Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/ne
(Redirected from Appendix:Proto-Germanic/ne)
Proto-Germanic edit
Alternative forms edit
- *ni (unstressed)
Etymology edit
From Proto-Indo-European *ne (“not”).
Pronunciation edit
Particle edit
*ne[1]
Usage notes edit
- This word was a general negation particle, and always preceded the word that it negated. If a verb with an adverbial prefix needed to be negated, the word was normally inserted between the prefix and the main verb stem.
Related terms edit
Descendants edit
This word does not survive in its original use in any modern language. Over time it usually became strengthened by other words, creating phrases such as "never", "not at all" or "not a thing". Eventually these phrases became the normal way of negating phrases, and this word fell into disuse. See Jespersen's Cycle on Wikipedia for more.
References edit
- ^ Ringe, Donald (2006) From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic (A Linguistic History of English; 1)[1], Oxford: Oxford University Press, →ISBN