On Sat, 4 Dec 1999, Sally Caves wrote:
>And even so, their prescriptions are broken all the time. Do we
>still split infinitives? Do we still say lay for lie? Do we still
>say "I don't like him going" instead of "I don't like his going"?
>We're constantly being corrected for "mistakes" that were there in
>Shakespeare's day and earlier.
I'd like to quickly add that I've never split an infinitive in my
life. And am not precisely sure _how_ one would do it. I've done the
laylie shuffle; and always use the "him going" construction over "his
going". Unless I want to point out possession of the verb: "His going
really upset me" kind of thing. "Him going really upset me" means
something entirely different.
>
>In English the plural endings and the inflections were leveled
>because of contact with other languages, notably Old Norse and Norman
>French.
>
For what it's worth, I can't find an ON word with a plural in -s at
all: nidhjar, soungvar, thakkir, etc. Of course Gordon is biased
towards Icelandic - do Old Danish or whatever have lots of plurals in
-(e)s?
>In Old English, there were a number of ways to form plurals. The
>masculine a=stem was the most common, and that's what gave us our "s"
>ending in the plural:
It is interesting to note how close the Norse and English declension
was:
>
> steinn stan stone nominative
> steins stanes stone's genitive
> steini stane stone dative
> stein stan stone accusative
>
> steinar stanas stones nominative plural
> steina stana stones' genitive plural
> steinum stanum stones dative plura.
> steina stanas stones accusative plural.
>
>Then there was neuter a stem which had no distinction between
>singular and plural in the nominative and accusative cases:
>
> ordh word hors deor fisc
> ordhs wordes horses deores fisces
> ordhi worde horse deore fisce
> ordh word hors deor fisc
>
> ordh word hors deor fisc
> ordha worda horsa deora fisca
> ordhum wordum horsum deorum fiscum
> ordh word hors deor fisce
>
>catch on); annihilate, which did. I have a whole list of these, if
>anyone is interested. Notably, it was Shakespeare who contributed
I am! I think there was also a 12th or 13th century movement along
the same lines, making English words for concepts that had French or
Latin roots: ungothroughsome for impenetrable sort of thing.
>Another "real change": the change from hem to them. Hem sounded too
>much like "him," so people in the south of England started adopting
>Northern Scandinavian "them" to distinguish the two words. This
>wasn't a change that was "foisted" on anyone. It just happened.
>Language follows usage, and follows the masses. Often the
>"privileged" masses, like the London dialect. Same with he and heo,
>he and she. The two sounded too much alike, so the northern
>Scandinavian form was adopted in the south. And in London. And
>everyone followed suit.
Hem lives on, though: Give em hell, Sally!
Padraic.