Singular Old English Approximate English Translation

The other common declensions are called: Singular Neuter a- Feminine o- Weak Masculine -n Weak Feminine -n Approx % of nouns 25 25 9 5 Nominative scip "ship" giefu "gift" guma "man" tunge "tongue" Accusative scip giefe guman tungan These will be covered in more detail in later chapters. Review. An Old English noun has two parts which you must note: it has a stem, which contains the noun's basic meaning and its gender; and it also has a case ending which tells you the noun's case and its number. A pattern of endings which are added to the end of a noun to show its grammatical function is called a declension. Each noun in Old English belongs to one declension. The most common declensions are called the masculine a-, neuter a-, feminine o-, weak masculine -n and weak feminine -n declensions. There are a few other declensions, but these are uncommon and we can ignore them for the time being.