The Sun: a female word...

[Leonard Blunk]

To my understanding the Sun(Sunna) is feminine and the Moon(Muni) is masculine. This relationship lends itself to the old saying that a successful man is a good reflection on his wife..
                                   DR. ORIENT ROHMER

--- On Tue, 1/27/09, Ian Ragsdale <delvebelow at gmail.com> wrote:


From: Ian Ragsdale <delvebelow at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [gothic-l] Re: The Sun: a female word...
To: gothic-l at yahoogroups.com
Date: Tuesday, January 27, 2009, 8:09 AM






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 yahoogroup s.com <gothic-l%40yahoogr oups.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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