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Posts uit februari, 2018 tonen

Lesson 5

In this lesson you'll learn: - How to ask rhetorical questions - How to decline O-stem nouns - How to say which language(s) you speak and ask which language(s) someone speaks - The full declension of adjectives - The full declension of "the" Rhetorical questions If you bump up to someone, you might say: "Hey, can't you see!?", of course an answer isn't expected here. Phrases which look like questions, but without an expected answer are rhetorical questions. There is a special way to form rhetorical questions in Gothic. If it is a negation (question with not, can't etc.), -u is added to "ni", you get "niu". Example: "Can't you see?", "Niu magt saihwan?". This can also be done with the word "ja", which is changed in "jau". An example can be found in John in the Bible. John 7:48      sai, jau ainshun þize reike galaubidedi imma aiþþau Fareisaie? Literally: "Look,

Lesson 4

In this lesson you'll learn: - How to say where you live - How to fully decline the personal pronoun (me, you etc.)  - How to use the past tense of -jan verbs - How to use the singular declension of "the" and "this/that" Lesson 4   All forms of the personal pronoun Apart from I, you and he, you also have dative and accusative forms, which in English are me, you, him, her etc. What are these forms in Gothic? Let's look at them in a table, the first word given is the dative, the second one accusative. For example: me - mis / mikMis is dative, mik is accusative. Let's look at all forms now: me - mis / mik you (sing.) - þus / þuk him - imma / ina her - izai / ija you (dual) - igqis / igqis you (plural) - izwis / izwis them - im (all forms) For example,"you talk with me" would become "(þu) rodeis miþ mis", miþ takes the dative case and the dative form of "me" is "mis". How to use

Lesson 3

In this lesson you'll learn: - How to say that something is yours - The singular possessive pronoun  - The present tense of -jan verbs Lesson 3 It is necessary to use words like "my" and "your" to say that someone possesses something. These words are personal pronouns. Let's look at the declension of  the masculine singular form: my = meins your (singular) = þeins his = is her = izos our = unsar your (dual) = igqar your (plural) = izwar their (masc. or neur.) = ize their (fem.) = izo Only a few of these are declined, words like "izos" and "is" always stay the same, but "meins", "þeins", "unsar", "igqar" and "izwar" are declined like strong A-stem adjectives. The singular forms are like this, given in the order masculine / feminine / neuter: Nom. = meins / meina / mein Gen. = meinis / meinaizos / meinis Dat. = meinamma / meinai / meinamma Acc. = meinana / meina

Lesson 2

 In this lesson you'll learn: - How to ask or say what something is - The three nominatuve forms of the definite article (the) - The other forms of the masc. A-stem and the neuter A-stem   Lesson 2 The definite article The definite article (the) in Gothic is translated with the same word for "thus" and "that".  In Gothic "the" is translated with "sa" (masc.) "þata" (neut.) and "so" (fem.). These are the forms for the singular form, so "sa" can be used for "the king", but not for "the kings". "the" however is only translated if a word was used before. So for example: "The king is with a soldier, the king is on the road." "Þiudans ist miþ gadrauhta, sa þiudans ist ana wiga." How to ask or say what something is It is very important to be able to say what something is, or to ask what something is. For this we need to know the word for "what&q

Lesson 1

In this lesson you'll learn: - How to start a conversation - The present tense of the verb "to be" and personal pronouns - A few important words  Lesson 1 The verb "to be" (wisan) Just like Spanish, Gothic uses personal pronouns (I, you, he etc.) which are often left out. Personal pronouns in Gothic are used for emphasis and for clarification. An example is: " Who did it? He! " The personal pronouns in Gothic look a bit like a mix of Dutch, German and English, let's take a look: I = ik You (sing) =  þu He = is She = si It = ita We (dual) = wit We = weis You (dual) = jut You (plural) = jus They (masc.) = eis They (fem.) = ijos They (neut.) = ija The dual is used to express that two persons are involved, so "wit" = we two, "jut" = you two. You use they (neuter) for mixed groups of both men and women. One of the most important verbs to know is "to be", while we look at this verb we'll re

Introduction

  Learn Gothic - Introduction Have you ever wondered, if you'd travel back in time with a time machine to the time when Rome was invaded by northern tribes, how you'd ask a Visigoth where to find the toilet? You might be surprised to hear that Latin and Greek aren't the only languages from antiquity which are well preserved, in eastern Europe there was a bishop with a Greek mother and a Gothic father with the name Wulfila, which translated the Bible into their language. He did this because most of them weren't that good at speaking Greek or Latin. Quite a lot is preserved of the language in this way, and in these lessons you'll learn how to speak and read Gothic. Gothic is an East-Germanic language. Learning it is a process, but interactive tests are added to each lesson to help you to learn to master what you've learnt. There will also be reading texts at the end of each lesson which you should be able to read if you know the grammar and vocabulary. Later