Re: Test and more.

Nik Taylor wrote:
>
> Fabian wrote:
> > <lil> is an odd word here, as it can mean 'to the' or 'to a'.  A flaw in
> > Maltese disambiguation not found in other particles.
>
> What's the origin of this {lil}?  I'd assume that, since Maltese is
> derived from Arabic, that in the sense "to the" it comes from a
> contraction of something with "al"?  Perhaps something like "li al" or
> "lil al"?
>
        French does that too:

a` + le -> au   a` + les -> aux
de + le -> du   de + les -> des

as well as Spanish (a + el -> al, de + el -> del) and even Italian which
does this with the prepositions a, di, in (and two others I don't
remember) and all definite articles, leading to forms like nella <- in +
la.

--
        Christophe Grandsire

        Philips Research Laboratories --  Building WB 145
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