So also ēare 'ear.'
WEAK FEMININES.
| SINGULAR. | PLURAL. | ||
| Nom. | sunn-e (sun). | Nom. | sunn-an. |
| Acc. | sunn-an. | Acc. | sunn-an. |
| Dat. | sunn-an. | Dat. | sunn-um. |
| Gen. | sunn-an. | Gen. | sunn-ena. |
So also ċiriċe (church), fǣmne (virgin), heorte (heart).
Lēo (lion) has acc., &c. lēon.
PROPER NAMES.
Native names of persons are declined like other nouns:—Ælfred, gen. Ælfredes, dat. Ælfrede; Ēad-burg (fem.), gen. Ēadburge, &c.
Foreign names of persons sometimes follow the analogy of native names, thus Crīst, Salomon have gen. Crīstes, Salomones, dat. Crīste, Salomone. Sometimes they are declined as in Latin, especially those in -us, but often with a mixture of English endings, and the Latin endings are used
somewhat loosely, the accus. ending being often extended to the other oblique cases; thus we find nom. Cȳrus, gen. Cȳres, acc. Cȳrum, dat. Cȳrum (þǣm cyninge Cȳrum).
Almost the only names of countries and districts in Old English are those taken from Latin, such as Breten (Britain), Cęnt (Kent), Ġermānia (Germany), and those formed by composition, generally with land, such as Ęnġla-land (land of the English, England), Isr·ahēla-þēod (Israel). In both of these cases the first element is in the gen. pl., but ordinary compounds, such as Scot-land, also occur. In other cases the name of the inhabitants of a country is used for the country itself:—on Ēast-ęnġlum = in East-anglia, lit. 'among the East-anglians.' So also on Angel-cynne = in England, lit. 'among the English race,' more accurately expressed by Angelcynnes land.