twoth
Wilson Gray
hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Fri Jan 25 18:53:51 UTC 2008
Thanks! FWIW, Czech still uses the historical spelling, "kde."
Considering that "kde" and "gde" have the same pronunciation in
Russian, you'd expect that it, too, would have retained the historical
spelling. But, of course, who knows from languages? Why are /hw/ and
/w/ falling together as [w] in English, despite the fact that it
introduces confusion - i.e. "which" v. "witch" - where once there was
none?
-Wilson
On 1/24/08, Mark Mandel <thnidu at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject: Re: twoth
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> F'rex, "It's two o'clock" is "Estas la dua horo", lit. 'It is the second
> hour'. So "What time is it?" is "Kioma horo estas?" 'How-many-th hour is
> it?' That's by far the commonest way this adj. is used.
>
> No, I-E. At least Slavic also has k- (kto 'who' is all that comes back from
> h.s.; maybe also gde 'where'). But I meant the use of the same form for rel.
> & interr., not specifically the [k].
>
> m a m
>
> On Jan 24, 2008 11:21 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > So, in Esperanto, one asks "how many-th?"? Why? How is the answer
> > constructed? I don't get it. Am I being stupid, here/ Or do i merely
> > lack sufficient background - any - in Esperanto?
> >
> > And, WRT "ki," you mean "Romance," not "I-E," right?
> >
> > -Wilson
> >
> >
> >
> > On 1/24/08, Mark Mandel <thnidu at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > > Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > > Poster: Mark Mandel <thnidu at GMAIL.COM>
> > > Subject: Re: twoth
> > >
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > >
> > > The Esp-o word needs no specific analogical etymology. There's a whole
> > grid
> > > of function words, generalizing from patterns like English
> > > "here/there/where", "__/then/when", "__/that/what":
> > >
> > > - begin with 'ki' for relative or interrogative (definite I-E bias
> > > there), 'ti' for demonstrative, 'i' for indefinite, 'neni' for
> > negative,
> > > 'c^i' for universal (c-circumflex, [tS], English "ch")
> > > - add 'u' for individual, 'e' for place, 'a' for quality, 'om' for
> > > quantity, ... nine in all
> > >
> > > So kiom 'how many/much', nenie 'nowhere', c^iu 'everyone, every one'
> > (+/-
> > > animate), tia 'that kind (of), such' and so on. And since you can
> > > productively add the appropriate POS ending to any stem, kiom + the
> > > adjective ending -a -> kioma 'how many-th'.
> > >
> > > m a m
> > >
> > > On Jan 24, 2008 9:47 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
> > >
> > > > At 9:28 AM -0500 1/24/08, Mark Mandel wrote:
> > > > >How common is it in natural languages to have an ordinal
> > interrogative
> > > > word?
> > > > >Esperanto has "kioma", derived by adjectivizing "kiom" 'how
> > much/many"?
> > > > >
> > > > >m a m
> > > >
> > > > Presumably this arose by analogy with French and
> > > > other Romance languages (the main source for
> > > > Esperanto). I note 106 google hits for
> > > > _combieni=E8me_ with this meaning and derivation,
> > > > as in
> > > >
> > > > Ca fait le combienieme sujet sur le genre?
> > > >
> > > > Mettons, que pour la j'sais pas combieni=E8me fois,
> > > > j'ai utilis=E9 le bouton "=E9diter ce message" au
> > > > lieu de "r=E9pondre =E0 ce message"
> > > >
> > > > c'est ton combienieme match?
> > > >
> > > > And the "less logical" but "more correct" form,
> > > > _combienti=E8me_ (with epenthetic -t-) gets 2250
> > > > hits (e.g. "Bill Clinton est le combienti=E8me
> > > > pr=E9sident des =C9tats-Unis?" and an appearance in
> > > > this blog on the topic:
> > > > http://forum.wordreference.com/archive/index.php/t-418730.html
> > > > (Respondents to this blog contribute
> > > > interrogative ordinals in Swedish, German,
> > > > Finnish, Turkish, Tagalog, etc.)
> > > >
> > > > LH
> > > >
> > > > >
> > > > >On Jan 17, 2008 8:48 PM, Bill Le May <blemay0 at mchsi.com> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > >> > -----Original Message-----
> > > > >> > From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU]
> > On
> > > > Behalf
> > > > >> > Of Joel S. Berson
> > > > >> > Sent: Thursday, January 17, 2008 10:42 AM
> > > > >> > To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > > > >> > Subject: Re: twoth
> > > > >>
> > > > >> > Thank heaven this is not likely to lead to oneth and thirdth.
> > (If =
> > > I
> > > > >> > come across speakers of these, I won't stand too close.)
> > > > >>
> > > > >> In childhood I remember saying "what-th". Wondering the day of the
> > > > month,
> > > > >> I
> > > > >> would ask a parent "what day is it" and inevitably get an answer
> > like
> > > > >> "Wednesday". Frustrated, I'd reply, "No, I mean today is that
> > what-th
> > > > of
> > > > >> January?"
> > > > >>
> > > > >> No virus found in this outgoing message.
> > > > >> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> > > > >> Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.19.6/1229 - Release Date:
> > > > 1/17/2008
> > > > >> 11:12 AM
> > > > >>
> > > > >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> > > > >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> > > > >>
> > > > >
> > > > >------------------------------------------------------------
> > > > >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> > > >
> > > > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > > > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> > > >
> > >
> > > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
> > come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> > -----
> > -Sam'l Clemens
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Sam'l Clemens
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
More information about the Ads-l
mailing list