'fiske' answer to Alan and others

From: I.E_Johansson (inger_e.johansson_at_telia.com)
Date: 12/18/04 

Date: Sat, 18 Dec 2004 10:02:01 GMT

Due to the fact that I in next message to the groups will be linking the
'fiske' voyage mentioned on KRS to artifacts found in Twin City to Lake
Superior area, I send this one to sci.archaeology as well. Better not to
have the 'fiske'word discussion twice.

There are words here which I haven't used the English word for more than
occasionally during the last 30 years. Thus I write some part in my own
language. Almos all of those who dispute against the 'fiske' word can read
Swedish. It's also essential for me to explain what I mean. That's why I
write those parts in Swedish. Of course I ought to have written this before.
I hope this will make my thoughts understandable.

First of all the sentence I put forward for discussion was and still is: 'We
war ok fiske.'

In order to explain why the 'fiske' word is correct I start with a short
discussion round the words 'We war'.
The two words were used for 'we were' in some Birgittiner monestries's
documents in first part of 15th century. That I will not comment here due to
the fact that I neither can show it to have been used before 1400 nor intend
to discuss when it first was used in Swedish. All I would like to point to
in that question is that the '-um' form was dropped earlier than what some
non-Swedish scholars assumed.

" § 205 Imperfektum.
..
b. Plural. Den fsv. Böjningen var '-um', '-in' och '-u' eller '-o' beroende
på vokalbalans.
'-o' genomfördes hos alla starka verb, även de kortstaviga. Så i 1500-talets
bibelspråk. Utanför detta förekommer under 1500- och 1600-talen synnerligen
ofta '-e': de ginge, droge, sloge, äre o.s.v. Troligen beror detta på en
försvagning av 'o' till 'e' (§159).."
Quote from [Wessén, 1962, page 227]

"§ 159. I götiska och mellansvenska mål försvagas 'or' till 'er' och 'o'
till 'e': gater, flicker, de ginge, de toge..."
Quote from [Wessén, 1962, page 142]

In the paragraphs above it's early Nysvenska which Wessén discuss. That's
normally set to 1500 but we also use to say the the younger 'fornsvenskan'
was used mainly during 1375-1526. As can be seen in the preserved documents
with St Birgitta's own writing it's wrong to use a fixed year as starting
point on the other hand Wessén and many other say that the younger
'fornsvenskan' still was used in parts of Sweden in late 1500's.

What might have caused problem for those who objected against 'fiske' is
that the difference between Old Norwegian and 'Fornsvenskan' were more
frequent than between Old Danish and 'Fornsvenskan' on one hand and that
during the later period of the 'äldre fornsvenskan', normally said to have
been used between 1225-1375 many of the 'yngre fornsvenskan' forms and
spellings existed before 1375 in local dialects.

To continue, 'We war' is written in past tense form(imperfekt in Swedish).
If we look closer on 'we war ok fiske' the 'fiske' word has been assumed to
be wrong due to form used. That had been the case had we been discussing
Norwegian or Danish or Middle resp Northern Swedish of 14th and 15th
century. But around or short after 1300 we in parts of Sweden started to use
'preteritum' form on strong verbs in cases where the stem for the word was
masculine.

In Sweden it seems as if what could be called 'folkspråket'( the language as
it was spoken) during 1300's came to be used as 'urkundsspråk'(language used
in documents). This leads to a more formative language inflected by
Norwegian, Low German and Danish. At the same time there was a more
conservative written language used in what's called 'Vadstenaspråket'
.(Wessén, 1960 page 91). As can be seen in documents from Vreta Kloster's
'donationslängd' and other documents from Östergötland during the period up
to 1380's there also existed a language in between of those two. That's a
problem when analysing texts from mid 1300's. You don't necessarily have a
clerk writing the way he spoke because he was under influence of a more
formally stipulated way of writing. On the other hand as seen in for example
following diplomas from Svenskt Diplomatarium: [IEJ: Alan, bara en
utviktning för att visa på att variation förekom mer frekvent än vad som
brukar nämnas]

7th March 1358, Helsingborg, Diplom 5864:
"Allæ the thaetta breff høra ælla see helsa iæk Niclis Thurisson.."

31 March 1358 Linköping, Diplom 5883.
"Allum them thætta breff høra ællæ see sænde iæk Niclis Thurisson... "

Same knight but different clerks as you can see for your self there are more
than the difference between 'ae' and 'æ' to be seen in the two originals.

11th March 1358 place unknown
"Allum theem thetta brewf høre allæ sea helsa jak Cecilia Glýsingxdotter..."

19th March 1358, somewhere in Smaland.
"Allum thøm thætta breff høra ok sea hælsar Swen Vkla.."

Here we have two different persons signing two separate documents, probably
written by more than one clerk. Spellings forms etc. can't be said to be in
a specific fixed form which unfortunatly many Norwegian and Danish linguists
seems to believe them to have been in at that time.

You can't expect to find same form and same spelling used over all of King
Magnus Eriksson's land in mid 1300's.

Back to 'fiske'. One thing that normally is forgotten when discussing the
stem 'fisk' is the differences between Östergötland Småland on one hand and
most of other parts of Sweden in 14th century on the other. While the plural
'r' still remain up to the time when it was re-introduced the 'r-' dropping
were in regular use. Example:
"R-bortfallet är i fsv. Mest konsekvent genomfört i vissa östgötska och
småländska texter(Östgötalagens äldsta fragment, Smålandslagen, Birgittas
autografer). Ex.: pl. fiska, biskopa.." (Wessén 1962, sid 42).

As seen in Magnus Erikssons 'stadslag' and in Codex Oxenstierna a new
inflected form of 'preteritum' with usage of the ending '-e' in monosyllabic
verb's came existed in 14th century.
(Noreen, Fornsvensk läsebok)

Taking all these divergence usage into consideration it's not possible to
use'fiske' as spelt in 'wi war ok fiske' on KRS as an indicator of when KRS
was carved.

Inger E
sources:
Wessén, 1960 = Wessén Elias, De Nordiska Språken, sjätte upplagan, Lund
1960.
Wessén, 1962= Wessén Elias, Svensk Språkhistoria I Ljudlära och
Ordböjningslära, sjätte upplagan, Lund 1962.