P. 8. l. [240] seli sped may be regarded as a compound, and printed seli-sped = good speed, prosperity. Cf. l. [310], where iwel sped = iwel-sped = misfortune. Cf. O.E. gode-happe, prosperity, and ille-happe, mishap. [247] seuendai = seuend dai = seventh day. [250] newes = a-new, a genitival adjective used adverbially. Cf. our modern adverb needs, O.E. nedes, of necessity; lives, alive. (R. of Gloucester, 301, 376. Owl and Nightingale, 1632.) deathes = dead. (R. of Gl., 375, 382. Owl and Nightingale, 1630.) [255] rode-wold = rode tree. I have printed rode-wold and not rode wold, because the two expressions are widely different in meaning. In the latter phrase the word wold = put to death, slain; in the former it is a suffix = -tree, -beam; so that rode-wold corresponds exactly to the O.E. rode-tre = rood-tre = the cross.
"Þe ille men in manhed sal hym [Christ] se,
Anly als he henged on þe rode-tre," etc.
—(Hampole's P. of C., l. 5260.)
Cf. dore-tree, Piers Pl. 833, and the phrases "hanged on a tree," "the gallows tree," etc. O.E. Tre = tree = wood, beam (and treen = wooden), still existing in axle-tree, saddle-tree, etc. The -wold in rode-wold must therefore = -tre = wood, beam, which we still preserve in threshold. O.E. threshwald, threshwold (A.S. thersc-wald, thyrscwold). The affix -wold fortunately occurs again in lines [576] and [614] in the word arche-wold = ark-board.
Sexe hundred ger noe was hold,
Quan he dede him in ðe arche-wold.—(l. [576].)
Sex hundred ger and on dan olde
Noe ſag ut of ðe arche-wolde.—(l. [614].)
A passage in Cædmon's poems furnishes us with the very term ark-board by which we have rendered arche-wold.