Burg und Bauge;—All Erbot wider dich
der Sohn Beanstânes sorglichst erfüllte.’
Criticism of the Translation.
In his translation Ettmüller followed in the steps of Kemble[2], but he was not slavishly dependent upon him. At times he disagrees with the English scholar (cp. e.g., ll. 468, 522, 1331), and offers a translation of the passage omitted by him, 3069–74. In general, the translation is strictly literal, and follows the original almost line for line.
It was probably well for Ettmüller that he made his translation thus literal. In the history of a foreign-language study there is a period when it is best that a translation should be strictly literal, for such a work is bound to be called into service as a part of the critical apparatus for the interpretation of the tongue. If the early translation is not thus literal, it is sure to be superseded later by the more faithful rendering, as Schaldemose’s superseded Grundtvig’s in Denmark[3]. It is not until criticism and scholarship have done their strictly interpretative work that a translation is safe in attempting to render the spirit rather than the letter of the original. The reason for this is evident: no real appreciation of the spirit is possible until scholarship has provided the means for discovering it.
By the publication of this volume, therefore, Ettmüller did for German scholarship what Kemble had done for English and Schaldemose was to do for Danish scholarship. Yet he might with propriety have made his work more simple. His translation is disfigured by numerous strange word-combinations which he often transcribed literally from the original, e.g. beadu-runen in the third line of the extract. It is safe to say that none but a scholar in Old English would be able to understand this word—if, indeed, we may call it a word. The text is full of such forms. The author is obliged to append notes explaining his own translation! He apparently forgets that it is his business as translator to render the difficult words as well as the simple ones. In Ettmüller’s case it was especially unfortunate, because it gave others an opportunity to come forward later with simpler, and hence more useful, translations.
Reception of the Translation.
The book had no extraordinary success. A reprint was never called for, and was perhaps hardly to be expected, considering the existence of Kemble’s volumes. Moreover, the translation was not accompanied by an edition of the text. Grein[4], the next German scholar, took his inspiration from Kemble[5] and Thorpe[6] rather than from Ettmüller.