Re: Neuter girls (was Re: French)

At 6:17 am +0100 28/5/02, Jan van Steenbergen wrote:
> --- Andreas Johansson wrote:
>
>> Way to go, Christophe! I've always had a soft spot for Germans refering to
>> girls as "it" (_Mädchen_ "girl" being neuter 'cos of the dimunitive ending).
>
>Same thing in Dutch: all dimunitives are neuter. Don't ask me why...
>
An IE habit, I think.  Diminutives were neuter in ancient Greek and their
descendants remain neuter, e.g.
ANCIENT                     MODERN
to paidion (the child)  --> to paidi /tope'Di/

The ancient _kore:_ was feminine and still survives in the modern language,
tho pronounce /'kori/; but the common modern term for "girl" is the
_neuter_ diminutive:  kotitsi /ko'ritsi/

But, not to show sexual discrmination, the modern Greek for boy, being
originally a diminutive, is also neuter:  agori /a'Gori/

Ray.

=======================================================
Speech is _poiesis_ and human linguistic articulation
is centrally creative.
                                 GEORGE STEINER.
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