Talk:First Grammatical Treatise

The result of my university library researches
The 2nd. edition of Haugen (1972) was checked out by a professor for the whole academic year or something, so I could only consult the 1st. edition (1950).

Anyway, "Þorodd"'s full name seems to be Þóroddr Gamlason (born 1085), but both Haugen and Benediktsson only mention him briefly among a number of other names. The individual whom both Haugen and Benediktsson seem to think is most likely to be the author is actually one Hallr Teitsson (ca. 1085 to 1130), who visited Italy. AnonMoos (talk) 23:50, 28 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Finally got around to citing the Cleasby-Vigfússon page that defines Þóroddr as the author, and after a brief search found another source from a Danish encyclopedia. I can't read Danish too well, but I'd bet those are sources at the end. LokiClock (talk) 01:53, 28 January 2010 (UTC)


 * The author can hardly have been Hallr Teitsson, since he died 1130. The first version of Íslendingabók is known to have been written between 1122 and 1133 and the author of the treatise seems to assume Ari's work to be known. The time interval is too short. 85.220.22.139 (talk) 23:33, 24 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Oops!
 * I looked up in Hreinn Benediktsson's edition, and he gives the dates for Hallr Teitsson as 1085-1150. If correct, that changes things a bit. But Hreinn wasn't always sensible in his edition. For example he believes the author's discussion of the relationship between Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse to be derived from the story of the tower of Babel. Occam's razor would lead us to assume that the author, being the educated man he was, simply realized the similarities and concluded that the languages were related. After all, everybody knew that the Old Norse dialects, although widely dissimilar in some cases were in fact closely related, and the same applies for the Romance languages of the time. Linguistic relationship was not an unknown concept in the Middle Ages. 85.220.22.139 (talk) 00:24, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Name
"Fyrsta Málfrœðiritgerðin" isn't much of an Old Norse title - the essay has no title in the manuscript that preserves it. It's called The First Grammatical Treatise (Icelandic: Fyrsta málfræðiritgerðin) because it is the first grammatical essay in the manuscript. Haukur (talk) 23:00, 28 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I see. I guess I figured the name was older than that. I'll remove the note on the Ę, then. LokiClock (talk) 01:37, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Small capitals
In § Alphabet:
 * Small capitals denote a geminate consonant....
 * Samhljóðendr (Consonants): ... c, ... s, ꜱ,...

In a sans-serif font, lowercase "c" and "s" are nearly or wholly indistinguishable from their small-cap counterparts. I realize (or assume) that wherever a small capital appears in the entire series
 * b, ʙ, c, ᴋ, d, ᴅ, f, ꜰ, g, ɢ, ǥ, h, l, ʟ, m, ᴍ, n, ɴ, p, ᴘ, r, ʀ, s, ꜱ, t, ᴛ, þ

it is immediately preceded by its lowercase counterpart, but we should be explicit here. I've added a note. To discuss this with me, please me. Thnidu (talk) 20:39, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

First? Several Hundred Years Too Late For That.
The Sanskrit grammarian Panini lived in the fourth century BCE -- as the Icelandic author of this grammar would probably have known. (Wikipedia has nine pages on "ancient" Sanskrit grammarians, and quite a few more on "medieval" ones, though these seem like Eurocentric time designations...) I'm reminded of the embarrassment Vint Cerf must feel for being christened "father of the Internet" by the public relations department of MCI when he worked for them. Cerf did good work, as no doubt did this Icelandic fella. Why gild the lily? David Lloyd-Jones (talk) 16:48, 12 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Did you actually read the article? Anyway, it's pretty much the first as far as North Germanic is concerned... AnonMoos (talk) 07:00, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

Recent edits to lead section
I'm not going to revert the edit now, but mid-20th-century linguists were probably more excited by the use of minimal pairs than linguists today would be... AnonMoos (talk) 09:16, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Nasalized vowels
Apparently only the long nasal vowels were phonemic (the short nasalized vowels being contextual/allophonic). AnonMoos (talk) 21:41, 9 November 2022 (UTC)