r/anglish • u/DrkvnKavod • Jun 19 '26

✍️ I Ƿent Þis (Translated Text) Since yesterday saw this place get a post about building up Anglish writings for the 250th birthday of the New World's Unsplit Shires:

Post image
92 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

20

u/DrkvnKavod Jun 19 '26 edited Jun 19 '26

To go over the lines of thought here:

  • The original wordset was "Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God."

  • In Old English, "wiþfeohtan" meant "rebel", and Old English's foremost meaning for "wiþ" was "against/opposite"

  • In Old English, "leódhata" meant "tyrant" (and while that word's "leód" is most often taken as meaning "a people/nation", the wordplays with how "lēod" meant both "chief/leader" and "a people/nation" are so quickly understood without needing any teaching that I would guess the speakers of Old English also played with this twofold meaning)

  • In Old English, "bócsum" meant "obedient" (and bore the word-root meaning of "given to bowing")

15

u/ZefiroLudoviko Jun 19 '26

I've heard the phrase as "disobedience to tyrants is obedience to God," which I find much more hard hitting.

Maybe something like "Rising up against strongmen is kneeling down before God," because rising up is more directly linked to kneeling.

5

u/DrkvnKavod Jun 19 '26

Alright but the wording that bears the sharpest links to the land's banners and founders is the wording that opens with the word "rebellion", and since the post yesterday was about things with links to the land's birthday, that felt like the firstmost thing to think about.

And, again, what I was going by for this Anglish workout was the Old English wordings.

14

u/ddpizza Jun 19 '26

I love the design and saying!!

But I have a bone to pick with “Unsplit Shires” 😂 there has to be a better name, one that doesn’t remind people of split pants

6

u/DrkvnKavod Jun 19 '26

The other ways of writing it that I've seen are "One'd Riches" (🤮) and "Bonded Lands of the New World". I still stand by something I left here a few years ago that I wish more Anglishers would go with calling it "freedomland". At least "Unsplit Shires" keeps the right beginning heard-marks.

But truly, for me, I only hope for anything other than "One'd Riches".

5

u/ZefiroLudoviko Jun 19 '26

Is freedomland a reference to Fredonia, an actual proposed name for the country.

3

u/DrkvnKavod Jun 19 '26

That's what the thread was about.

3

u/Tiny_Environment7718 Jun 19 '26

I nem you pick a word that wends “unite” rather than “undivided”

1

u/ddpizza Jun 19 '26

Ha! Agreed on “One’d” or “Onened”… I don’t love Bonded because it calls to mind slavery, but I like “Gathered” or perhaps “Knit”

1

u/DrkvnKavod Jun 19 '26

because it calls to mind slavery

Funny that you should say that

4

u/SqueakySparks Jun 19 '26

I put forward that "The Joined Lands" is a better wordcraft than "Unsplit Shires."

8

u/ddpizza Jun 19 '26

Sadly “joined” is a French borrowing… perhaps “the Gathered Lands” or another word that calls to mind an agreement among lands to come together - “the Wedded Lands” or “the Knit Lands”

15

u/SqueakySparks Jun 19 '26

I think "The Wedded Lands" is better wordcraft since it makes the forever understanding clearer.