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Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2023 June 18

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June 18

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Questions

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  1. Is there any Germanic language where soft C is not /s/?
  2. Are there any words in Spanish with letter combinations ⟨qua⟩ and ⟨quo⟩?
  3. Are there any verbs in German where present and imperfect forms are identical, like English put?
  4. In English, one says "To drink" is a verb. Does German say "Zu trinken" ist ein Verb or "Trinken" ist ein Verb? --40bus (talk) 15:23, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
ad 4. The latter. How do you come up with all these questions?... --Wrongfilter (talk) 15:32, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Does English ever say "Drink" is a verb?--40bus (talk) 16:19, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes.--User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 17:04, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
40bus -- With respect to no. 1, I thought you would know that in German it's [ts]. Most of those words have been respelled with "z" by now, but my paperback dictionary still lists "Celsius" and "circa"... AnonMoos (talk) 15:45, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Wiktionary also lists Celsius and circa as pronounced with /t͡s/. Other examples are Cello and Cicerone, but for these the pronunciation may stem from mimicking the original Italian.  --Lambiam 19:43, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Although the Italian pronunciation is /t͡ʃ/, rather. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 22:58, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
And so is the German. 46.31.102.126 (talk) 06:00, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
2. Wiktionary lists a few borrowed words from English, including quad and quark but no current words beginning with quo-. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 17:06, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
also borrowings from Latin such as "sine qua non". Xuxl (talk) 17:13, 18 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
See also quid pro quo. Presumably, this Latin phrase can be used in Spanish. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 07:35, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
3. No, there aren't. Weak verbs and preterite-present verbs always have -(e)te added in the past tense, and strong verbs always have ablaut. There are no irregular verbs where the past is identical to the present either. —Mahāgaja · talk 14:22, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Are there any verbs in other Germanic languages where present is identical to imperfect? --40bus (talk) 17:23, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Not being an expert on the matter, I imagine it could be the case in certain Norwegian dialects. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 19:11, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
wikt:måste 46.31.102.126 (talk) 19:50, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
40bus -- If the final schwa vowel of the verb in "ich hatte" were ever to be elided for any reason, then it would sound like the verb in "er hat". That's probably as good as it gets for German... AnonMoos (talk) 20:42, 20 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
In Dutch, weak verbs with a stem ending in t or d have, in the plural, a past tense sounding identical to the present tense: wij baden, wij baadden (we bath, we bathed). In verbs where this t or d is the only consonant in the coda of the stem and the preceding vowel is short/checked, the spelling is also the same: wij bekladden de muur (we put graffiti on the wall, both present and past tense). PiusImpavidus (talk) 09:19, 21 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The plural forms are the same; the singular ones are different. See wikt:kladden#Inflection.  --Lambiam 23:38, 21 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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