Re: THEORY: Meanings of Verbal Accidents.

Elliott Lash wrote:
[snip]

> In any event, I think this is fairly common.  In Latin
> for instance, the same set of morphemes can be either
> active or passive, depending on the verb they are
> attached to. This set of morphemes is usually called
> 'passive' or 'deponent', but the deponent is really
> just an active use:
>
>   deponent                   passive
>  mori-or 'I die'       ~   am-or  'I am loved'
Umm - I fail to see how "I die, I am dying" can possibly be considered
_active_! Surely, if anything is passive, dying is.

(I discount suicides from this - but they are a tiny minority, and then
the reflexive 'I am killing myself' is perhaps more appropriate.)

It has always seemed to me that Latin is rather more true to reality in
giving the verb "to die" passive endings. I have yet to be convinced
that 'morior' should be classified as a deponent verb any more that
'nascor' (I am being born) should be. The babe that gets thrust into int
the world from its mother's womb s hardly the agent. At least with this
verb English uses passive forms as well as Latin; yet, strangely
anglophone Latin textbooks still list 'nascor' as a deponent - weird!

A better example would surely be to contrast:
eam sequor = I am following her   ~ ab ea amor = I am loved by her

>  Ancient Greek has the same thing, but it is less
> systematic about it.
Sorry, I completely fail to understand how Latin is more systematic than
Greek in this respect.

--
Ray
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ray@carolandray.plus.com
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
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Nid rhy hen neb i ddysgu.
There's none too old to learn.
[WELSH PROVERB]

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