Re: 3rd-person imperative

Yeah, Latin definitely does.  "Esto" as in "alea jacta esto" (a creative
emendation of "alea jacta est," if I remember correctly -- how much more
worthy of Caesar to say "be the die cast!" than merely "the die is
cast!" as he crosses the Rubicon....).

I think Greek does too.

Hell, for all I know Latin may have a first person imperative.  If it
didn't originally, I wouldn't put it past the crazy Irish Grammarians to
have come up with one. :)

Ed


On Mon, 8 May 2000, Brad Coon wrote:

> James Campbell wrote:
> >
> > Jameld has a feature that is surely not unique, yet I don't recall seeing it
> > elsewhere in any other lang. This is the fact that the imperative is not
> > restricted to the 2nd person.
> >
>
> > It was translating this verse yesterday that made me think about this
> > feature, and wonder: what other langs do this?
> >
>
> Well my recollection is that Latin had a 3rd Future Imperative but I
> also recollect some discussion as to its real imperative nature, or
> lack thereof.
> Nova formerly applied imperative across all 4 persons it uses.  Its not
> clear now if that is still so since I now make a fundamental distinction
> between direct address forms and everything else.
> --
> Brad Coon
> bcoon@imt.net
>
> Somedays when you wake up, its just not worth chewing through
> the leather straps.
>