The Sun: a female word...

[Ian Ragsdale]

As a linguist, I dare suggest that grammatical gender has little to do with
meaning.  Mark Twain famously points out that German speakers must refer to
a girl as "it" and an onion as "she," but I don't think anyone would suggest
the little bulb has more "feminine" qualities than the little maid.  It is
rather a circumstance of endings.

Additionally, the PIE root leading to the Germanic words for "sun" was also
a source for masculine words, such as Gr. helios.

I am open to the idea that a people could have selectively chosen their
religious/spiritual words along gender lines, but I did want to put it out
there that grammatical gender is not necessarily a bearer of meaning.

IMR





On Tue, Jan 27, 2009 at 6:49 AM, Ingemar Nordgren <ingemar at nordgren.se>wrote:

>   Since we have all knowledge mostly from Wulfila, with a Greek
> background, it is not quite sure that it was indeed not feminine among
> the people. That is all I dare suggest as a non linguist.
>
> Best
> Ingemar
>
>
> --- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com <gothic-l%40yahoogroups.com>, "theudimer"
> <theudimer at ...> wrote:
> >
> > Hails
> >
> > doesn't anybody knows if "SUN" is a female word in all gemanic
> > languages? Moon and Sun were both Goddess in the pre-christian times.?
> >
> > Sauil,is a word neuter in Gutiska, but it was a religous tranformation
> > happened in Gothic People? Why in the rest of germanic peoples "Sun"
> > is female? Was sarmatian influence?
> >
> > Regards
> > Theudimer
> >
>
>  
>


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