Page:The Journal of English and Germanic Philology Volume 18.djvu/258

 252 Klaeber Similarly, e.g., Grendel wear 3. . . ingenga min, Beow. 1775; he eac pees tifia weard, Wulfst. 277.19; sum mceden wear's lama, Dial. Greg.228.9',pabiscopas. . . wurdon. . . fleme*,ib. 241.3; pa froxas wurdon deade, ^Elfr. Exod. 8.13; wurdon hale, Mat. 14.36; "da wurdon hig ealleforhte, Luke 4.36; etc. 6 3. Still more pronounced is the predominance of weordan in connection with prepositional phrases and, likewise, with adverbs of place. Types: he on fylle weard, Beow. 1544; wearp he Heapolafe to handbonan, Beow. 460; hie sume inne wurdon, OE. Chron. A.D. 867. Similarly, e.g., to hroper . . . weorfian, Crist 1196; he wierfi on fcestum slcepe, Cur. Past. 194.12; 6 seo ylca caster . . . weard on bryne, Dial. Greg. 47.23;^ Ices hi ... on ofermettum weorften, Boeth. 133.24; we of pisse weorulde weorfia'd, Solil. 67.2; panne weorpap pees mannes lif and saule ofpam heape mines folces, Wulfst. 218.12; to hwon sculon wit weorfian nu? Gen. B 815 ( = OS. Gen. 24: te hui sculun unit uuerfian nu?) moste ane tide ute weorfian, Gen. B 369; gifeage ofweorfi, ^Edelb. Laws 43. Applying this rule (as well as the first one stated) to a case of textual criticism, it will be seen that the emendation, originally proposed by Zupitza, in Elene 614: (ond him hlaf ond stan) on gesitiSe bu samod geweorfiafi (MS. : on gesihfie bu geweor- fiati) is extremely improbable, and that the correct reading was obviously on gesihfie bu geseted weorfiad. 7 4. Certain exceptions to these rules suggest, as a possible explanation, the theory that geweor'dan was felt to be more appropriate when the fact of a far-reaching, violent, or sudden change was to be emphasized. 8 Also, the ideas of futurity and 4 Cf. German flilchtig iverden. 6 Occasionally the meaning shades off into 'turn out,' 'prove': fiat hi beaduweorca beleran wurdon, Brun. 48; }>/ his goddada / swyfiran iveorfian >onne misdada, OE. Chron A.D. 959 (D, E). Cf. Ancr. Riwle 236.24: his meister iweard (Var.: ward) aslepe; ib. 27: iwearft eft aslepe. 7 Sievers (Beitr. X, 518) objected, on metrical grounds, to ten Brink's con- jecture gesette weor'Sa'd or geweordad. Certainly the second alternative is pre- cluded by our first rule. The corresponding passage of the 'Legends of the Holy Rood,' ed. Morris, p. 11, 1. 13 ff. reads:. . . and man him lecge toforan s tanas and hlaf as. 8 Liebermann in his excellent glossary to the Ags. Laws gives 'anders werden' as one of the meanings of geweor'dan.