Re: What's a gender?

Den 22. des. 2006 kl. 11.10 skrev Benct Philip Jonsson:
>
> I don't think so, as in Swedish at least _en öl_ has the
> same plural -- i.e. _öl_ with no change -- as _ett öl_.
> Moreover there is no evidence of a non-neuter parallel word
> in the old languages, and even if there were there is no big
> chance that it would come down to the modern languages in
> identical form, since _ett öl_ comes from an Old Germanic
> consonant stem _*aluþ_(borrowed into Finnish and still
> _olut_ there! :-). A parallel non-neuter would probably have
> been thematic -- masculine _**aluþaz_ or feminine
> _**aluþô_, which would have become _öll_ in Swedish, but
> as I said there is no evidence of such a form. Everything
> points to a late differentiation. My best guess is that _en
> öl_ is an ellipsis for _en bägare öl_ 'a beaker of beer'.
Yes, I also didn't think the two senses of the word had different
origins. The masculine "øl" is probably a quite recent development
from the neuter "øl", and probably from such an ellipsis as you
mention. Still I think it would be fair to classify them as different
words now, since they have different meanings.

Probably the usage of "en øl" in Norwegian is borrowed from Swedish,
because in our speech, "beger" is neuter. I cannot think of any other
likely masculine vessels either.

Anyway, may we all have many well-filled vessels to swing in the
merry days to come!

LEF