Re: Genitive relationships (WAS: Construct States)

Sally Caves wrote:

> And does Celtic really have an -ing that corresponds
> to OE -and? Yr wyf i yn tynnu y trol, "I pull/am pulling the cart."
> W. uses the verb noun in such constructions, not a present
> participle.
Well, ever since the ppl and the gerund collapsed in ME, it's hard
to tell which we are dealing with at any time.

>  "I am in pulling (gerund)."  Are you (or Tolkien)
> in suggesting that the E. use of  "am pulling" is in deriving  from
> the Welsh?      Cebodel.
Apparently I erred in attributing this particular idea to JRRT;
I must have run across it somewhere else.

Here's most of my September 1997 posting containing excerpts
from _English and Welsh_ on the subject of the two present-tense
forms of the copula:

Message-ID:  <34281709.79EC@...>
Date:         Tue, 23 Sep 1997 15:22:49 -0400
Subject:      USAGE: The language of Heaven

# As an example of a curious parallelism I will mention
# a peculiar beature of the Old English substantive verb,
# the modern 'be'.  This had two distinct forms of the
# 'present':  A, used only of the actual present, and
# B, used only as a future or consuetudinal.  The B
# functions were expressed by forms beginning with b-,
# which did not appear in the true present: thus,
# b=EDo, bist, bi=F0; pl. b=EDo=F0.  The meaning of bi=F0 was
# 'is (naturally, always, or habitually)' or 'will be'.

# Now this system is peculiar to Old English.  It is not
# found in any other Germanic language, not even in
# those most closely related to English.  The association
# with the b-forms of two different functions that have
# no necessary logical connexion is also notable.  But
# I mention this feature of Old English morphology
# here only because the same distinction of functions is
# associated with similar phonetic forms in Welsh.

# In Welsh one finds a true present without b-forms,
# and a tense with a b-stem used both as a future and a
# consuetudinal [Note 21].  The 3sg. of the latter
# tense is bydd from earlier *bi=F0 [Note 22].  The resemblance
# between this and the OE form is perhaps made more
# remarkable if we observe that the short vowel of OE
# is difficult to explain and cannot be a regular
# development from earlier Germanic, whereas in Welsh
# it is regularly derived.

# This similarity may be dismissed as accidental.  The
# peculiarity of OE may be held to depend simply on
# preservation in the English dialect of a feature
# later lost in others; the anomalous short vowel
# of bist and bi=F0 may be explained as analogical
# [Note 23].   The OE verb is in any case peculiar
# in other ways not paralleled by Welsh (the 2sg.
# of the true present, ear=F0, later eart, is not
# found outside English).  It will still remain
# notable, none the less, that this preservation
# occurred in Britain and in a point in which the
# usage of the native language agreed.  It will
# be a morphological parallel to the phonetic
# agreement, seen above [p. 178].

# But this is not the full story.  The Northumbrian
# dialect of Old English uses as the plural of
# tense B the form bi=F0un, bio=F0un.  Now this
# must be an innovation developed on British soil.
# Its invention was strictly unnecessary (since the
# older plural remained sufficiently distinct from
# the singular), and its method of formation was,
# from the point of view of English morphology, wholly
# anomalous [Note 24].  Its similarity (especially
# in apparent relation to the 3sg.) to Welsh
# byddant is obvious.  (The still closer Welsh 1pl.
# byddwn would not have had, probably, this
# inflexion in Old Welsh.)
(pp. 186-87)

# Note 21: The association of these two dissimilar
# functions is again notable.  Old Irish uses
# b-forms in these two functions, but distinguishes
# between future and consuetudinal in inflexion.
# The Welsh tense (byddaf &c.) as a whole blends
# the two functions, though the older language
# had also a form of the 3sg bid (bit) limited
# to consuetudinal use.  The difference of functions
# is not yet fully realized by Anglo-Saxon scholars.
# The older dictionaries and grammars ignore it,
# and even in recent grammars it is not clearly
# stated; the consuetudinal is usually overlooked,
# though traces of it survive in English as late
# as the language of Chaucer (in beth as consuetudinal
# sg. and pl.)

# Note 22: The Irish, Welsh, and English forms relate
# to older b=ED, bij (cf. Latin f=EDs, fit, &c.). The
# development from bij to bi=F0 in Welsh is due to
# a consonantal strengthening of j which began far
# back in British.  When ij reached the stage i=F0 is
# not known, but a date about A.D. 500 seems probable.

# Note 23: The influence of the short i in the forms
# of the true present might be held responsible.
# In a pre-English stage these would have been im,
# is, ist (is).

# Note 24:  The addition of a plural ending (normally
# belonging to the past tense) to an *inflected* form
# of the 3sg.  In this way bi=F0un differs from the
# extended form sindum made from the old pl. sind.
# The latter was already pl. and its ending -nd could
# not be recognized as an inflexion, whereas the
# -i=F0 of bi=F0 was the normal ending of the 3sg.
(pp. 196-97)

# Excerpt from p. 178: [English] has
# preserved [...] the Germanic consonants =FE and
# w.  No other Germanic language preserves them
# both, and =FE is in fact otherwise preserved
# only in Icelandic.  It may at least be noted
# that Welsh also makes abundant use of these two
# sounds.

Finally, a small reward, from the same essay, for
those who have plowed through all that technical
jargon:

# M=E1lin eru h=F6fu=F0einkenni =FEj=F3=F0anna --- 'Languages are
# the chief distinguishing marks of peoples.  No people
# in fact comes into being until it speaks a language
# of its own; let the languages perish and the peoples
# perish too, or become different peoples.  But that
# never happens except as the result of oppression and
# distress.'

# These are the words of a little-known Icelander of
# the early nineteenth century, Sj=E9ra T=F3mas S=E6mundsson.
# He had, of course, primarily in mind the part played
# by the cultivated Icelandic language in spite of
# poverty, lack of power, and insignificant numbers,
# in keeping the Icelanders in being in desperate times.
# But the words might as well apply to the Welsh of Wales,
# who have also loved and cultivated their language for
# its own sake (not as an aspirant for the ruinous honor
# of becoming the lingua franca of the world), and who by it
# and with it maintain their identity.
(p. 166)

-- =

John Cowan      http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowan@ccil.org
        You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
        You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
                Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)