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- [Serge Rosmorduc, Sun, 15 Mar 1998 ]
- Gardiner's grammar is a monument, still an important reference
today. The first chapters are IMHO a pleasure to learn from. Yet,
on the specific subject of sDm=f and (to a lesser extend) sDm.n=f forms, his theories are superseded by those of Polotsky (and
later linguists). There have been a number of mails on the list
about that, have a look at the AEL archive.
- iw before a sDm=f form iw=f sDm=f or iw sDm=f normally is used to denote an habit, a repeated action :
- *iw ra wbn=f m pt ra nb
- Ra rises in the sky every day
- The problem with iw and Gardiner is that large parts of Gardiner's theories about
sDm=f are obsolete, and must be taken with a grain of salt. For example,
for exercise b5 you could find also :
- iw sS gr=f m hrw m grH
- - because when you have a nominal subject, the iw=f sDm=f tend to be more iw Subject sDm=f than iw sDm Subject.
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- In detail, the example in ex. a 1:- wbn ra m pt. Gardiner would translate in several different ways:-
- i. The sun rises in the sky, is very unlikely [because of the bare initial verb].
- It could mean :
- "It is in the sky that the sun rises " (an emphatic/second tense
verb form), but "the sun rises in the sky" would be rendered by
iw ra wbn=f m pt or perhaps ra wbn=f m pt, a kind of sentence which (actually) occurs.
- ii. The sun rose in the sky
- - same as above, in a way. The Egyptian tenses are relative, not
absolute. That is, wbn occurs in the same timeframe as the rest of the text [before
it]. If the text refers to the past, wbn is past.
- iii. The sun will rise in the sky
- This tense is called now "prospective sDm=f". If I'm not mistaken, it was discovered by B. Gunn, Gardiner's
assistant. It can be a future, or express a wish, or a promise.
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- iv. ... When the sun rises in the sky
- v. ... When the sun rose in the sky
- vii. ... If the sun rose in the sky
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- These values still holds today. They are "circumstantial sDm=f", usually in the second part of a sentence (if the sun... could
be, depending on the rest of the sentence, a nominal sDm=f, the one that appears in -
- viii. Let the sun rise in the sky
- ix. That the sun may (might) rise in the
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- These two are both prospective sDm=f, like the one above.
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- For the shorter sentence: ra m pt , this could be either :
- * an independant clause. In this case, the absence of iw presents the sentence as being linked with the opinion, wishes,
etc. of the speaker. It could mean, for example : the sun is in
the sky !
- * linked to another sentence, and mean, in this case : (and) the
sun is in the sky or when the sun is in the sky
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- The "normal" sentence is the one with iw, not the reverse. If a one says :
- iw s m at tn. It's a plain (adverbial) statement : There is a man in this room.
- mk s m at tn
- If it's something you can see : See, there's a man in this room.
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- To sum up : in themes, put iw in front of independant sentences, when possible.
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