Re: Person marking on nouns?

> Muke Tever scripsit:
>
> > In many languages I think though it is possible to use 1st or 2nd person
> > verbs when they construe with the speaker or the listener ("Our Father,
> > which *art* in heaven"), it usually isnt (Your Majesty *is*; Your Honor
> > *doesn't*, your servant *hears*, Usted *quiere*, o senhor *vende*...).
The Vulgate has "Pater noster qui in caelis *es* . . ." ("Father our who
in heaven art . . . ")


John Cowan wrote:
>
> It's just one of those things, I think, like the opening lines of the
> once very well known poem "Casabianca" by Felicia Hemans:  "The boy
> stood on the burning deck/Whence all but he had fled".  If "but" is a
> conjunction here, then we have to construe the second line as "all had
> fled, but he had _not_ fled", which seems very forced.  But if we take
> "but" to be a preposition meaning "except", as in "None but the brave
> deserve the fair", then it would call for "him" instead of "he" following,
> which would lead to the apparent howler "him had fled", which is probably
> why Hemans avoided it.  (*Whew*)
If you consider "but" here to be a preposition, then "all" is the subject
of "had," so "all but him had fled" would be no more a howler than
"one of the hats is missing" (vs. the incorrect "one of the hats are
missing.")

--Ph. D.

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