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Re: Standard Average European (was: case system)

From:Eric Christopherson <rakko@...>
Date:Sunday, April 13, 2008, 18:49
On Apr 13, 2008, at 7:29 AM, J. 'Mach' Wust wrote:
> Dative external possessors... There's also the German construction: > > dem König seine Kleider > the-DAT king his cloths > 'the king's cloths' > > The possessor takes dative, the possession – which makes the head > of this construction and > therefore takes whichever case required – has an extra possessive > adjective to refer back to > the possessor. The construction is not standard German, but > according to my linguistic prof, > it's found in dialects all over the German-speaking area, so it > seems to stem from a common > older source. > > I thought I stumbled once on some data that made me think that > English once allowed a > similar construction, but I don't remember anymore.
I read somewhere that at one time the possessive suffix <'s> was reinterpreted as being a contraction of <his>; some grammarians at that time thus commented that it was illogical to use <'s> for a female possessor, preferring something like "the queen her crown". I think they also sometimes expanded the "contraction", writing things like "the king his castle". I'm not sure how they treated inanimate possessors. In any event, that analysis of <'s> didn't last.

Replies

ROGER MILLS <rfmilly@...>
René Uittenbogaard <ruittenb@...>
Benct Philip Jonsson <bpj@...>