Translating Early Medieval Poetry

by Tom Birkett

  ising power of verse belongs to alliteration enriched by internal root morpheme

  rhymes occurring in stressed syl ables. As in Old English poetry, these sound

  devices perform the double function of binding half-lines into long ones and of

  drawing attention to the semantical y most important words in the line. Any sound

  repetition of unstressed syl ables, however precise, that takes part in the sound

  embellishment of the line is incapable of performing either of the two functions.

  The rhythm of the Russian translations is as varied as the rhythmical organisa-

  tion of the Old English originals. The number of unstressed syl ables varies quite

  widely (commonly between two and four per line) whereas the number of stresses is

  usual y confined to three alliterating (and usual y rhyming) syl ables per line which

  exactly corresponds to the distribution of alliterating syl ables in Old English poetry, as in the following examples: ‘Kak cha sto ya pe cha lilsya, / vstre cha ya rassvety’ for

  ‘Oft ic sceolde ana uhtna gehwylce’ (line 8); ‘ sor atnikov on privetstvyet / s m o t r it na sor odichey’ for ‘greteð gliwstafum, georne geondsceawað // secga geseldan’

  (lines 53–54a); ‘mu zhi dru zhi nnye / zhi zn zemnuyu’ for ‘þonne ic eorla lif eal geondþence’ (line 60). In all these instances alliteration, enriched by assonance or

  consonance, fal s on stressed root morphemes. In some cases the number of syl ables

  included into the alliteration varies between two: ‘komu by sm og ya / sm elo poverit’

  for ‘þe ic him modsefan minne durre’ (line 10) and three: ‘so slu go y ne go dnym

  – s go rem v chuzhbine’ translating ‘hu sliþen bið sorg to geferan’ (line 30), but then the depth of the sound repetitions makes them audible in the line, especial y

  if several sets of internal root-morpheme rhymes involve different syl ables in the

  line. For example, in the line ‘i mol chat, za pech atav pech ali v serdze’ translating ‘in hyra breostcofan bindað fæste’ (line 18), two sets of different sound devices are

  used: the rhyme of the syl able -pech- in ‘za pech atav pech ali’ and the rhyme of the 35 An example of this layout could be shown with the help of the opening lines of The Wanderer translated into Russian:

  ‘Кто одинок в печали,

  тот чаще мечтает,

  о помочи Господней,

  когда на тропе далекой…’

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  Inna Matyushina

  syl able -chat- ‘mol chat, zape chat av’. A similar device of doubling sound repetitions within a line is employed in the opening line of the poem: ‘Kto odinok v p ech ali, /

  tot cha she m ech taet’ for ‘Oft him anhaga are gebideð’ (line 1), in which the internal root-morpheme rhyme of the syl able cha- in ‘v pe cha li’ : ‘ cha she’ is complemented by the sound repetition of the unstressed syl able -ech- in ‘v p ech ali’ : ‘m ech taet’.

  In the rare cases when alliteration occurs by itself and is not enriched by either

  assonances or consonances, the number of alliterating syl ables is increased to five:

  ‘Bla zh en, kto stere zh et svoyu veru, / ibo zh alobam mu zh ne dol zh en’ translating

  ‘Til biþ se þe his treowe gehealdeþ, ne sceal næfre his torn to rycene // beorn of

  his breostum acyþan’ (lines 112–13a), and the impression of regularity in the sound

  organisation of the verse is conveyed through the quantity of alliterating syl ables.

  Thus, either through the quantity or the quality of sound devices, Tikhomirov

  manages to create a functional replacement for alliteration, preserving its main

  function of binding two half-lines into a single long line.

  In Tikhomorov’s translation, as in the Old English original, sentences are

  concluded not at the end of a long line but in the middle, and syntactical structure

  does not coincide with the borders of poetic units as the following example of lines

  1–5 il ustrates:

  Kto odinok v p echa li, / tot cha she m ech taet // o po mochi Gos po dney, / kog da na trope

  da lekoy, // na mors ko y, nezna ko moy / s tos ko yu v s er dze, // on mer yaet vzmakhami /

  mor e ledyanoe, // odi n okii i z g na nnik, / i zna et: sudba vsesilna (Oft him anhaga are gebideð, // metudes miltse, þeah þe he modcearig // geond

  lagulade longe sceolde // hreran mid hondum hrimcealde sæ // wadan wræclastas.

  Wyrd bið ful aræd!)

  One phrase picks up the alliteration of the previous one, making connections

  between ideas and developing a narrative as well as a description.

  Alliteration is not necessarily used in the Russian translations on the initial

  syl ables of the words, but always involves the root morphemes of the semantical y

  most important words of the line (e.g. the translation of line 79, ‘dreame bidrorene, duguþ eal gecrong’ with ‘ut ra chena ra dost, ra t’ pobita’ (‘deprived of joy, the troop has fallen’)), recalling the culminative function of alliteration in Old English verse.

  In Tikhomirov’s translations, as in the Old English originals, semantical y rich

  root morphemes, usual y marked by stress and alliteration, are contrasted with

  the less semantical y important material, such as suffixes, inflections and auxiliary

  words, which are always put in unstressed positions (cf. the translation of ‘Forðon

  domgeorne dreorigne oft’ (line 17) as ‘ sk orbi svoey ne sk azhut / vzy sk uyushie

  s lavy’ (‘those eager for glory do not reveal their sadness’)). Polysyl abic groups of unstressed auxiliary words (such as pronouns ‘svoey’ or negations ‘ne’), or of inflec-tional or suffixational morphemes (for example, the final syl ables of alliterating

  words ‘skor- bi’, ‘ska- zhut’, ‘vzysku- yushie’, ‘sla- vy’) are pronounced faster than a single stressed syl able of a root morpheme (like the initial alliterating syl ables in the same line: ‘ skor-bi, ska-zhut, sla-vy’), thus making half-lines roughly isochronal.

  Alliteration is employed to mark specifical y poetic vocabulary, usual y

  consisting of nouns and adjectives but not excluding metaphoric uses of verbs

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  creating anthropomorphic images, such as ‘zmeya t sya t reshiny’ for ‘wyrmlicum fah’ (‘snaking cracks’, line 98b); ‘o kly kast ye skaly / spoty kaets ya burya’ for ‘ond þas stanhleoþu, stormas cnyssað’ (‘storm stumbles over fanged rocks’, line 101);

  ‘ zim nyi veter / zem lyu moro zi t’ for ‘hrið hreosende hrusan bindeð’ (‘winter wind is freezing the earth’, line 102); ‘i gremit zi m a, / i tm a nastupaet’ for ‘wintres woma, þonne won cymeð’ (‘and winter is thundering, and darkness is coming’,

  line 103); and ‘sokrushila dru zh inu / zh adnaya secha’ for ‘Eorlas fornoman asca þryþe’ (‘avid slashing crushed the troops’, line 99). In Tikhomirov’s translation, in

  contrast to the Old English originals, verbs are not excluded from alliteration (as

  in quoted lines 79, 101, 102, 103) but, on the contrary, frequently participate in the sound repetitions. A phonetic similarity of words invariably results from identity of

  root morphemes, as in the line: ‘steny opust eli, p opust il Gospod’ for ‘Yþde swa þisne eardgeard ælda scyppend’ (line 85), just as in the Old English originals, in which

  the stress on the root morphemes made them the only possible place for alliteration.

  In Tikhomirov’s translations sound repetitions do not usual y consist of end-

  rhymes, which are very common in Russian and in a way prompted by the identity

  of suffixes and inflections resulting from the identity of grammatical forms. These


  involuntary rhymes would be too easy to achieve and are therefore avoided in

  the translation, except in cases where they appear as a result of syntactical paral-

  lelism, compare the rhyme of stressed and unstressed syl ables in the lines: ‘ya,

  razl uchennyi s otchiznoy, / udr uchennyi, siryi’ for ‘oft earmcearig, eðle bidæled’

  (line 20); ‘kogda na trope dalek oy, // na morsk oy, neznakom oy’ for ‘geond lagulade longe sceolde’ (line 3). Sound repetitions (either of stressed or of unstressed

  syl ables) resulting from syntactical parallelisms are frequently used in Old English

  poetry, in addition to the canonical alliteration (cf. ‘wordgyd wrecan, ond ymb wer sprecan’, ( Beowulf, line 3172); ‘cwædon þæt he wære wyruldcyninga // manna mildust ond monðswærust, // leodum liðost / ond lofgeornost’ ( Beowulf, lines 3180–82); ‘wynna gewitaþ were geswicaþ’ ( The Rune Poem, line 94); ‘hwælmere hlimmeð hlude grimmeð // streamas staþu beatað, stundum weorpað’ ( Riddle 2, lines 5–6); ‘mid þy heardestan ond mid scearpestan’ ( Riddle 28, lines 2–3).

  Therefore in using inflexional rhymes which result from rhythmic-syntactic paral-

  lelisms in isosyl abic units constituting rhythmic groups, Tikhomirov recreates a

  device common in Old English poetry, where it was endowed with the same func-

  tion as the rhymes of root morphemes.

  Like an Old English scop, who used alliteration to unite words already bound

  by etymology, Tikhomirov does not bind words according to his own choice but

  penetrates into etymologic relations between words, as in the translation of line 92a

  ‘Hwær cwom mearg? Hwær cwom mago?’ (‘Where is this horse and where is this

  rider?’) as ‘Gde zhe tot kon i gde zhe kon nik?’. He both binds etymological y related words and echoes them in etymological y unrelated but phonetical y similar lines

  (as in the translation of ‘Hwær cwom maþþumgyfa?’ (‘Where is the gold-giver?’,

  line 92b) as ‘Gde is kon nyi zlatodaritel?’). Consonances and full rhymes occur both within the metrical units of verse and within the units of poetic speech, such as repetitions of genetical y related words (‘ kon, kon nik’ for mearg, mago (line 92)), lexical repetitions (‘ sneg, i so sneg om dozhd’, for ‘hreosan hrim ond snaw hagle gemenged’

  (line 48)), and compound words (‘ dob ro dob lestnaya druzhina’ for ‘goldhladen

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  Inna Matyushina

  ðegn’ ( The Fight at Finnsburg, line 13a)). As in Old English poetry, where phonetic similarity resulted from the repetition of words within one line, in Tikhomirov’s

  translations the repetitions of words (as in the translation of line 48 ‘hreosan hrim

  ond snaw, haggle gemenged’ (‘and snow from the sky, and with snow rain’) as ‘i s

  neba sneg, i so sneg om dozhd’) convey an impression of high phonetic structuring resulting from poetic expressivity.

  The richness of Old English poetic vocabulary is partial y preserved in Tikhomi-

  rov’s translations, although he does not attempt to rival an Old English poet in the

  diversity of the synonymic systems the latter had at his disposal. The resources of

  a translator cannot compete with the resources of the original, because collections

  of synonyms never constituted an inherent feature of Russian poetry. It would have

  been impossible to find in the Russian language dozens of synonyms denoting ‘sea’ or

  ‘battle’, as their existence in the original reflects the key concepts of that time, which had lost importance in the era of the translation. Nevertheless Tikhomirov finds his

  own original devices to compensate for this. Side by side with common everyday

  words he uses poetic words ( vzyskat,36 poznat,37 privetit,38 teshit,39 horomy 40), archaisms ( pomoch,41 ‘pod spudom’,42 siryi,43 vspomyanet,44 slagat 45), rare or obsolete words ( rodovichi,46 podmoga,47 vosparyat 48) and potential words49 – ‘moi ne mrachitsya razum’, for ‘hwan modsefa min ne gesweorce’ (line 59), ‘ne slishkom sporchivyi’ for ‘ne to hrædwyrde’ (line 66) ‘zdaniya upadayut’ for ‘woriað þa winsalo’

  (line 78), ‘o temnote bytejskoj’ for ‘deope geondþenceð’ (line 89), ‘ kolchuzhnyi ratnik’

  for ‘eala byrnwiga’ (line 94), ‘put pozemnyi’ for ‘eorþan rice’ (line 106), as if endowing them with equal rights, in the hope that the reader will become used to them and

  begin to perceive them as belonging to a poetic vocabulary. More importantly, he

  manages to retain the impression of the open-endedness of the poetic synonymic

  systems of alliterative poetry by inventing archaisms, such as smertodei (‘death’ +

  ‘doers’), zloschastie (‘evil’ + ‘fortune’), grustnolikiy (‘dreary’ + ‘face’), ratenachalnik 36 Взыскать, а poetic word with the approximate meaning of ‘to recover, to exact, to surcharge’.

  37 Познать, а poetic word with the approximate meaning of ‘know, learn, cognise’.

  38 Приветить, а poetic word with the approximate meaning of ‘to welcome’.

  39 Тешить, а poetic word with the approximate meaning of ‘to amuse, to salve, to soothe’.

  40 Хоромы, а poetic word with the approximate meaning of ‘high status dwelling, palace, mansion’.

  41 Пóмочь, an archaic form of the noun meaning ‘help, assistance’.

  42 Под спудом, an archaic adverb meaning ‘concealed, hidden away’.

  43 Сирый, an archaic form of the adjective meaning ‘orphaned, lonely, deserted’.

  44 Вспомянет, an archaic form of the verb meaning ‘to mention, recal , remember’.

  45 Слагать, an archaic form of the verb meaning ‘to compose, make verse’.

  46 Родовичи, a rare, obsolete form of the noun ‘kinsmen’.

  47 Подмога, a rare, obsolete form of the noun ‘help, assistance’.

  48 Воспарять, a rare. obsolete form of the verb meaning ‘to soar, to rise high, feel elated, levitate’.

  49 Old English parallel lines are given in order to give an idea of the meaning of potential words coined by the translator according to the models of word formation productive in the Russian language. Potential words are lexical units which do not exist in the language but are coined according to the models of word-formation productive in this language, for example, smertodei (‘deathdoers’), kolzedrobitel (‘ringbreaker’), zlatopodatel (‘goldgiver’).

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  (‘troops’ + ‘leader’), voiskovoda (‘troops’ + ‘leader’), kolzedrobitel (‘ring’ + ‘breaker’), zlatopodatel (‘gold’ + ‘giver’), which never existed in ancient Russian poetry, but are created according to models productive in the Russian language.50

  Compound words, frequently with pleonastic repetition (e.g. ‘muzh-voevoditel’

  – literal y ‘man’ + ‘leader of troops’), occur in Tikhomirov’s translation much

  more frequently than in the Old English original (cf. his translation of The Fight at Finnsburg, line 13, ‘Ða aras mænig goldhladen ðegn, gyrde hine his swurde’

  as ‘Probudilas togda / dobrodoblestnaya druzhina, / zlatosbruynye vstali / znatnye

  mecheboizy’), which creates the impression that word-composition resulting in

  compound words is natural in the Russian language.

  Synonymic systems are also to some extent recreated in the Russian translations,

  in which poetic words exist side by side with compound words denoting key concepts

  of Old English poetry, such as ‘battle’ ( rat (‘fighting’), bran (‘battle, fight, abuse’), secha (‘slashing’), bitva (‘battle, fight’ or ‘king, lord’), gosudar (‘lord’), zlatopodatel (‘giver-of-gold’), kolzedrobitel (‘breaker-of-rings’), zastupnik (‘patron, intercessor, paracl
ete, advocate’), gosudar-zlatopodatel (‘lord + giver-of-gold’), vozhd-soratnik (‘leader + companion-in-arms’), and voiskovoda (‘leader-of-troops’)). As in alliterative verse, combinations of words ( gosudar (‘lord’), zlatopodatel (‘giver-of-gold’)) can appear in translations as compound words ( gosudar-zlatopodatel (‘lord +

  giver-of-gold’)).

  However successful the rendering of the lexical and phonetic organisation of

  alliterative verse appears to be, it is in the recreation of the syntactical structure of the Old English original that the qualities of the Russian language are manifested

  at their best. In contrast to translators into Modern English, who are bound by the

  strictness of English word-order, a translator into Russian is as free to experiment

  with the syntax of his translations as was an Old English scop. A comparison of lines 53–55a of the original, ‘secga geseldan. Swimmað eft on weg! // Fleotendra

  ferð no þær fela bringeð // cuðra cwidegiedda’ (‘but his old friends swim frequently away; The floating spirits bring him all too few of the old well-known songs’)51 with the Russian translation, ‘ p roch u p lyvayut / otle te vshie te ni / te shat ego nedolgo / p es nyami p amyat nymi’, shows that free word-order helps a Russian translator to arrange his words according to the needs of alliteration and rhythm.

  The analytical structure of the English language inevitably results in the flooding

  of the translations with auxiliary words, which extinguish the phonetic effect of

  alliteration (thus in the line, ‘The floating spirits bring him all too few of the old well-known songs’, two alliterations on ‘s’ and on ‘f’ are incapable of structuring a sixteen-syl able line); whereas the synthetic structure of both Old English and

  Russian enables a translator into Russian to keep the same number of words and

  roughly the same number of syl ables per line.

  50 This peculiarity of Tikhomirov’s translations was noticed by Olga Smirnitskaya in

  her article on the poetic art of the Anglo-Saxons, Поэтическое искусство англосаксов. In: Древнеанглийская поэзия, Издание подготовили О. А. Смирницкая, В. Г. Тихомиров