Re: To be or not to be... or to have.

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Glen Gordon" <glengordon01@...> >
So, in the absence of both "be" or "have" in unmarked equational,

> descriptive or possessive sentences, the exact original meaning of
> *es- might be subject to question. Particularily so with the Semitic
> correspondance. In Akkadian /is^u:/ can mean both "have"

(possessive)

> and "there is" (descriptive). Its secondary use to declare the
> general existence of things is the key here.
>
> Mid IE would have borrowed the Semitic verb to be used more as
> "there is" (something like in Mandarin /you ren/ "there are people"
> as opposed to /shi ren/ "it's a person"). Coincidentally /you/ also
> means "to have". Funny enough, a lot of languages use "have" to
> declare the existence of something, even French /il y a/ "there is"
> lit."it has there" < /avoir/ "have". It's as if to state someone's

or

> something's "possession of existence".

No, just a natural tendency to claim everything for oneself :)
E.g. "We have your argument here."

> So in effect, it's along the lines of the following fully plausible
> interrelationship:
>
> "to have" == "there has/is" == "is"

You've established the first stage. What's your example for the
second stage? Semantically, I can see an intermediate stage as a
verb of location, "There's the wolf on the hill" => "The wolf is on
the hill", but are there any examples of even that change?

Could there be a more direct link? French (and general Romance)
expressions such as "avoir froid" 'to be cold' come to mind. A loss
of contrast between an abstract noun and adjective would be a quick
route ("have happiness" = "be happy"), but I've no evidence for such
an occurrence.

Richard.