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En réponse à Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@hidden.email>: > > I have to look at this one. I'm thinking that it could indeed come from > ESSERE, > but the appearance of the T is not a normal development. Maybe one of > the > infinitive contaminated the other as they became synonymous and finally > > collapsed into a single declension... I have a book about Old French at > home. > When I'm there I will look at it. > OK, after looking at it I don't have much more to say. According to the book the picture is too blurred to give a secure answer. To get to |estre| (the Old French form), you have to suppose a form *ESSRE instead of *ESSERE, something not impossible but intriguing. Moreover, the participles |estant| and |esté| cannot even be surely said to come from STARE. They could very well be a creation from the new infinitive |estre|. So basically without a time machine we'll never know :)) . But indeed, STARE at that time had given the verb |ester| (which died out a little later), so a single origin from it is nearly out of the question. Christophe. http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr Take your life as a movie: do not let anybody else play the leading role.