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be compared to an earlier rendering by Gollancz: ‘He came then for their
aid and for their life’s salvation.’57
one may ask what the arguments are for anlezark’s translation of
*ealdorneru as ‘lifesaver’ rather than ‘life’s salvation’. anlezark does not
explain his choice, but the interpretation he opts for is insightful: someone
who comes for the salvation of life is evidently the one who saves life.
3.3. aldornere in Genesis
aside from the occurrence in Azarias, there are two examples of the form
aldornere in old English (cf. Bosworth and toller and the DOE); both
are found in the poem Genesis, which is preserved in the Junius XI manu-
script from the tenth century, like the Exeter Book. the text is cited from
anlezark’s edition:
ne mæg ic mid idesum aldornere mine
swa feor heonon feðe-gange
siðe gesecan. ...
Lyfað me þær
are and reste, þæt we aldornere
on Sigor up secan móten. 58
anlezark translates as follows:
I cannot look too far from here for the saving of my life, with these
ladies going by foot... Deliver me there with favor and respite, so
that we are able to seek survival in Zoar.59
Interestingly, in this passage anlezark considers the translation ‘saving of
life, survival’ to be more suitable in the relevant context than ‘lifesaver’.
the interpretation in Bosworth and toller is similar (‘I cannot seek my
life’s safety... that we may seek an asylum’). Aldornere is in the accusative
case in both examples, as is clear from the fact that they occur with the verb
sécan/ge-sécan ‘seek’, which regularly takes an accusative object; moreover,
the form of the possessive pronoun míne ‘mine’, modifying the noun aldor-
57 The Exeter Book: An Anthology of Anglo-Saxon Poetry, ed. by Israel Gollancz (London: K.
Paul, trench, trübner & Co., 1895), 192.
58 Old Testament Narratives, 174. On the dating, see Ibid., vii.
59 Ibid., 175.
ALDRNARI