--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Christophe Grandsire
<christophe.grandsire@F...> wrote:
> >Well, if Narbonosc has it, I'm sure Kerno will
> >want one too! How does it work?
>
> Just add a dative personal pronoun to your sentence. Even if there's
> already one in, you may add it :)) (for instance, in French you can
say:
> "Je te lui est absolument rien donné !" where "lui" is the true
dative -
> since you give something *to* someone :)) - while "te" is the
ethical dative).
So "est" is the 1sg form nowadays? ;-)
I still don't quite understand what function this "te" has
in this context. The one with the child who doesn't eat
was kinda intuitive; it could be interpreted as "the child
doesn't eat anything *from* me", or that the child does
that *to me* out of sheer malice. That makes me sense. =P
But in the sentence above?
(BTW, consider the structure adopted into Jovian. Can't
stay behind if even the Kemrese have it! Id cinde mic esse
nile!)
> Most Romance conlangs still have a separate dative at least with the
> personal pronouns. The "ethical dative" is never used with anything
else
> but pronouns (or agreement marks in the case of Euskara) anyway.
So what does the "ethical" mean here?
-- Christian Thalmann