synn

Forms

synn f (strong ō-stem; genitive singular synne, nominative plural synna)^[1]

Etymology

Wiktionary takes it as inherited from Proto-West Germanic *sunnju (“reality; trouble”), from Proto-Germanic *sunjō (“truth, reality”), whose sense was coloured by *sundī, from *sundī (“crime, sin”).^[1] The first group has Gothic 𐍃𐌿𐌽𐌾𐌰 (sunja, “truth”), Old High German sunna and Old Norse syn (“denial”); the second Old Frisian sende, Old Saxon sundia, Old High German sunta and Old Norse synd.^[1][2][3] Köbler starts from *sundjō beside *sundiz.^[2] Holthausen compares Old Saxon sunnea (“hindrance, need”), the Old Norse word for denial and Latin sōns (“guilty”).^[3]

Both groups go back to the participle of Proto-Indo-European *h₁es- (“to be”), “being, true”.^[2][1] Orel takes the Gothic noun from a zero-grade formation that matches Sanskrit सत्य (satyá, “true, real”).^[4][5] On this view the sin was first what was “truly” so, the charge proved against the accused.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word is first recorded in the mid-ninth-century gloss of the Vespasian Psalter: ðu gemildsas synne minre “you will have mercy on my sin”, over the Latin “propitiaberis peccato meo” of Psalm 24.^[6][7]

Semantic evolution

Bosworth and Toller divide the senses by the law broken: a misdeed, fault or crime against human law, and a sin against the law of God.^[8] The older, worldly sense is clear in the poetry: in Beowulf synn ond sacu between Swedes and Geats is enmity and strife, and Klaeber glosses the word “hostility, wrongdoing”.^[8][9] Clark Hall gives “injury, mischief, enmity, feud” beside “sin, guilt, crime”.^[10] In the glosses it renders Latin “peccatum”, “scelus”, “facinus” and “vitium”, and in the laws it is the sin of the Church.^[2][11]

The word lived on as Middle English synne, now English sin.^[1]

Timeline

• s. ix med. – synne minre “my sin” in the Vespasian Psalter gloss.^[6][7]
• 890×897 – Unwise lareowas cumað for ðæs folces synnum “unwise teachers come because of the people's sins” in the Pastoral Care.^[12][7]
• s. x ex. – frequent in Ælfric's Catholic Homilies I.^[13][7]
• s. x/xi – synn ond sacu “enmity and strife” in the Beowulf manuscript.^[14][9]

Meanings

Noun

1. a misdeed, fault, crime, wrong.^[8][10]
2. (poetic) injury, enmity, feud.^[9][10][15]
3. a sin against the law of God; guilt.^[8][2]

Word family

• synful
• synlēas
• synniġ
• unsynn

Descendants

• Middle English synne (→ English sin; Scots sin)^[1]

Related words

• syngian

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. synn
3. ^ a b Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 340
4. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 387
5. ^ Feist, Sigmund (1939), Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der gotischen Sprache, 3rd ed., Leiden: Brill, p. 273
6. ^ a b Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 329
7. ^ a b c d Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
8. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 963
9. ^ a b c Fulk, R. D.; Bjork, Robert E.; Niles, John D., eds. (2008), Klaeber's Beowulf and The Fight at Finnsburg, 4th ed., Toronto: University of Toronto Press (glossary), p. s.v. synn
10. ^ a b c Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 335
11. ^ Liebermann, F. (1906), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, vol. II.1: Wörterbuch, Halle: Niemeyer, p. 207
12. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 499
13. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 407
14. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 344
15. ^ Sweet, Henry (1896), The Student's Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 191