Text 981, 67 rader
Skriven 2005-10-02 21:15:27 av Ardith Hinton (1:153/716.0)
    Kommentar till text 979 av Dan Ceppa (1:138/666.0)
Ärende: Old English or ???
==========================
Hi, Dan!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

AB>  bringing me fro Yther to Nether,
AH>                  |Aether (variant of "ether")

DC>  I looked at that in another way...


           At first I did too.  But when I got a copy of the lyrics & saw that
the "Y" = "Ae"... that the lady's name is "Angelique"... and that the contrast
between Angel & Devil is a recurring theme... these elements all fit together.
Aether = the stratosphere.  The Netherworld = the Underworld (AKA Hades).  :-)



AH>  It seems CP866 2 uses a code for the compressed "Ae"
AH>  which IBMPC 2 interprets as "Y".

DC>  Ah, a symbol change.  (aside:  so easy to do <G>  )


           Yes, I see it often when people copy stuff from the Internet... and
when they type in Russian.  That's one reason I checked an alternative source.
Another is that bits of songs etc. are more easily understood in context.  :-)



AH>  I also find the OXFORD ENGLISH DICTIONARY (unabridged
AH>  version) useful with regard to archaic language.  It
AH>  lists "Aether", "sweven", and other words I wasn't
AH>  quite sure about....  :-)

DC>  My Mirriam-Websters DOS version does not have those
DC>  two, but my WIN version does "aether".

DC>  As to "sweven", I'll have to sleep on it.  <G>


           Uh-huh.  A dream or vision... [chuckle].



DC>  Yes, it does cover both.  <VBG>


           As does my unabridged RANDOM HOUSE WEBSTER'S.  Dallas bought it for
me when he noticed how often the public library used it to find definitions of
the obscure words I was enquiring about because they weren't listed elsewhere.
Maybe the trick is to consult a dictionary with 300,000 entries or so....  :-)



DC>  I'll have to see if I can configure in the WIN version
DC>  to work directly with my DOS text editor....


           And I'll have to see what a spell checker makes of Robbie Burns!  I
hadn't thought of doing that before... but it's an intriguing idea.  As native
speakers of English we can guess what's been omitted, for example, when we see
"gi'e".  But it might be very helpful to other people to have the computer say
"Uh-oh!" and list a bunch of alternatives which use similar spellings....  :-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+
 * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver BC, CANADA [604-266-5271] (1:153/716)