Re: Theory about the evolution of languages
| From: | B. Garcia <madyaas@...> |
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| Date: | Wednesday, August 18, 2004, 10:46 |
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On Wed, 18 Aug 2004 10:57:09 +0100, Chris Bates
<chris.maths_student@...> wrote:
> it. All romance languages to my knowledge have lost some tenses/aspects
> in the subjunctive, French and Italian have lost the preterite or simple
> past for an compound past which is simpler to form (since the only
> irregularity you need to remember is the form of the past participle...
> there are not irregular forms for each person). No romance language I
> speak still has a simple pluperfect anymore, etc.
Spanish has lost the future subjunctive, and the future perfect
subjunctive, which seem to have gone out of use around the 18th
century in normal speech, being restricted to legal contexts (and even
then in highly restricted legal registers), and certain set phrases
(like "sea lo que fuere").
The future subjunctive really had no exclusive use that the present
subjunctive or the future tense couldn't express. Even certain set
phrases it's disappearing, being replaced by the present subjunctive.
Barry
--
Something gets lost when you translate,
It's hard to keep straight, perspective is everything
- Invisible ink - Aimee Mann -