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Re: Arabo-Romance (was Re: Arabic transliteration)

From:John Cowan <jcowan@...>
Date:Thursday, November 21, 2002, 12:12
Christophe Grandsire scripsit:

> > Some nouns are either masculine or femine, with little or no > > difference in meaning: el or la azucar, el or la mar. > > Indeed, another example. Strangely enough, they both end in -ar. Maybe it has to > do with this ending...
Well, "mar" is from a Latin 3rd declension noun, which does not wear its gender on its end, so it's not too surprising that it would become unstable. (OTOH, all the Romance languages faithfully retain the feminine gender of MANUS.) -- John Cowan jcowan@reutershealth.com www.reutershealth.com www.ccil.org/~cowan "The exception proves the rule." Dimbulbs think: "Your counterexample proves my theory." Latin students think "'Probat' means 'tests': the exception puts the rule to the proof." But legal historians know it means "Evidence for an exception is evidence of the existence of a rule in cases not excepted from."