Expressing age [Was: Hallo hallo!]

[Rydwlf]

Dear Johann,

As far as I know the extant forms used to express age in Wulfila bible follow these three structures:

- 'wisan' ("to be") + 'jere' + numeral (Genitive).
As in Mark 5:42: 'was auk jere twalibe'.
"for she was twelve years old".
Or in Luke 3:23: 'jah silba was Iesus swe jere þrije tigiwe uf gakunþai'.
"And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age".
In this sentence 'þrije' is Masc. Gen. and 'tigiwe' is Gen. Pl.
These sentences mean literally "for she was of twelve years" and "and Jesus himself began to be about of thirty 

- haban ("to have") + numeral (Accusative) + 'jere'.
As in John, 8:57: 'fimf tiguns jere nauh ni habais'.
"you're not yet fifty years old" .
 
- wisan + numeral (Nom.) + 'wintrus' (Nominative, "winter").
Luke 2:42: 'jah biþe warþ twalibwintrus'
"and when he was twelve years old" (lit. "twelve winters").
This is really a compound; instead of 'twalif', 'twalib' is used(cf. 'twalibim', Dative).

It is good to bear in mind the special rules that apply to the declination of numerals. 1, 2 and 3 are declinable in all cases and genders. 4 - 15 usually remain uninflected, but in some parts of the text they appear inflected (following i-declension with Dat. in -im and Gen. in -e). For tens, 20-90, the structure is 'numeral from 2 to 9' + 'tigjus' (which is Nom. Pl. of 'tigus', "decade"). If you have to decline a ten, you decline 'tigus' in the needed case ('tuguns' is Acc. Pl. and 'tigiwe' is Gen. Pl.) according to the verb (wisan or haban).  The first numeral is declined in Masc. and the same case as 'tigus' (if 2 or 3, since 4 - 9 are undeclinable), as deducted from Luke 3:23 (I don't know if other rules apply).

I've probably missed one or two things but I think this summary can be helpful. Hope so!

Rydwlf   



--- On Sat, 12/20/08, Johann von Messer <furry_von_messer at yahoo.com> wrote:

> From: Johann von Messer <furry_von_messer at yahoo.com>
> Subject: [gothic-l] Re: Hallo hallo!
> To: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
> Date: Saturday, December 20, 2008, 5:58 PM
> Wow... I didn't think the -lif suffix was used in other
> numbers other 
> than eleven and twelve (and maybe thirteen.)
> 
> And dative plural for jer? I thought it'd be some
> really odd 
> grammatical way of saying it. Something like 'I have X
> years' or the 
> like. But thank you for this! I've something to work
> off of now. :D
> 
> How about the rest of the stuff?
> 
> --- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, OSCAR HERRERA
> <duke.co at ...> wrote:
> >
> > ik im ahtauliff jeram....i am 18 years.....ik im
> niunliff jeram...i 
> am nineteen years old...
> 
> 
> 
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