[YG Conlang Archives] > [engelang group] > messages [Date Index] [Thread Index] >
Mike S. scripsit: > Hmm, maybe I should have said that Portuguese and ancient Greek > generally require the definite article with *names*? Names of places are just as much names as names of persons. > Would it be accurate to say that ancient Greek and Portuguese generally > treat names as common nouns needing the definite article, and English > treat names as proper (names/nouns) inherently definite and not needing > an article? I think the answer is no in both cases. Names are definite; that is, the hearer of a name is presupposed to know the referent. The fact that they don't all bear definite articles in certain languages is a historical accident. In English, lakes have no article (Superior, Windermere), but rivers do (the Thames, the Missisippi). The Bronx and the Gambia have articles because they are named after their rivers. A certain border region of Russia was once "the Ukraine"; the country occupying it, since it became independent, insists on "Ukraine", though neither Russian nor Ukrainian have definite articles. The formal name of the U.S. is "United States of America" without an article, though it generally named with an article in less than fully formal contexts. In French, all place names have articles except the names of islands, thus France is "la France" but Mauritius is "Maurice" (short for "l'isle Maurice"). In German, personal names without articles are neutral, whereas with articles they are endearments. I could go on .... -- John Cowan cowan@hidden.email http://ccil.org/~cowan I must confess that I have very little notion of what [s. 4 of the British Trade Marks Act, 1938] is intended to convey, and particularly the sentence of 253 words, as I make them, which constitutes sub-section 1. I doubt if the entire statute book could be successfully searched for a sentence of equal length which is of more fuliginous obscurity. --MacKinnon LJ, 1940