OK, I will go front-channel as well, though the discussion has become so confused and confusing that I dont know where to start. But consider, first, on the alliterative front, that yogh--like our modern y--could perhaps have functioned as either a vowel or a consonant.
[ASIDE: Note that Im eliminating all apostrophes and quotation marks in hopes of correcting the corruption of my messages. Please do let me know if any other punctuation is likewise scrambled, as I cant see what you can. Thanks.]
As far as the history of the letter g is concerned, it is wrong to see it as a modern development. It goes all the way back to the runic alphabet, where it stood for the word GYFU (gift). (Each rune stands for both a letter and a word beginning with that letter--just to add to the confusion.)
[ASIDE: I have a still-unfinished draft (13 pages) of an essay on Prynne's rune poem that I began in 2000 and have done little more on it since then. It is titled How to Glove Things with Runes: J. H. Prynnes Subliminal Poetics and may be of interest to some of you, as I correct Andrew Duncan's mistranslations (both A-S and Mod. Eng.) of the rune poem. Douglas Oliver and Alice Notley were hoping to publish those translations, along with the rune poem, pending Prynne's approval, in GARE DU NORD, but then Doug died, and that was that. Anyway, I will be glad to mail hard copies of the draft to anyone who wants one--just e-mail me your postal address. End of shameless self-promotion.]
Candice
P.S. Please be advised that Im on digest and will not see your list posts in response to this (if any) until tomorrow evening. If you want a quicker reply from me, you will need to b-c me with your post. Thanks.
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