"Azantyssy valoti annī rhaenis."

Translation:The knights are finding the men's horses.

July 22, 2017

7 Comments
This discussion is locked.


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/djzeus01

any reliable way to know whether "valoti" is genitive for "azantyssy" as opposed to "annii"? I assumed correctly that the latter made more sense, but could it be the other, as well? (i.e., The men's knights find the horses)


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/SprightBark

As far as I can see, we can only say that possessor-possessee is mostly reliable, but not 100%. This is based on:

The order of possessor-possessee is strongly preferred, however, and should only be reversed in cases of overcrowding, or for honorific transposition.

Source: https://www.duolingo.com/skill/hv/Genitive-1


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/fp8LO0pf

If I have understood everything correctly, it's because 'azantyssy' is nominative whereas 'annī' is accusative, so that it's unambiguous that 'Azantyssy' is the subject, and 'annī' is the object in this sentence. 'The men's knights find the horses' would therefore be 'Valoti azantī annī rhaenis.' or 'Azantī valoti annī rhaenis.' (Which would then be truly confusing)


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/ReinerSelb

as you said correctly, "azantyssy" is the nominative. in your sentence "the men's knights find the horses", "knights" is the subject (nominative), so it would be "valoti azantyssy annī rhaenis" (strongly preferred word order, see sprightBark's comment) or the ambiguous "azantyssy valoti annī rhaenis" (not recommended for this translation). the question was not about what's the subject of the sentence, but about whether "valoti" (gen.) refers to the subject (nom.) or the object (acc.) of the sentence.


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/ReinerSelb

there's another unclear term in this sentence. afaik "annī" might also stand for the singular - the knights find the men's horse. (horse sharing, the precursor of car sharing)


https://www.duolingo.com/profile/ehartz

"The knights find the men's horse" was accepted for me, so it seems horse sharing is acceptable. ;)

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