Re: THEORY: irregular conlangs

Nik Taylor wrote:
>
> Sally Caves wrote:
> > No, that wasn't the point.  It wasn't my point, at least.  My point was
> > about standard modern English, in which the verb wrought isn't used
> > anymore,
> > in response to whoever it was who said that wrought has turned into a
> > new
> > verb entirely.
>
> Well, I said it, and it was probably a bad example.  Granted, it's been
> lost in today's English, but I believe it was once an active verb.
Oh, very much so!

> Perhaps a better example would be "may" and "might", originally present
> and past forms, but now completely separate verbs, same with
> "will/would", "shall/should", and, to a lesser extent, "can/could"
They had different meanings in Old English, and got "demoted" to modals,
if that's a demotion.  May, which now means "be permitted," used to mean
"can"; can used to mean "know how to," or "be acquainted with"; might
was
the past tense of may, "was able to"; will, our futuric, used to mean
"want," "desire"; shall, now a variant of "will," used to mean
"constrained
to," "obligated to," "must."  Must used to be the past tense of _motan_,
"be permitted to."   Chaucer already uses it in its present sense, but
in
the old present tense:

        So oft a daye I mot thy werk renewe,
        it to correcte and eke to rubbe and scrape...

        "So often each day I must your work renewe,
        to correct it and also to erase and scrape...

                                To his long-haired incompetent Scribe Adam.
> --
Sal
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SALLY CAVES
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http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves (bragpage)
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Niffodyr tweluenrem lis teuim an.
"The gods have retractible claws."
                                from _The Gospel of Bastet_
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