Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2012 December 2

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December 2

dual articles

Are there any languages that ever use or used dual definite articles or dual indefinite articles? Just curious. --66.190.69.246 (talk) 06:31, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

IBy dual do you mean two redundant words with exactly the same syntactic, pragmatic, and semantic lexical roles? If so, nothing is jumping immediately to mind, but if they do exist, I expect you'd find them in young creoles where both contributing languages might supply an article. Of course, there are plenty of languages with multiple articles which vary subtly in function. Snow (talk) 08:39, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Clarification: by dual I mean grammatic number. Portuguese, for example, has two definite articles for singular nouns (o, a), and two definite articles for plural nouns (os, as), but as far as I know, no articles for dual nouns. --66.190.69.246 (talk) 08:59, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm no linguist, but to my untutored mind, there are some contexts when "both" in English (and equivalents like "ambos"/"ambas" in other languages although not French) can serve very roughly the same function as might a singular or plural article, as in "he is both hunter and hunted" or "a human being is both man and beast". Some formalists would argue that there is "the" understood in the first sentence ("he is both the hunter and the hunted") and "a" understood in the second ("a human being is both a man and a beast"), while descriptivists might argue that mentally adding such an "understood" article is driving out a subtle but significant nuance — why else would someone write or speak it his or her own way rather than with the grammarian's paraphrase? When only one noun is used representing exactly two things, "the" or "of the" is really unnecessary, as in "Both [the] children speak French" or "he opposes both [of the] parties equally". And what about "No man can serve both masters" (paraphrasing Matthew 6:24) or "Both husband and wife" or "I look at life from both sides, now" (Joni Mitchell) ? [Cf. Acts 8:12 "they were baptized, both men and women." and Acts 2:36 "God hath made the same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ." (King James/Authorised Version of 1611) ] —— Shakescene (talk) 10:19, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

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66.190.69.246 -- In ancient Greek, the word ὁ ἡ το had distinctive dual forms -- nominative/accusative τω and genitive/dative τοιιν -- but I'm not sure how often these forms were actually used as definite articles. In Epic Greek, ὁ ἡ το was more of a weak demonstrative (kind of like modern French "ce") than a true article, while in Classical Greek the dual was on its way out... AnonMoos (talk) 10:43, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

You can see the Greek articles declined here: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ὁ#Inflection, you have to "show" the collapsed chart. μηδείς (talk) 16:57, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I guess τοῖν is the classical Greek form corresponding to Epic Greek τοῖιν (I was looking in a book on Homeric Greek for the forms); however, the dual seems to have been used a lot less in Classical Greek than it was in Epic... AnonMoos (talk) 17:35, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Some outlier Polynesian languages such as Mele-Fila (FIL) and Futuna Aniwa (WFU) appear to have or have had dual and trial articles:

"Both have a singular definite article te ˜ ta ˜ ti contrasting with a dual article (FIL ru, WFU ru ˜ ruh), a trial article (FIL o, WFU taka ˜ tah), and a plural article (FIL a, WFU a ˜ a-ŋa ˜ ŋa). A few other PN languages show a three-way contrast between singular, dual and plural articles, with cognate forms (e.g., REN, NUK, MAE) but no other known PN language has a trial article."

"'The Relationships of Polynesian Outlier Languages 1", Andrew Pawley, The Journal of the Polynesian Society, Volume 76 1967, p 257 - 296. ---Sluzzelin talk 17:21, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Dual (grammatical number)#Languages with dual number gives a good starting point -- you could click these languages one by one to see if their usage of the dual extends to their articles. Duoduoduo (talk) 18:05, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

the meaning of "iactati aequore toto...

Please teach me the meaning of "iactati aequore toto...reliquiae Danaum atque immitis Achilli..." in the following passage. Perhaps they are Latin, I think.

"Eliot," he continued, "who can be unaware of the tragic events of recent days? As, after Troy fell, countless innocent inhabitants were iactati aequore toto...reliquiae Danaum atque immitis Achilli..."---Erich Segal, The Class, p.113.123.227.223.236 (talk) 10:59, 2 December 2012 (UTC)Nobuhiko

It is Latin - it's a quote from Virgil's epic poem the Aeneid. It means something like "thrown over the entire ocean... the remnants of the Danaans (the Greeks who fought at Troy) and the pitiless Achilles". --Nicknack009 (talk) 11:20, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

In case the OP cares, the specific reference is to lines 29–30 of the first book of the Aeneid. Deor (talk) 11:37, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Castilian and Latin

Could someone help me translate this? It is in Spanish/Castilian and Latin.

H. R. SANCIA REGINA TOTIUS HISPANIAE, MAGNI REGIS FERDINANDI UXOR. FILIA REGIS ADEFONSI, QUI POPULAVIT LEGIONEM POS DESTRUCTIONEM ALMANZOR. OBIIT ERA MCVIII. III N. M.

Que traducido al castellano viene a decir:

Aquí yace Sancha, reina de toda Hispania, esposa del gran rey Fernando e hija del rey Alfonso, que pobló León después de la destrucción de Almanzor. Falleció el día 3 de noviembre de la era mil ciento ocho años.

--The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 17:09, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Here lies Sancha, Queen of All Spain, wife of the great king Ferdinand and daughter of king Alfonso, who populated Leon after the destruction of Almanzor. Died 3 November 1108. ---Ehrenkater (talk) 17:13, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

That year at the end should be 1108, I think. (Sorry, Ehrenkater was apparently emending 1908 to 1108 in his post at the same time I was posting this.) Of course, that still doesn't match the actual year of death of Sancha of León, as given in our article. Deor (talk) 17:25, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

It's probably using the Spanish era, in which case it matches...well, a bit better, if not exactly. Adam Bishop (talk) 17:51, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks.––The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 18:51, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Note also that the transcription of the funerary inscription here (p. 150) and here (p. 154) both give the date as MCVIIII (1109), not MCVIII. For what it's worth. Deor (talk) 20:47, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Can someone help translate this paragraph?

Durante el estudio llevado a cabo en 1997 de las tumbas del Panteón de Reyes de San Isidoro de León se constató que el cadáver de la infanta se hallaba incorrupto, característica que comparte con el del infante Fernando, hijo de Fernando II de León, que también yace sepultado allí.15 Introducida en el cojín donde reposaba la cabeza de la infanta Sancha se halló una carta, fechada el día 22 de diciembre de 1868, en la que se manifiesta: "En el año 1868, reinando doña Isabel II, se hallaba el Panteón de los reyes en un estado de completo abandono, y el cadáver de la reina doña Sancha, perfectamente conservado en estado de momia, se encontraba en completa desnudez. El Panteón fue restaurado por el celo del Gobernador de esta provincia, D. Manuel Rodríguez Monje y por su hija Doña Carmen se vistió dicho cadáver con ropa de tisú de la reina doña Isabel II, regalo para este efecto."16

––The Emperor's New Spy (talk) 18:51, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Well I don't really know Spanish, but: "During the study carried out in 1997 on the tombs of the Pantheon of the Kings in San Isidoro in Leon, it was found that the body of the Infanta lay incorrupted, as did that of the Infante Fernando, son of Fernando II of Leon, who is also buried there. Placed in the cushion where the head of the Infanta Sanch was laying was a letter, written December 22 1868, which said: "In the year 1868, during the reign of Dona Isabel II, the Pantheon of the Kings lay in a completely abandoned state, and the body of the queen Dona Sancha, perfectly preserved in a mummy state, was found to be completely nude. The Pantheon was restored by the zeal of the governor of this province, D. Manuel Rodríguez Monje, and his daughter Dona Carmen dressed the body of the queen Dona Isabel II in linen, a gift for this occasion." (I'm not too sure about the last sentence...Spanish's similarity with French and Latin only goes so far!) Adam Bishop (talk) 22:14, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Adam's translation is largely fine, but I would say: "During the study of the tombs of the Pantheon of the Kings in San Isidoro in Leon, completed in 1997, it was determined that the body of the Infanta lay incorrupted, as did that of the Infante Fernando, son of Fernando II of Leon, who also lies buried there. Placed on the cushion where the head of the Infanta Sancha lay was found a letter, dated December 22, 1868, which explained: "In the year 1868, during the reign of Doña Isabel II, the Pantheon of the Kings was found in a completely abandoned state, and the body of the queen Doña Sancha, perfectly preserved in a state of mummification, was found completely nude. The Pantheon was restored by the effort of the governor of this province, D. Manuel Rodríguez Monje, and the body of the queen Doña Isabel II was dressed in linen donated for this purpose by his daughter Doña Carmen." μηδείς (talk) 22:36, 2 December 2012 (UTC)