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Gothic Lesson 2 Lesson 2 1. NOUN INFLECTION AND STRONG DECLENSION Nouns in Gothic are inflected for case, number, and grammatical gender. There are three grammatical genders: masculine, feminine, neuter. For nouns with clear sexual gender, the grammatical gender generally agrees with the sexual gender. For example, qēns “woman” is feminine, so that natural gender and grammatical gender agree; but graba “ditch” is also feminine, though the referent has no natural gender. There are two numbers: singular and plural (though personal pronouns and verbs also have a dual number). There are four cases: nominative (N), accusative (A), genitive (G), dative (D). Case inflection is essentially a means of marking by suffixes grammatical functions which would otherwise be signalled by prepositions in Modern English. The most obvious remnant of the older case system in English is 's (apostrophe-s), which at the end of a noun fills the same role as the preposition of before a noun. For example, the bark of a dog is the same as a dog's bark. Like the other Germanic languages, Gothic has strong and weak nominal declensions. These are terms originally applied by J. Grimm to distinguish two types of declension within Germanic languages. 1.1 A-STEMS The a-stem nouns historically derive from o-stem nouns, respectively, and some grammars use the historical terminology. These nouns are generally masculine or neuter. Among a-stem masculine nouns are: dags “da” and hláifs “loaf, bread”. Their declension is as follows: Masculine a-Stem Stem daga- N Sg. dags A, V dag G dagis D daga 1 N Pl. dagōs A dagans G dagē D dagam When the nominative singular ends in -s, the -s is lost for the vocative, and so the vocative and accusative fall together. In the plural, nominative and vocative are the same. Final -s drops when it immediately follows the combination (short vowel) + (consonantal r). For example one finds nominative singular waír + s > waír “man”, baúr + s > baúr “son”, both nouns following the declension of dags. The Nominative is used as the subject of the sentence. The forms of the masculine article (which is also a demonstrative pronoun) are Nominative Singular sa Nominative Plural thai the Accusative Singular is thana the Accusative Plural is thans Here are some more a-stem masculine nouns: fisks: fish fugls: bird gaits: goat (note that Gothic ai frequently = English o or oa) hunds: dog (cf. “hound”, “Hund”) skalks: servant thiudans: king (cf. Old English “theoden”) wulfs: wolf 2. STRONG VERB CONJUGATION Verbs in Gothic, as in the other Germanic languages, fall into two categories: strong and weak. These terms have no relation to the same names applied to nouns and adjectives. 2 There are two tenses in Gothic, present and preterite. As with other Indo-European languages exhibiting this type of two-tense system, the distinction between preterite and present is the distinction between past and non-past, since the present forms are used for both present and future. This is similar to Modern English “I am going on vacation next week”, where the present tense has future meaning, equivalent to “will go”. Likewise, the preterite forms subsume the roles of several different tenses in Modern English, such as the simple past “did”, perfect “has done”, and pluperfect “had done”. There are three moods: indicative, subjunctive, imperative. There are also two voices in Gothic: active and (medio)passive. 2.1. STRONG VERB CLASSES As in English, ablaut, or vowel gradation, characterizes the strong verbs of Gothic. This system employs vowel alternation within a root to signify change in meaning or function. Take, for example, the English forms: sing-sang-sung-song. Within the base s-ng, an i gives present forms, a - past forms, u - the past participle, and o – a derived noun. Other verbs may follow the same ablaut pattern in full or in part, e.g. ring-rang-rung. Still other verbs follow an entirely different ablaut pattern, e.g. hold-held-held. There are seven classes of strong verbs. Six of these are characterized solely by ablaut. The seventh is characterized by reduplication, or by reduplication coupled with ablaut. The Gothic has four principle stems from which all forms of a given verb may be derived: 1st Principal Stem, from which all forms of the present are derived; 2nd Principal Stem, from which the finite forms of the preterite singular are derived; 3rd Principal Stem, from which all non-singular finite forms of the preterite are derived; 4th Principal Stem, from which the preterite participle is derived. The forms chosen as principal stems are, respectively, (1) the infinitive, (2) the first (or third) person singular preterite, (3) the first person plural preterite, (4) the nominative singular masculine preterite participle. 3 2.2 PRESENT STEM We start with the Present Stem: The infinitive ending of the strong verb is -an The third person singular ending of the strong Present Indicative is -ith The third person plural ending of the strong Present Indicative is -and Here are a few strong verbs: Class I: Present stem contains -ei beitan: bite dreiban: drive (remember b = v) speiwan: spit (cf. “spew”) greipan: seize (cf. grip, archaic English “gripe”) skeinan: shine (sk = English sh) Class II: Present stem contains -iu biugan: bend (cf. the related “bow”) kiusan: test (cf. “choose”) liugan: lie siukan: be sick sliupan: slip Class III: Present stem contains -in-, -il-, -air bindan: bind brinnan: burn hilpan: help drigkan: drink finthan: find (note: -nth- < -nd- in English) siggwan: sing sigqan: sink spinnan: spin thriskan: thresh (again sk = sh) 4 wairpan: throw (ai = short e) windan: wind Class IV: Present stem contains -i-, -ai bairan: bear, carry (ai = short e) brikan: break niman: take qiman: come stilan: steal trudan: tread Class V: Present stem contains -i-, -ai- (this Class only differs from IV in the past participle) diwan: die giban: give (b = v) itan: eat ligan: lie down (note this is distinct from liugan “tell a lie”) mitan: measure (cf. “mete”) qithan: say (cf. “quoth”) sitan: sit saihwan: see (ai = short e) Class VI: Present stem contains -a faran: go (cf. “fare”) skaban: shave (sk = sh, b = v) standan: stand swaran: swear wakan: wake Class VII: Various falthan: fold (lth > English ld; cf. nth > nd in finthan) gaggan: go (cf. Scots “gang”, meaning go, walk) hahan: hang 5 haldan: hold letan: let saian: sow slepan: sleep tekan: touch PRACTICAL ASSIGNMENT Exercise 1: Read and Translate the Following Sentences into English: 1. Sa hunds ni beitith. 2. Thai wulfos beitand. 3. Sa thiudans saihwith. 4. Sa skalks ni slepith. 5. Thai fiskos ni itand. 6. Thai fuglos siggwand. 7. Sa fugls jah sa gaits ni spinnand. The word for “not” is ni. The word for “and” is jah. Noun phrases joined by jah take a plural verb. Exercise 2: Translate the Following Sentences into Gothic: 1. The bird drinks. 2. The king dies. 3. The servants do not lie. 4. The wolves eat. 5. The fish does not bite. 6. The dogs do not seize. 7. The king and the servant drink. Now let’s try to say something like “the dogs bite the wolf” and have more than one kind of thing involved. To do that, we need the Accusative case, to mark the direct object of the verb. 6 Here are some more masculine a-stems that can be used as direct objects: aiths: oath (ai = oa) asts: twig bagms: tree (cf. German Baum, English “beam” (of wood)) laufs: leaf (Gothic au frequently = English ea) maithms: gift stains: stone (ai=o) winds: wind Exercise 3: Read and Translate the Following Sentences into English: 1. Thai hundos beitand thana wulf. 2. Sa wulfs itith thans gaitans. 3. Sa thiudans gibith maithm. 4. Thai skalkos brikand thans stainans. 5. Thai fuglos ni saihwand thana wind. 6. Sa skalks ni swarith aithans. 7. Sa thiudans jah sa skalks itand thans fiskans. Exercise 4: Translate the Following Sentences into Gothic: 1. The servant carries the goat. 2. The birds break the branches. 3. The king swears an oath. 4. The wolves do not see birds. 5. The goat eats leaves. 6. Birds, wolves, and goats do not spin. 7. The servants give gifts. 7