Word Order

We've already touched on word order in previous modules, and noted that Old English is more flexible in its word order than modern English, but it is still governed by a set of rules. The most common word order encountered in Old English is Subject-Verb-Object (SVO), which the same as modern English. For example, examine the sentence: God lufode Iacob - God loved Jacob.

Here the only thing that distinguishes the subject from the object is the SVO word order. If we put Iacob before the verb and God after, Iacob would be the subject and God the object because there is no distinction between nominative and accusative masculine noun declensions. This shows that during the time Old English texts were written down, the SVO word order was already the norm.

Subject-Object-Verb

While SVO is the most common order for the main clause, there are common variations on this pattern. One is putting the object directly after the subject. This tends to happen when the object is a pronoun rather than a noun or a noun phrase. So in the sentence below, 'God loved him', the pronoun hine comes directly after the subject and before the verb. Unlike nominative and accusative masculine nouns, there is a clear distinction between nominative he and accusative hine, so there can be no confusion about who loved whom.

In addition, if the indirect object is a pronoun and the direct object is not, the indirect object will usually come first. So you might come across the equivalent of 'God him soul gave':

In some cases the object will come before the subject, as in 'him God sawle geaf', but you'll quickly get used to using inflections to overcome the unfamiliar syntax, and context helps a lot. It is unlikely that God would give a 'him' to 'a soul', for example.

Verb Before Subject

The placement of the verb before the subject happens most consistently in clauses introduced by adverbs of time such as 'þa - then' and 'nu - now', as well as certain abverbs of place such as 'þær - there' or 'þider - thither'. In the sentence below, 'they travelled to that monastery and there they died', the first clause has regular SVO word order, and the second clause - introduced by þa - then - has the verb before the subject.

Successive clauses are often introduced with 'þa', so this is a construction you will frequently encounter. It's worth remembering that in modern English we also switch the S-V order around to make questions - 'Did you go?', 'Are you well?' - something that also happens in Old English.

Verb in Final Position

The final important word order you'll come across is one in which the subject comes at the start of the sentence or clause, and the verb goes to the end. This is most common in subordinate clauses or introduced by the relative pronoun 'þe - that/which/who' and by 'þa - that', or by conjunctions, and the verb tends to be pushed to the end or near the end of the clause. Take the nice description of grammar in the following sentence 'Stæfcræft is seo cæg þe ðæra boca andgytt unlycþ - Wordcraft is the key which unlocks the meaning of books', in which the verb 'unlock' gone to the end of the clause introduced by the relative pronoun 'þe'.

As shown above, while word order in Old English is more flexible, it is still guided by rules, and the three word orders outlined here are by far the most common. The trick is to use the inflections to guide your reading with the word order being a useful support. These rules are fairly consistently applied in prose. However, in poetry there are different rules and conventions. These will be explored in more detail in the following two topics.

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