The Accusative Absolute

[Grsartor at AOL.COM]

Hailai allai,

I have followed the contributions under the headings "araaiþei aflaiþ" and 
"gafilhsaggws" and, as often, been full of admiration for the erudition they 
evince. There is one small contribution I may be able to make to all this. It is 
about the absolute construction in Gothic. In his writing on 14.6.06 Llama_nom 
mentions the accusative absolute as found in

þuk taujandan armaion [ni witi hleidumei þeina hwa taujiþ taihswo þeina] 
(Matt. 6:3)

Wright has an interesting remark about this on page 292 of his Grammar of the 
Gothic Language. He states that it is not, in fact, an absolute construction 
but that "þuk" is the object of "witi", and two Latin manuscripts of the 
Gospels have the same construction, using "te facientem" for "þuk taujandan". The 
implication is that the Gothic has followed the Latin rather than the genitive 
absolute of the Greek. William Bennett, on page 94 of his Introduction to the 
Gothic Language, admits as possible both Wright's view and that the 
construction in question may be an accusative absolute.

I myself am happier thinking the construction is an accusative absolute, 
since I am not sure I can make proper sense of the Gothic on Wright's view; but my 
inability to understand is not an argument.

Gerry T.


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> 
Yahoo! Groups gets a make over. See the new email design.
http://us.click.yahoo.com/XISQkA/lOaOAA/yQLSAA/wWMplB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~-> 

You are a member of the Gothic-L list.  To unsubscribe, send a blank email to <gothic-l-unsubscribe at egroups.com>. 
Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/gothic-l/

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    gothic-l-unsubscribe at yahoogroups.com

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/