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

Mon May 23 06:22:49 UTC 2005

*************
Hi Peter!

Maybe it is hard to believe for Spanish-speaking people, 
but the most probable origination of the Spanish definite 
article <el> is just from late (popular, vulgar) Latin 
rather than Arabic. I have mentioned that the Spanish form 
with the vowel <e> instead of <i> in Latin <illus> and 
Italian <il> might be provoked by Arabic <al/el>, 
but Francisc Czobor considers it (in his Re:) as 
a natural development within Spanish. Besides, 
he added a reasonable observation that the Spanish article 
changes by genders as in Latin and opposed to the Arabic 
article. Evolving this topic, I could make a note that 
the Spanish article does not assimilate its <l> before 
a consonant as the Arabic article does: 
(al -> ar (before <r>), -> as (before <s>), -> at (before <t>), 
etc.).
You ask if am I "sure that Latin (il) wasn't borrowed from 
the Arabic (el), as well"? Ok, I am not sure, 
I wouldn't bet on it, this explanation is only most probable 
and acceptable.
Perhaps I understood your question regarding <al> not exactly, 
but, in my understanding, you mean the merging of 
the preposition <a> with the article <el>. A main meaning 
of the preposition <a>, derivative from Latin <ad>, is just 
your "leaning towards". Also, using the preposition <a> 
in your sense "in the manner of" is typical for Romance 
(cf. <all'Italiano> -- in Italian (way), where <al> = a+il; 
<au Francais> - in French (way) where <au> = a+le).

Vladimir

-----Original Message-----
From: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com [mailto:gothic-l at yahoogroups.com]On
Behalf Of Peter Gutierrez
Sent: Wednesday, May 11, 2005 7:55 PM
To: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [gothic-l] the word "the" as in "the house" or "the car"

Hi Vladimir,

Nice to meet you.  Thanks for taking the time to
respond to my questions.  I always believed that the
word (el)came from the arabic language. It's a
surprise to hear that it didn't.  Never-the-less, it's
hard to believe that (el) didn't come from arabic in
some shape or fashion, since nearly a fifth of the
Spanish vocabulary is made up of arabic words.  I made
the association that if the Spanish word (al) was an
Arabic word, then (el) must have been, as well.  And
since the Moors didn't use the Roman-Greek alphabet,
that (al) and (el) must have been written out in the
Roman-Greek Alphabet according to it's sound and
meaning. (Al)is used in many arabic words in the
Spanish vocabulary. Lastly, because these words are so
short and simple and so widely used in Arabic names,
that they must have come from the Arabic language.  In
any case, what can be said is that, in regards to the
word (el), it was just a coincidence that the arabic
language (el) was so like the Latin (il), and that
both words had the exact same manner of usage in
grammar. Are you sure that Latin (il) wasn't borrowed
from the Arabic (el), as well? And also, would you
agree that the word (al), meaning "leaning towards "
or "in the manner of), is an arabic word? Al Jugo
(Spanish): Au jus (French). I guess in English, Al
Jugo means "In juice form" or "in the  form of juice:"
"the beef was cooked in juice form" or something like
that. It's a strange word :)

Peter Gutierrez
--- еЗПТПЧ чМБДЙНЙТ <vegorov at ipiran.ru> wrote:
> ********************
> Hi Peter!
> 
> Gothic had definite articles, i.e. analogues to
> English <the>, 
> but, leaving this item to more competent members of
> the Gothic-L, 
> I'd like to note that Spanish <el> is NOT an Arabic
> word. 
> Otherwise we should accept Italian <il> and French
> <le> also 
> as loan words from Arabic, which seems unbelievable.
> 
> More probable (and widely accepted) is derivation 
> of the definite articles in all Romance languages
> from Latin 
> <illus, illum, illa> 'this, that' for various
> genders. 
> Thus origination of the Romance article is the same
> as for 
> Germanic one (cf. English <the> from <this> or High
> German 
> <der, das, die> from <dieser, dieses, diese> etc.). 
> Though the change of <i> in Italian <il> to <e> in
> Spanish 
> <el> may reflect some Moorish influence. 
> By the way, the idea itself to put an article before
> all nouns 
> may penetrate late Latin just from the Gothic,
> Langobardic 
> or other Germanic languages.
> 
> Vladimir
>  
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
> [mailto:gothic-l at yahoogroups.com]On
> Behalf Of Peter Gutierrez
> Sent: Thursday, May 05, 2005 9:42 AM
> To: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [gothic-l] the word "the" as in "the house"
> or "the car"
> 
> 
> Hi fellow lovers of the written language,
> 
> Does anybody know what the visigoths might have used
> for the word "the."   Spain uses an arabic word for
> "the" which is the word "EL."  What the [edit] did
> the
> visigoths used prior to the moorish invasions?  I
> imagine that they used something from their old
> gothic
> language. Perhaps something akin to ostrogothic or
> even something before they split up to become the
> east
> and west goths. 
> 
> Peter  
> 
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