Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2021 September 30

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September 30

Old(er) French phrase

S'il vous plaît, can someone translate this bit of French - from, I think, the Vulgate Cycle - into English for me? Neither Google nor my remnants of high school French are being much help: "n'a an soi nule vertu de Nostre Seignor qui en estant le tiegne". Something about Godly virtue and ringworms?? Wikignome Wintergreen^talk 15:22, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

As far as I can figure out, "n'a an soi nule vertu" means "he hasn't got any virtue in him" (in modernized French orthography: "[il] n'a en soi nulle vertu"); "en estant" seems to mean "standing" or "being" (cf. here, and "tiegne" must be a subjunctive form of "tenir" ('hold'), so my conjecture is it means something like "He hasn't got any virtue in him to keep him upright". Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:39, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

I think it just means "He has none of the virtues of the Lord in himself that you have". I'm wondering if "le tiegne" is actually just modern "le tien" and not a form of "tenir". More literally it's "he has none of the virtues of the Lord in himself, the likes of which are yours". Kind of clunky but that's often how old/middle French is. Adam Bishop (talk) 18:30, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Can't really follow this reading, I'm afraid. What would the syntactic structure be? "en estant" can't be a finite verb; the only possible verb in the "qui" clause is "tiegne" (the spelling of which exactly matches the form we have for the subjunctive of "tenir" in the Wiktionary entry). Also, why would "le" be masculine if "le tiegne" was really "le tien", referring to "yours" (i.e. "your virtue"), when "vertu" is feminine? My reading, where "tiegne" is the verb, "le" is an object referring back to the (omitted) subject of the first clause, and "en estant" is some form of adverbial, is syntactically straightforward; nothing "clunky" about it at all. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:37, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

The omitted subject (presumably omitted in the quote and not in the original source, probably La Mort le Roi Artu) is Lionel, and "en estant" is the gerund (gérondif) of the verb "estre" (see the conjugation table at Wiktionary). As in modern French, it functions as an adverbial, here of a mode (standing) in which Lionel's lack of virtue cannot hold him. The Old French equivalent of "tien" could be spelled in several ways in the early 13th century, but "tiegne" is not one of them. - — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lambiam (talk • contribs) 22:58, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Yup, it's Lionel. Here's the whole passage from the essay ("The English prose Morte", by C. S. Lewis) for context: "In C XVI. 13 (W 968.11) Lionel is condemned by the French author because n'a an soi nule vertu de Nostre Seignor qui en estant le tiegne; by Malory, because 'he is a murderer and doth contrary to the order of knighthood.'" Obviously the English and French versions are quite different, which is the point being made and the issue under discussion at this point in the essay. Wikignome Wintergreen^talk 23:43, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, that makes sense. I suppose I was trying to make it weirder than it really is! Adam Bishop (talk) 12:04, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

Also, I found this in wikisource [[1]], under IV, 4th line...which would point to "tenir". Lectonar (talk) 18:43, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

As of yet

This "expression" seems to be gaining a foothold. I just saw it in Generative grammar, of all places.

To me, it seems like a merging of "as of now" (+ a negative statement), with "not yet" (+ a positive statement).

Example: I could say "As of now I've seen no evidence of this", or I could say "I have not yet seen evidence of this".

"As of" is usually followed by a specific point in time: 1954, last month, yesterday, now, etc. "Yet" can sort of stand for "at this time", not just "this time", so I don't see how it can validly be connected to "as of".

Please tell me "as of yet" is frowned upon by those on high. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:17, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Who are "those on high", and why should anyone care? The earliest example in COHA is from 1939. -- Hoary (talk) 22:52, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

We need some frowning upon it on high to avoid a disturbance of the delicate balance with those frowning upon it with their straggly brows down under.  --Lambiam 23:07, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

[EditConflict] Likely influenced by the term "as yet", which is certainly in my BrE idiolect. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.193.131.207 (talk) 23:16, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

"Yet" means or meant "till now", so "as of yet" means "as of till now". Right.[2] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:21, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

Here is a source meeting your heartfelt request: [3], and a more forgiving one: [4]. (COHA may have missed a 1923 source.)  --Lambiam 23:13, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

Careful, the revenge of the Yeti you court. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:07, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

ngram shows that “as of now” only predates “as of yet” by a decade or so [5] and both are far less common, and much younger, than “as yet” [6]. 70.67.193.176 (talk) 18:25, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

Regarding the closely related "as of now" I found this:

As of now is a barbarism which only a love of illiteracy for its own sake can explain. What is generally meant is at present.

From a 1968 diatribe with the wonderful title, You Americans are Murdering the Language, by Henry Strauss, 1st Baron Conesford and quoted in Garner's Modern English Usage (p. 75). Unfortunately, the same work's comments on "as yet" and "as of yet" are not revealed by Google. Alansplodge (talk) 18:28, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

The fickle Google Books has apparently changed its mind and has now revealed:

as yet, as of yet. These are both invariably inferior to yet alone, still, thus far or some other equivalent... As of yet is a vulgarism. (pp. 80-81).

Alansplodge (talk) 18:51, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

"You Americans are murdering the language" appears to have been in the Saturday Evening Post, 13 July 1957, pp 302-32. DuncanHill (talk) 23:46, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

I have asked at WP:RX for the article. DuncanHill (talk) 23:54, 2 October 2021 (UTC)

Written by Prof. Enry Iggins? :) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:51, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

Conesford doesn't mention "yet". The article is excellent, and Conesford is not as anti-Americanism as some might assume from the headline. I'll quote fully the paragraph about "as of".

Let me now turn yo the strange American delusion that the words "as of" can always be used before a date as if they were a temporal preposition. Of course, you can have a letter "of" a certain date, Further, if the letter was not, in fact, written on that date, but you wish it to be treated as if it had been, you can describe the letter as "as of" that date. The expression is, however, now often used where there is no letter or other noun for the words to qualify. That practice is wholly illiterate. An additional illiteracy is introduced when the words "as of' precede not a date, but the adverb "now." "As of now" is a barbarism which only a love of illiteracy for its own sake can explain. What is generally meant is "at present."

As for Garner, Garner's Modern American Usage (2nd edition, 2003) says "As yet; as of yet. These are both invariably inferior to yet alone, still, thus far, or some other equivalent. ... As of yet is a vulgarism". DuncanHill (talk) 19:34, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

Aha! So those on high have indeed frowned. Thank you, Duncan. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 22:19, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

Resolved