orgello" is either, and I can't find that anywhere.

[lapsus_lingue]

What I mean is that perhaps orgello goes along with oferhydge rather than with the unræd portion. Maybe. Possibly.

[k_navit]

This is edited only in Logeman's article in Anglia 11 - nobody else has ever taken a crack at it. He gives the points as they appear in the manuscript, so it goes:
Ic ondette æfste . ך tælnesse . twyspræcnesse . ך leasunge . ellenhete . ך nið . unnyttes gylpes bigong . ך idle glengas . uncyste . ך idelre oferhygde . orgello þe to mines lichoman unræde æfre gelumpe oððe . . .

so there is a point in the manuscript between oferhygde and orgello. That doesn't mean an emendation wouldn't help, but Logeman must have been able to make sense of it or he would probably have emended it (or at least made some note). Of course, for BT to omit it means they must have been able to make sense of the passage without it. Too bad they're all dead and I can't ask them how they would have parsed it.

So are you suggesting orgello is an adjective?

[lapsus_lingue]

maybe? i can see how the point would give you pause, though (no pun intended, sorry, i can't figure out how to say that without the stupid pun). i am also not good enough with endings to say anything for sure, so that.

[k_navit]

Well, orgello isn't a normal noun, and -o isn't any normal adjectival ending either, so even having all the endings memorized wouldn't really help - orgello is a hapax acc. to the DOE Corpus. All I have found is "alternative form of orgel" which I am not even sure of the gender of, though BT seem to think orgello is fem even if they aren't sure about orgel. If my students weren't so freakin needy this semester I would go bug Ecghete about it during his office hours... or maybe I'll ask my MA advisor... b/c this sure doesn't play by the usual rules, Christ...