[gothic-l] Re: a Gothic poem

[llama_nom]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "rausch_roman" <aranwe at m...> wrote:
> Even if you know a Germanic language as a 
> mothertongue all those conjucations are still pure brain pain.


Ah, it's not so bad.  At least they're very regular.  If you write 
enough poems you'll just absorb it naturally.



> Hwas ist þata hráinama* ana aírþai?
> What is the purest on earth?


hráinisto


> 
> Snáiws saei ni [laggs]** libiþ,
> Snow which not long lives,



Romans 11,13
swa lagga swe ik im þiudo apaustaulus
"as long as I am of-the-gentiles an-apostle"

Here 'lagga' is actually an adjectival form, as if short for "so 
long a time as", compare:

Romans 7,1
swa lagga hveila swe libaiþ
"as long as he lives"

The spelling 'hveila' here is the one used by the Wulfila Project.  
Although it doesn't reflect the sound as well as 'hw', it's useful 
because it preserves a distinction in the original Gothic alphabet 
and avoids certain potential confusions, see:

http://www.wulfila.be/Corpus/Search.html
http://www.wulfila.be/gothic/browse/

The form 'libaiþ' is because 'liban' is a Class 3 weak verb.  Did 
the lessons cover weak verb conjugations?  There are four altogether.

One more point: 'ni' usually comes directly before the verb (even in 
contrast with Greek), except with past participles of preterite-
present verbs, e.g. ni skuld ist "it's not permitted", and sometimes 
with other past participles, and sometimes with certain combinations 
like 'ni waihts' nothing, 'ni þanaseiþs' "not any more, no longer".  
So I'd rearrange it: 'ni libaiþ lagga', or else: 'lagga ni libaiþ'.  
Both orders are found.  I don't yet know whether the fact of it 
being a dependent clause would influence that choice.  A matter for 
further investigation...



> 
> Saei sa himins uns ofta fragibiþ
> Which the heaven us often grants


saei > þanei, accusative (since snow has already been mentioned in 
the main clause in the nominative, the relative pronoun will take 
the case appropriate to the dependent clause).
ofta > ufta
I would probably leave out 'sa' (see recent posts about "the").  
English is a bit quirky here.  We say "heaven" (=the place where 
angels live), but "the heavens" (poetic word for sky).



> Swê huzd miþ kaldamma*** haírtin?
> Like [a] treasure by [a] cold heart?



Inflections all correct, as far as I can see!  Prepositions don't 
require weak adjectives, only 1) the demonstrive/article, 2) 
vocatives, 3) certain names or titles without the article but where 
we would say "the" in English, like 'at faírgunja alewjin' "at the 
mount of olives" (literally "at the olive mountain"); 'in spedistin 
daga' "on the last day", but also 'in þamma spedistin daga'.

Llama Nom




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