methought (was: Circumfixes?)

At 11:35 am -0400 7/6/01, John Cowan wrote:
>Douglas Koller, Latin & French wrote:
>
>> [...] the antiquated "Me thinks..."
>
>
>Note that "think" in this idiom is an impersonal verb meaning
>"it seems".  Chaucer uses "Him thought" [hIm Tuxt] to mean
>"It seemed to him that..."
>
>Similarly, Malory makes King Arthur say "Me liketh better
>the sword", i.e. the sword pleases me better.  Note the
>3rd-person agreement on both verbs.
Indeed, and in King Arthur's sentence _the sword_ is the grammatical
subject. Both _me_ and _him_ in the examples above continue old Dative
usages.

Ray.

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A mind which thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language.
                   [J.G. Hamann 1760]
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