Quick question on adjectives

[edmundfairfax@yahoo.ca [gothic-l]]

Dirk, 

 Your suggested parallels are essentially correct, although the -er in 'treuer Hirte' is not an instance of Gothic -s becoming -r in German. The nominative singular masculine ending -s in Gothic a-stems comes from Proto-Germanic *-az, ultimately from Indo-European *-os. This *-az was reduced to -s in Gothic, to -r in Proto-Norse, and to nothing in West Germanic: thus Old High German 'blint hirti' from late Proto-Germanic *blindaz hirdijaz. The -er in the modern language is a secondary analogical development, one based on the forms of 'der, er.'
 

 Edmund
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/gothic-l/attachments/20140811/8a8c9fa7/attachment.htm>