Re: Probability of Article Replacement?

Quoting Tristan <kesuari@...>:

> taliesin the storyteller wrote:
>
> > All the forms (well, not all the allowable alternates, I think I'll
> > make a webpage...):
> >
> >          | masculine       | feminine       | neuter          |
> > ---------+-+---------------+----------------+-----------------+
> > singular | (en) stein      | (ei) hoppe     | (et) sverd      |
> >          | steinen         | hoppa          | sverdet         |
> >          | den steinen     | den hoppa      | det sverdet     |
> > ---------+-----------------+----------------+-----------------+
> > plural   | (flere) steiner | (flere) hopper | (flere) sverd   |
> >          | (alle) steinene | (alle) hoppene | (alle) sverdene |
> >          | de steinene     | de hoppene     | de sverdene     |
> > ---------+-----------------+----------------+-----------------+
>
>   How did this system come about? It seems really odd (the fact that
> the
> same (modified) morpheme(?) forms the indefinite article and the
> definite suffix in the singular).
I seem to recall something about adjective+noun constructions got replaced by
nominalized adjective+noun (eg "the big (one), the stone"), which was then
reanalyzed back into adjective+noun, but retaining the two instances of the
article. This'd also explain the difference 'tween the "weak" and "strong"
forms of adjectives (also seen in German, which doesn't do double articles).

Daniel Andreasson presumeably knows better.

                                                              Andreas

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