[gothic-l] Re: the word "the" as in "the house" or "the car"

[llama_nom]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "Ingemar Nordgren" <ingemar at n...> 
wrote:
> I have never succeeded to see definite article  before words in 
Gothic.
> Indefinite like  'a house' or 'that house, this house' et c. I rather
> see the definite in the ending of the word like in Scandinavian
> languages or rather the word is bowed  according to it's function in 
a
> special sequence. I am of course not very good in Gothic so I might 
be
> wrong.

No, you're right, Ingemar--except that I think the enclitic article  
(attached to the end of a noun) is a later development in North 
Germanic.  This lack of the definite article is one of the most 
frequent ways in which the Gothic bible translation differs in syntax 
from the Greek original.  It's apparent in virtually every line [ 
http://www.wulfila.be/gothic/browse/ ].

e.g. du hunslastada "to THE altar"

'sa', 'so' and 'þata' are the nominative sigular forms (nominative 
mostly = the subject of a sentence).  They are used as a demonstrative 
pronoun "that [one]" or "this [one]" or sometimes "he/she/it", 
depending on the context.  They are inflected for four cases: 
accusative, dative, genitive; singular and plural ("those").  An old 
intrumental form 'þe' appears in certain phrases.

But where the noun is definite and qualified by an adjective or 
prepositional phrase, the same pronouns are often used like the 
definite article "the" in English.

ahma sa weiha
"THE Holy Spirit"
(masculine nominative)

unte usgibis ÞANA minnistan kintu
"till you´ve paid THE smallest farthing [a type of coin]"
(masculine accusative)

SO garehsns bi ina
"THE plan concerning him"
(feminine nominative)

Sometimes though the definiteness is expressed in another way by using 
a special set of inflections for the adjective, called the "weak" 
declension--particularly with fixed expressions, names or titles.  But 
there is some fluctuation.  "on THE last day" is rendered either 'in 
spedistin daga' or 'in ÞAMMA spedistin daga' (masculine dative).

The definite article is also often translated with 'sa', 'so', 'þata', 
etc. when an adjective or participle is used on its own as a noun:

ÞAI unhailans
"THE ill"
"THOSE [who are] unwell"


Occasionally also with a simple (abstract) noun:

jah ufkunnaiþ sunja, jah SO sunja frijans izwis briggiþ
"and you will know THE truth, and THE truth will make you free"

iþ ik, þatei sunja rodida, ni galaubeiþ mis
"and because I tell you THE truth, ye believe me not"

hva ist SO sunja!
"what is truth?"

But maybe the reason is that the demonstrative/article is used only 
when "truth" has already been mentioned and is already the subject of 
the discussion: "What is this truth of which you speak."  The same 
rule applies according to Streitberg for the use of the article with a 
possessive pronoun, which is the rule in Greek, but only used in 
Gothic in this more limited circumstance, see Mark 3,32-33: aiþei 
þeina...hvo ist so aiþei meina "your mother...Who is my mother?" 
(...this mother of mine of whom you speak).

Streitberg also notes some examples of the combination ARTICLE + NOUN 
+ ARTICLE + ATTRIBUTE, which is how Greek behaves.  But more common in 
the Gothic translation is: NOUN + ARTICLE + ATTRIBUTE:

rums wigs SA bigganda in fralustai
"THE broad road leading to destruction"

Note the combination of strong (rums) and weak (brigganda) adjectives 
here.  But also quite common even here, no article at all:

sunus gudis libandins
(THE) son of THE living God

us dauþaim
"from THE dead"
(literally: "out from among the dead people)

So to get back to the original question, "the house" RAZNA; "the car" 
*WAGNS (i.e. "cart", not attested, except as Crimean 'waghen').  
But "the blue car": SA BLEWA WAGNS, or else WAGNS SA BLEWA.  
Incidentally, does anyone have any thoughts on how each of these 
possibilities would sound in terms of emphasis?

Llama Nom




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