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The suffix in today's Word caught my eye: [From French cinéaste, from ciné- (cinema) + -aste (as in enthousiaste: enthusiast).] Here, it appears that -aste or -ast functions the same as -ist, in some different words. Is there a rule for when one or the other is used?
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Alternative definition: cine is from Greek root meaning to move. So a South Sea kineaste would be a grass skirt in motion.
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-asm / -ast alternates with the more common -ism / -ist. The difference is whether the Greek verb had an -a- or an -i- before the infinitival ending -zein. So enthousiazein 'to be inspired or possessed by a god' (cf. theos 'god'): enthousiasmos, enthousiastes. It's interesting that cineasm doesn't seem to be a word, at least in English. The only other -asm word I know is from the horror movie title Phantasm.
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The difference is whether the Greek verb had an -a- or an -i- before the infinitival ending -zein
This would correspond to the Latin first vs. non-first conjugation rule seen in the variant -able/ible endings?
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This would correspond to the Latin first vs. non-first conjugation rule seen in the variant -able/ible endings?
Yes. They are from the thematic vowel (e/o) in the Proto-Indo-European verbal system.
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Haha! Thematic vowel (e/o)! Tell us more.
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Haha! Thematic vowel (e/o)! Tell us more.
Well, there are two kinds of verbs in IE languages: thematic and athematic, with two associated sets of personal endings. In Latin, you've got 4 conjugations: -are, -e:re, -ere, -ire. Basically, Latin simplified the system to just thematic systems using -o, -Vs, -Vt, etc. for endings. Sanskrit used the athematic endings: -mi, -si, -ti, etc. Greek uses both: some verbs end in -o: and others in -mi. For the motion verb above, there's actually two different verbs: kineo: vs kineumi. (There's also another interesting thing about these verbs, in that they show evidence of the nasal presents: a whole other thing.) Anyway, it's a lot harder than my simplistic explanation, but a good book to look at, still in print I think, is W. Lehmann's Theoretical Bases of Indo-European Linguistics. The reason I wrote the vowel as e/o, is that depending on where the accent (or tone) of a word falls, an /e/ sometimes becomes an /o/. These thematic vowels probably started out as a kind of suffix that changed the meaning of the verb.
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Theoretical Bases of Indo-European Linguistics
Customers interested in this title may also be interested in:
A La Carte Europe Tours
Well, that's Amazon for you.
I guess I know what I want for my birthday.
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>I guess I know what I want for my birthday.
here's hoping that you don't get more than one copy of A La Carte Europe Tours..
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Make that 'more than zero copies' and I'll go along with you, tsuwm.
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