Editiones Arnamagnæanæ. Series A - 01.06.2003, Page 76
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INTRODUCTION
(iv) Final <t) for ð is common: prep. ‘vit’ (written out in e.g.
61vb42, 43), ‘kvat’, ‘havfvt’, ‘bvnat’, ‘þer farit’ (‘trvit’, ‘gefvit’); note
in Hand A ‘mvnvt’ (= munúð) 59ra7, ‘Breiðabolstat’ 56rb36, in Hand
B ‘hatit’ (= hátíð) 66rb9. <ð) for t is equally common: ‘mikið’,
‘nockvð’, ‘ærið’, Tit(t)að’ (9vb5, 10rbl7, llvb8; cf. Tittat’ 14ra9);
pron. ‘ið’ (= (þ)it) 19ral4; past. parts. dissyllabic and monosyllabic,
‘verið’, ‘farið’, ‘bvið’, ‘svngið’, ‘seð’, ‘spað’, ‘nað’. The free standing
def. article, nom. and acc. n., appears as ‘(h)ið’ or ‘eð’; when suffixed
frequently as ‘ið’. Interrogative ‘hvað’ occurs at e.g. 24vb2, 38rb42;
prep. ‘að’ at e.g. 58rb37.
(v) Despite the free play just noted, the rule that the final consonant
is <t> where the stem ends in d/ð and <ð> when it ends in t is almost
universally observed by Hand A and with somewhat less consistency
by Hand B. Thus in verb forms e.g. ‘færðit’, ‘sendit’, ‘baðvt’, ‘tialldat’,
but ‘veitið’, ‘metið’, ‘sottuð’, ‘skotið’; in the suffixed art. ‘bloðit’,
‘horvndit’, but Toptið’, ‘andlitið’, and so on. Exceptions are few, e.g.
‘ritat’ 3ral7, ‘neitvt’ 5ra30, Titit’ 21 rb 13, ‘boðið’ 22ra8, ‘bvndið’
28rbl8, ‘holldið’ 47rbl5. Hand B mostly has final <ð) after t in the
stem, but with more exceptions to the rule than Hand A, e.g. ‘dictat’,
Tyctat’, ‘heitit’, ‘vitiat’, ‘hiartat’, ‘iattat’.
15. Conventional <x> is written in forms of the verb vaxa and de-
rivatives and in e.g. subst. jaxl, numeral sex, place-name Saxland. It
variously appears in the kst cluster in the word rekstr: ‘-rekxtR’ 7ral3,
‘-regxstrar’ 12rb36, ‘-rextR’ 14rb2. It has not been noted in the gsl or
ksl cluster; thus usually ‘hneyksli’ (but ‘hneyskslvm’ 30vb2), ‘vigslv’
(but also ‘vigzlv’ 71ra29, ‘vigðslv’ 71rb22).
16. (i) A dental followed by 5 is constantly written with <z), often
without expression of the dental itself. Forms like ‘hræzla’, ‘fæzla’,
‘beizla’, ‘giæzka’ are normal. Verb hleza and subst. blezan are always
in <z> (once ‘blez/zan’ 59va44-vbl). Gen. endings vary, thus both
‘Kristz’ and ‘Kriz’, ‘prestz’ and ‘prez’ (and once ‘prestzt’ in Hand B),
‘andlatz’ and ‘liflaz’ (and once ‘andlatzt’ in Hand B), Toptz’ and
‘krapz’. The words guð and orð most often have <s> in the gen., excep-
tionally <z> (but cf. 13 (iii) above). Conj. unz, which is rare, is spelt
‘vn(n)z’, once ‘vnzt’ 50va26.
(ii) <z> may appear for initial s in the second element of a compound
whose first element ends in a dental which is itself generally written:
‘navðzyn’, ‘nauðzvn’ (but also ‘navzvn’), ‘atzoknn’, ‘nattzavng’ (cf.
‘nazett’ = náttsett), ‘fotzkefli’; occasionally <zs> is written in such po-