Gripla - 20.12.2017, Síða 167

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about words like fé, mér and sér, which in Worm’s book were spelled, incorrectly in
Brynjólfur’s view, as “fie”, “mier” and “sier”. the words fé, mér and sér had a long
monophthong é [eː] in old Icelandic (oIcel.), which in later Icelandic had devel-
oped to the sequence je [jɛ(ː)]. the Bishop’s comments, as well as evidence from
manuscript orthography, indicate that this change had run its course long before
the seventeenth century.
Brynjólfur points out that in old manuscripts, the words in question are
written “fe”, “mer” and “ser”, and he claims that this is the correct way to write
and pronounce such words. furthermore, he argues that the contemporary pro-
nunciation of je in such words is a recent bad habit, characterizing inhabitants of
the north in particular, who even pronounce the name of the letter “e” as je. It
is shown that the letter name je for “e” is a regular development from the oIcel.
name é and is mentioned in other slightly younger sources connected to Northern
Iceland.
against prior claims to the contrary, it is argued here that Brynjólfur’s com-
ments are not evidence that the development of é to je had still not reached all
parts of the country in the seventeenth century. Such claims are contradicted by
the Bishop’s own words as well as evidence from manuscript orthography. old
manuscripts probably provided Brynjólfur with sufficient evidence from which to
draw the conclusion that the sequence je of words like fé, mér and sér constituted
a change from older pronunciation. the Bishop pointed out that old manuscripts
did not have “that illegitimate northern i” (“spurio hoc i Boreali”) and concluded
that in earlier times people most likely did not pronounce the corresponding sound
j either.
Because words with oIcel. long é were generally written with “e” in old manu-
scripts and words with oIcel. short e were usually written in the same manner,
Brynjólfur probably believed that both groups of words had had the same vowel in
earlier times. furthermore, the second member of the later Icelandic sequence je,
commonly derived from OIcel. é, is the same vowel as later Icelandic has in words
like ber, sel and fer, going back to OIcel. short e. from Brynjólfur’s point of view,
then, it seemed that words like fé, mér and sér had become differentiated from
words like ber, fer and sel through the insertion of “i” (and the corresponding sound
j) into the former group of words. this constituted the “bad habit” (“consvetudo
vitiosa/prava”) originating with northern Icelanders.
Aðalsteinn Hákonarson
Íslensku- og menningardeild Háskóla Íslands
Árnagarði við Suðurgötu
IS-101 Reykjavík
adh3@hi.is
uM norÐ LEnSKan Ó SIÐ oG BÓ KStafSnafnIÐ J E