Nouns Overview

In Old English there are three major categories of nouns: Strong, Weak, and Minor. Strong nouns are the most numerous, followed by weak nouns, with minor nouns being the least common. Nouns never change their strength. So a strong noun, like 'scip' is always strong, a weak noun like 'tunge' is always weak, and a minor noun like 'sunu' is always minor.

All nouns have a grammatical gender: Masculine, Neuter, and Feminine. The grammatical gender affects which demonstrative pronoun is paired with a noun, and usually affects the way the noun declines. Nouns also decline differently based on whether they are singular or plural.

Strong Nouns

Strong nouns are considered grammatically strong because there are many variations in how they decline based on gender, case, and number.

Though there are more variations between genders in strong nouns, there are many similarities between the genders which can help you identify which case the noun is in. For example, the demonstrative pronoun 'þæm' always signifies the dative, and the 'um' ending always signifies the dative plural. Similarly, the demonstrative pronoun 'þara' and the suffix 'a', always signify the genitive plural. While the dative declensions for masculine, neuter and feminine nouns are identical, you only ever see the demonstrative pronoun 'þære' with feminine nouns.

Weak Nouns

Weak nouns are considered grammatically weak because there are very few variations in how they decline. Only the nominative singular and neuter accusative forms differ between genders, and there are only two weak neuter nouns: 'eage - eye' and 'eare - ear'. All other nouns are either masculine or feminine.

Since weak nouns decline almost identically between genders, and have simliar inflectional suffixes between cases, often demonstrative pronouns are the best way of identifying a noun's gender and case. Where a demonstrative pronoun is not present, you must rely on the context of the noun to figure out its case.

Minor Nouns

Minor nouns are the least numerous, often having only a handful of nouns per category. They can be broken down into several sub-categories: u-declensions, r-plurals, family nouns, and i-mutation nouns.

U-Declensions

Unlike Strong and Weak nouns, nouns in the u-declension decline the same for both masculine and feminine. There are no neuter nouns in the u-declension.

R-Plurals

R-plurals are nouns which add an 'r' between the stem and the suffix when declining in the plural. All r-plural nouns are neuter and take the same inflectional suffixes as strong neuter nouns. There are four nouns in the r-plural category: 'lamb - lamb', 'æg - egg', 'cealf - calf', and 'cild - child'.

Family Nouns

The family nouns are 'fæder', 'modor', 'broðor', 'sweostor', and 'dohtor'. They are the most irregular of the minor declensions, but they are still easy to recognise as they are the ancestors of the family nouns we still use today.

In the singular, only the dative of 'modor', 'broðor', and 'dohtor' declines and they decline the same way, with the 'o' becoming 'e due to i-mutation'. The plural of 'modor', 'broðor', 'sweostor', and 'dohtor' all decline the same way, but 'fæder' declines differently in the nominative and accusative plural, following the more traditional strong masculine paradigm.

I-Mutation

I-mutation is a change in the sound of a vowel so that it is pronounced with the tongue higher and farther forward than usual. I-mutation is visible in the root-vowel of the singular dative, nominative plural, and accusative plural forms of certain nouns.

Some Final Tips

Remember, a rough way of identifying a weak noun vs a strong one is that the root of a weak noun generally ends in a vowel (except 'u'), while strong nouns usually end in a consonant or 'u'. For example, 'fugol - bird', 'lufu - love' and 'sawol - soul' are strong, while 'hearpa - harp', 'draca - dragon', and 'culfre - dove' are weak. This, however, is not a hard rule as there are strong verbs like 'rice - kingdom', 'stede - place', and 'wite - punishment', and of course, most of the u-declension nouns end in 'u', but when encountering an unfamiliar noun, you can use this as a rough guide.

Now that you know the rules that govern Old English nouns, the next step is to test your knowlege. You can choose to test your knowledge of just the weak and minor nouns presented in this module, or test your knowledge of all noun forms, using the buttons below. When you are ready to advance to the next module, click the link to continue.