Ænglisc / Old English - Lesson XVIII - Pronouns V ('The / That' )

[HistoryCulture]

[I TAKE NO PERSONAL CREDIT FOR THESE LESSONS]

Ƿesaþ ġē hāl!

If you missed the previous lesson (Interrogative Pronouns) click here -

Today, we go over the demonstrative pronoun of 'the/that'

'The / That'
(for both Sing. and Plural).

Nom.

se (M)

þæt (N)

seo (F)

þa (Plural - All Genders)

Acc.

þone (M)

þæt (N)

þa (F)

þa (Plural - All Genders)

Gen.

þæs (M)

þæs (N)

þære (F)

þara or þæra (Plural - All Genders)

Dat.

þæm or þam (M)

þæm or þam (N)

þa (F)

þæm or þam (Plural - All Genders)

Instrum.

þy or þe or þon (M)

þy or þe or þon (N)

þære (F)

þæm or þam (Plural - All Genders)

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P.S - (M) =Masculine, (F) =Feminine, (N) =Neuter ---->(All these refer to the singular versions, as there are no gender differences in plurals)

[81cheney]

I'm glad that English doesn't have genders anymore. It's not nearly as much of a hassle. Yet again, Spanish and other Romance languages would be easier to learn if it did. Thanks for another amazing lesson!

[HistoryCulture]

Thanks! However, I personally prefer the genders, and I also like German genders :)

[81cheney]

Isn't it hard to decipher German genders? I haven't done it, but this is what I've read from people who have. Latin gender is really easy. -Us is masculine, -um is neutral, and -a is feminine most of the time. Like every language, there's exceptions.

[HistoryCulture]

I don't know. Ich liebe Deutsch, aber keine ich spreche es.

[Eard_Stapa]

*Ich liebe Deutsch, aber ich kann es nicht sprechen.

Also: German genders are indeed a bit difficult when you start out. There are a few patterns in word endings or prefixes that tend to be one gender or another and also there are categories of objects that tend to be one gender or another. But there are also so many exceptions to each rule that it's easier just to learn the article with the noun so you learn the gender at the same time. Learning the patterns is only marginally helpful in guessing the gender of a word for which you don't know or can't remember the gender, but honestly I haven't found this to be a roadblock in speaking or writing with some amount of fluency.

[Osnakezz]

English strictly spoken still has remnants of grammatical genders that have their effect, like in '' She's a nice ship, isn't she? '', though.

[Ember7081]

This is impressive. I’ve studied Old English for a while but I’ve always had a difficult time with “The”, swa Ic þancie þe ond Ic hopa þæt ge hæbbe ān gōdne dæg. ^^