LL-L: "Verbs" [E] LOWLANDS-L, 10.JUN.1999 (01)

Thu Jun 10 15:48:05 UTC 1999

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From: Edwin Michael Alexander <edsells at wwwebcity.com>
Subject: Verbs

At 01:52 PM 99/06/09 -0700, Ian James Parsley wrote:
>Subject: Strong Verbs

>Thanks a lot for your offer of help, and a possible explanation I hadn't
>heard before, though I wonder whether it will ever be possible to prove the
>truth of that matter clearly. Of course, rather than having some
>pre-historic origins, it may also be that the dental suffix marker was a
>sort of grammatical loan. My own knowledge of Uralic or Finno-Ugric
>languages amounts to zero, but I do understand that other such loans are
>possible.

What you call the "dental suffix marker" is the also the mark of the oft
encountered past passive participle in Sanskrit, commonly known to students
as the "ta" participle, and undoubtedly shares the same IE origin.  The
Sanskrit present participle marker "mana" survives in the Romance
languages, such as in French "-ment".  In the case of the "ta" participle,
this form was often used somewhat the way it is used in the Germanic
languagues, e.g. tenedam uttam [tena idam uttam]- "this was said by him"
literally "by him this [was] said".

Glad to be of help.  By the way, I studied Sanskrit at UPENN.

Ed Alexander
JAG REALTY INC.
80 Jones Street
Hamilton, Ontario, Canada L8R 1Y1
Pager: 905-545-0177
Fax: 905-525-6671
Email: edsells at wwwebcity.com
Jag Realty Inc.: http://www.deerhurst.com/jag/
Ontario Ultra Series:  http://www.connection.com/~esmond/ouser.html

----------

From: Richard L Turner <fr.andreas at juno.com>
Subject: Verbs

Hello.

Sandy writes in response to Ron's sense of "wrongness" regarding
Sneak/Snuck: "I suppose it arises by analogy with some past
tense forms such as "struck", "stuck" &c, but the eak -> uck mutation
doesn't actually exist elsewhere in the language."

Perhaps not in Standard English, but in Appalachian there is Take/Tuck
(as opposed to Take/Took). The [i:] in Sneak is pronounced closer to
[ei:] in Appalachian (as a matter of fact it takes some close listening
to hear the difference in the vowels used in the phrase "sneaky snake"
[snei:ki sne:ik]), and I wonder if it is not US Midlands English that is
not the source for Snuck.

Next time I see a dead snake I'll refer to it as a snuck.:) There's
probably a poem in the idea of the broken and exanimate having their own
new names.

Yours,
+Fr Andreas Richard Turner.

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From: Ian James Parsley <parsleyij at hotmail.com>
Subject:

Sandy,

Yes, I too would use weak pasts of "slide" and "bide" - thus my spelling
"slied" and "bied" as opposed to "rys" and "dryv", whose past  form I
consider "ris" and "driv". In my own spelling I tend to avoid final silent
<e> if at all possible, by moving it before the final consonant or
consonantal cluster.

I rather think the "bade" form is a form of false analogy from
"forbid"-"forbade", but have no evidence to hand to back this up.

Regards,

----------

From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at geocities.com>
Subject: Verbs

Dear Lowlanders,

Sandy wrote with regard to my problems adopting (though not accepting) American
"sneak - snuck":

> Could this seeming "wrongness" be to do with the lack of other grammatical
> analogy? The verbs seek, freak out, greek, creak, leak, peek, speak, peak,
> squeak and streak don't become suck, fruck out, gruck, cruck, luck, puck,
> spuck, puck, skwuck or struck. I suppose it arises by analogy with some past
> tense forms such as "struck", "stuck" &c, but the eak -> uck mutation
> doesn't actually exist elsewhere in the language.

Sandy, you seem to be onto something there.  After all, analogy does play an
important part in memorizing strong verb forms, and, as you correctly said,
there is no analogy to "sneak - snuck" in Standard English.

Getting back to Ian's original point about strong vs weak competetion, it seems
to me - and I may be wrong -  that this is particularly striking in English
compared with other Germanic languages.  Yes, there are cases such as German
_backen_ - _buk_ ~ _backte_ and _fragen_ - _frug_ ~ _fragte_, but I can't think
of a whole bunch of other such instances.  By the way, _bak-_ (_backen_) is a
weak verb in Low Saxon (Low German).  Low Saxon _fraag-_ 'to ask' is one of the
very few instances of preterite competition:

'ask'
fraag - froyg ~ fraag - fraagd
(fraag - fröög/freug/fräug ~ fraag - fraagt)

Otherwise, differences are mostly dialectal in Low Saxon, and this involves
mostly front vs back in vowels, apart from mere orthographic alternatives (in
parentheses, separated by slashes/obliques); e.g.,

/fleig-/ 'fly'
fleig - floug ~ floyg - flagen
(fleeg/fleig - floog/flaug ~ flöög/fleug/fläug - flagen/flogen)

/soyk-/ 'seek'
soyk - soech - soechd ~ sochd
(söök/seuk/säuk - söch - söcht ~ socht)

But occasionally there is true vowel alternation, e.g.,

/stoyv-/ 'dust', 'rise up (of dust)'
stoyv - stouv - stoyven ~ staven
(stööv/stööb/stäuv/stäub - stoof/stauf - stöven/stöben/stäuven/stäuben ~
staven/staben/stoven/stoben)

What is more difficult for the learner of Low Saxon, for instance for a speaker
of English or German, is that many verbs have irregular forms for the second and
third persons singular in the present tense.  In most instances this is a case
of vowel shortening or alternation between a diphthong and a short vowel in the
2nd and 3rd person forms.  In fact, this type of alternation is almost a rule;
e.g.,

Regular:

/fal-/ 'fall'
1. fal, 2. falst, 3. falt  (1. fall, 2. fallst, 3. fallt)

/graav-/ 'dig'
1. graav, 2. graavst, 3. graavt  (1. graav/groov, 2. graafst/groofst, 3.
graaft/grooft)

Irregular:

/biit-/ 'bite'
1. biit, 2. bitst, 3. bit  (1. biet, 2. bittst, 3. bitt)

/fleig-/ 'fly'
1. fleig, 2. fluegst, 3. fluegt  (1. fleeg/fleig, 2. flüggst, 3. flüggt)

/slaap-/ 'sleep'
1. slaap, 2. sloepst, 3. sloept  (1. slaap, 2. slöppst, 3. slöppt)

/weig-/ 'weigh', 'rock (a cradle)'
1. weig, 2. weigst ~ wigst, 3. weigt ~ wigt  (1. weeg/weig, 2. weegst/weigst ~
wiggst, 3. weegt/weigt ~ wiggt)

Richard wrote above:

> Perhaps not in Standard English, but in Appalachian there is Take/Tuck
> (as opposed to Take/Took). The [i:] in Sneak is pronounced closer to
> [ei:] in Appalachian (as a matter of fact it takes some close listening
> to hear the difference in the vowels used in the phrase "sneaky snake"
> [snei:ki sne:ik]), and I wonder if it is not US Midlands English that is
> not the source for Snuck.

Interesting!  Consider the Low Saxon cognate:

snaaksche snaak

Literally it's "snakish snake."  It comes across more like "weird snake" or even
"funny snake."  I think _snaaksch_ "snakish" originally referred to 'sneaky' and
'threatening', i.e., 'out of the ordinary,' hence the extension 'strange'.
After all, 'strange' and 'threatening' tend to be perceived as linked.
Afrikaans and Dutch _snaaks_ also have the meaning of 'weird' and 'funny,'
though apparently the don't use *_snaak_ for 'snake' but _slang_, which is also
an alternative word in Low Saxon (cf. German _Schlange_).

The origin of English 'sneak' and thus of 'sneaky' appears to be unknown, but I
assume are related related to 'snake'.

Best regards,

Reinhard/Ron

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