lambert@boring.UUCP (02/20/86)
In article <131@spar.UUCP> ellis@spar.UUCP (Michael Ellis) writes: > English's auxiliaries {can, will, may, shall} are indeed quite odd. > ... > I believe that, historically, these verbs were `preterite presents', > which means they were originally the past tenses of verbs whose present > tense fell into disuse. > I believe that `can' meant `learn' in its original present tense. > (`uncouth', which is related, meant `unlearned'); thus, one who has > learned to do something can do it. I have read similar explanations for > the others (which I cannot recall). This is basically confirmed by the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology (a great source of information), except for will, a cognate of Latin velle, volo. For may, the classification as preterite-present is based on its conjugation in Common Germanic (a possible meaning is "have grown strong"). The original meaning of I shall is "I have owed", "I ought", so "I am to", whence "I shall". Other cases are dare = "have been bold", and wit (as in to wit) = "have found out", still existing as an verb that can also be used as an auxilary in Dutch and German. Note, however, that the preterite- present tense in Germanic grammar is not a past tense; it is more like a perfect tense and has a stative meaning (although this does not help to explain the case of shall). Also, in Common Germanic these preterite- present verbs are less defective than in English; in particular, they have an infinitive (as wit, apparently, also had). So other Germanic languages did not invent these afterwards, whereas they did so for new past participles. For example, we have in Dutch: We hebben dat niet gekund, We have not "canned" (= been able to do) that. English somehow lost the infinitive, also for will, which does not have its origin in the same class. It is interesting, and I should think probably no coincidence, that Dutch verbs used as auxiliaries do not get the past participle in the perfect tense, but, rather curiously, the infinitive form: not *We hebben de maan niet gekund zien, but: We hebben de maan niet kunnen zien; literally: "We have not CAN (= BE able to) see the moon"; these infinitive past participles together with other infinitives can be stacked painlessly to staggering constructions: Ik had jou willen zien durven blijven staan kijken = "I had you will see dare stay stand look" = I would have liked to see you dare (to) remain looking. > I suspect that the verb `must' > (which has failed to produce even a new past tense) and, more recently, > `ought' (whose original present `owe' is still with us) have had > a similar development. The development of must to present tense is much later (by at least 1000 years) and therefore hard to compare. Must is a past tense that developed into a present; the original present form got lost only in modern English (Middle English mote with past moste). There is no preterite aspect here, however. I think the use of the past tense here is more like the subjunctive mood, signifying a weakening of the meaning because of an implied condition, as in "you should" = "if conditions were favourable, you should, so you may be excused if you won't", desirable for smooth social intercourse in which explicit imposition of will is generally impolite although the same message gets across anyway; compare also "had better". The weakness of "ought", which is the subjunctive of owe and goes back to Old English, is obvious and is illustrated by the tendency to buttress it with "really". A similar use of the past tense moest, weakening the harsh present-tense moet but with present-tense semantics, is quite common in Dutch. If I am correct, then in English the more friendly must shifted back to the harsh meaning of the original present tense. -- Lambert Meertens ...!{seismo,okstate,garfield,decvax,philabs}!lambert@mcvax.UUCP CWI (Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science), Amsterdam