Very entertaining. I’m totally lost around 1400. I don’t even recognize 1200 as English lol.
With enough patience I could maybe make it through a 1500 novel
Same, 1400s are difficult, but 1500s is at least understandable.
From 1400 and back, it’s more phonetic. Less differentiation between how it sounds and how it’s written, plus the accent shifts.
I feel an old Scots(wo)man might be more at ease with it, if read aloud. As both their words and this seems like the same kind of gibberish to me.Fit? We dinna spik gibberish! It’s thon Sassenachs that makkit the book wi’ spellings that mak yi feel like yir heid is mince!
Tap for spoiler
What? We don’t speak gibberish! It’s those English that made the book (ie dictionary) with spellings that make you feel your head is mince(d beef).
I still think that 1800s Charles Dickens English was the high point of the language and the version we should aspire to
From the article:
They’re both performances of a sort: the 2000s protagonist is performing for his blog’s audience, so the tone is chatty and personal. The 1800s protagonist, with the mind of a Georgian diarist, is performing for posterity, so he philosophizes.
I thought that was interesting.
I’m good up until the letters start changing to be something other than the 26 characters we have now.
I got to around 1400 in reading 1300 was too much, but I image if it was spoken it would be a lot easier, I was reading it in my head as a thick Yorkshire accent, and most of it made sense
I image
You imagine?
Ic ymagyne?
[Saxon noises, or something]
The þ character is called thorn and is pronounced like th in the, that, those etc. the 3 letter from what I gather is a silent g, maybe it wasn’t silent back then though
I was doing pretty well (albeit really slow and deliberate) through 1300, 1200 I was able to make out a few lines, but the rest is gibberish to me.
Edit: I had another wack at it and was able to pick out a little bit of 1100, still no luck on 1000
Same here, 1300 was a slog, but I got through it. 1200 was like trying to read German, I got a few phrases here and there but that’s it.
That’s exactly what’s happening. If you read the author’s explanation, around 1250 is when English starts picking the up the Latin and French loan words that modern English speakers are used to.
English is a Germanic language. So, without the loan words, it is very much more like German.
I was able to read every sentence in the 1300 section with difficultly, occasionally getting stumped by individual words.
I could figure out the basic events of the 1200 section, but missed some specific details - I didn’t realize that the person who saves the blogger is a woman, for example.
1100 was beyond me, or at least beyond the effort I was willing to put into it.
The change was more stark for me. I would say I’m over 85% comprehension in 1200 and in 1100 it dropped precipitously to like 10 percent or less. It was a crazy steep drop.
What happens in 1200, after the furry decks the writer?
The bottom of the article translates the whole thing for us.
Interestingly, DeepL has no problem translating the sections before 1200 into modern English if you tell it it’s in Icelandic
Huh. That’s definitely interesting.
The article explains the language throughout the ages, at the end, and the derivatives, Latin and French drop off, at about that time, and you see the language with its original core, Germanic, at that time, (I have probably butchered that in retelling, I couldn’t be bothered going in to get the actual text)
Shakespeare is modern English. Even that is challenging for most people. Beyond that it’s not longer the English we think of (with the heavy French influence).
Now do a translation into brainrot.
I lose the plot at 1500. Not a native english speaker
Only after languages were institutionalized and formal education became more common, that the languages sort of stabilized and the rate of change became slower. Back then, languages were more “freestyle” and people sometimes didn’t even properly understand each other
1200 was where I got lost. Ive been reading through 1600s documents recently for my history coursework so ive got a bit of practice!
if you can understand OLD english that is how far.
Is it some kind of social commentary that the writer seems progressively more superstitious and easily frightened as the centuries roll back?
Dude talks about a walk back to his B&B like he’s a Hobbit dodging nazguls
Yep! For instance, the author discusses the changes from a blog post to a letter from 2000 - 1800. As they move back in time, both the language and also the themes and form change to match the style of literature and culture of the time.
I mean he has a right to be suspicious
!the story seems to be about a werewolfs goons capturing him and sentencing him to death until he’s saved by Ælfgifu gehaten!<
I’ve been a Rob Words channel fiend lately, about the same as you OP. I suspect if I was teleported back in time earlier than 1400 that I could learn quicker than someone who has never learned any form of English to a point, but it’d still be quite the effort. Then again I’m only considering listening and reading. I think learning to speak well enough to be understood in return is probably harder still, possibly worse than blank slate?
