For this article I'll focus on the history of Old English writing.

(See here for an audio version of the original hymn.)

Cædmon's Hymn is utterly incomprehensible to the modern English reader.

There's no doubt about it: Old and Modern English might as well be two completely different languages. A few other connections shine faintly through, like hefaen for heaven, fadur for father, and uerc for work, but I can’t glean much else… and even in the modern version, I still have no idea what a “Wulder-father” is. Only two words appear unchanged: he and his. Separated by more than a millennium, these two texts are barely recognisable as the “same” language. Work of the Wulder-Father as he of wonders The might of the Measurer and his purpose Now shall we praise the Warden of Heaven-Kingdom Those are the first few lines of Cædmon's Hymn, a 7th-Century poem generally considered to be the oldest surviving work of English literature. ?Ĭan you read Old English writing? Here's a sample:

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Old german words in english