Old English WotW 003 Hæfst þū būr? - Do you have room? (Patreon)

Word of the Week series index

Old English WotW 003

Hæfst þū būr? - Do you have room?

Wes þū hāl! My fiancée gave me a wonderful Christmas gift of conversational phrases in Old English, and when I came upon the phrase hæfst þū būr? “do you have room?” in the chapter about staying at the inn, I was exciting to recognise the descendent of būr as the not-oft-used Modern English word “bower,” related to the German cognate in the name Jack Bauer. Long ū in Old English regularly becomes /au/ in Modern English, thus būr to bower, hūs to house, mūs to mouse.

“Bower” is a word I picked up somewhat earlier in life from a Scottish folk duo called The Corries; in their renditition of “Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go?” they sing, “I will build my love a bower” (listen here: https://youtube.com/watch?v=SVQkdV4GwLc ) and it means a dwelling, a bedroom, a country cottage. It also means a shady or leafy shelter in the woods, and this is probably its original meaning, since the word is cognate with Ancient Greek φύω meaning “to grow,” giving φύσις “nature” and φυτόν “leaf.”

So if you ask the innkeeper, hæfst þū būr? hopefully he will respond ġīese, iċ hæbbe būr.

Iċ þancie þē! Till next time.