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Old English 101

By Conor MacLean

I have noticed off and one some people attempting old english (y'know, with all the thees and thous and forasmuches) and many are really not getting it correct. This is a guide to correct that.

Generally Old English is frowned upon, as it is usually mangled, quite cumbersome to read and write, and is generally unnecessary. If you would like to learn how anyways, read on. With that out of the way...

The whole issue I mainly see is with possessives. Thee and Thou are both pronouns for 'you,' however, never ever use 'thou's' or 'thy's' as a possessive. "Is that thou's house?" or "Is that thee's house?" Using the last two examples are tantamount to using 'you's'. "Is that you's house?" Instead, you would use 'your' for the possessive of 'you.' The possessives are thy and thine. Now, here's where it gets confusing. Thine is usually used when the subject begins with a vowel, such as using an instead of a. So, it would not be "thy eye," it would be "thine eye." Thine is also used when the subject is plural. For instance, it would not be "thy houses," it would be, "thine houses." However, this example is subject to personal opinion and is not a set rule. Thy is used wherever else. Thi

Otherwise, some Old English replacements for regular words are as follows:

Regular Words:	Old English:	Example:	Translation:
Have	Hath	Hath ye any more?	Have you any more?
You	Thee, Thou, Ye	Hath ye/thee/thou any more?	Have you any more?
My	Mine	Hath ye seen mine house?	Have you seen my house?
Speak	Spake	Did he spake unto thee?	Did he speak to you?
Spoke	Bespake	He bespake mine name.	He spoke my name.
Does	Dost	Dost thou liketh mine gift to thee?	Do you like my gift to you?
See	Espy	Espy thee that horse?	See you that horse? (Do you see that horse?)
Like	Liketh	Liketh
To	Unto	Traverse thee unto the wilderness?	Travel you to the wilderness? (Do you travel to the wilderness?)
Travel	traverse	See above

As you may have noticed, the phrasing is different between what one would commonly say nowadays and what was said then. Wax poetic a little. Phrase things poetically, as if everything you said was an epic poem, and you should be off to a great start. Think romance language.

Now, if you really want to get creative--and if you don't do it regularly, and if you don't actually expect people to read and understand your post--you can go with typical old english spelling. This means replacing all i's with y's. You can also add double consonants, such as, "dost thou likke mine hande?" (do you like my hand?) Now, all you have to do next is add an e on the end of some random words--maynly nouns--and replace some endyngs with th. So, now that you have changethed the endyngs of a worde, yt ys tyme to haveth some fun. Are ye havyng fun yet?