" Leave It Be " ~ Anyone Explain That Expressions Roots For Me, Please?

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Seriously! I mean, I know what it means, obviously. But what the hell's a word like " Be " doing, being used in that context, in the english language?

 

Reason I ask is because I've always known 'Be' to be a Roma word for " Alone ". Of course, in written Romanes it would be spelt as " bi ", but pronounced exactly the same as Be. I hope that's all clear enough? Damn near confusing my self here!

 

So, anyway; English has Be. As In, " I'll be late. " But it also appears to have filtched Bi, as in " Leave me bi (alone) ". Wouldn't be the first time a Roma word has crept into accepted usage in English, of course ~ as opposed to a basterdised, slang usage. But here's what I'm wondering:

 

Romanes (the Gypsy language) is largely accepted as stemming from the ancient Indian language of Sanskrit. So, taking that as read: Did Bi come to English from the Romanes? Or did it slip in directly from Sanskrit?

 

Seriously. This question's been niggling away at the edges of my conciousness for f*cking decades! Just never quite found time to try and do anything about sorting it. So I thought I'd start here. I mean; Why not?

[Guest Macnas]

You're contemplating the hell out of your navel these days mate.

[Guest Macnas]

Mirriam-Webster sez:

"to remain unmolested, undisturbed, or uninterrupted —used only in infinitive form <let him be>"

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Leave my navel out of this, Macnas! (It's the longer evenings, mate! )

 

Now then; I could have told MW that. I've pretty much just stated it above, haven't I? But that only serves to compound the point I'm getting at, doesn't it? That it's Only used in the context seemingly lifted directly from the Romanes. But Why and How Come???

 

Anyway, stop taking the piss with ye feighned synaptic deficiency and get your arse down to the Johnny Cash thread. You may well have seen the same (type of?) programme, over here, that set me thinking. Let's have some input from ye there, please

[SNAP SHOT 194]

Leave my navel out of this, Macnas! (It's the longer evenings, mate! )

 

Now then; I could have told MW that. I've pretty much just stated it above, haven't I? But that only serves to compound the point I'm getting at, doesn't it? That it's Only used in the context seemingly lifted directly from the Romanes. But Why and How Come???

 

Anyway, stop taking the piss with ye feighned synaptic deficiency and get your arse down to the Johnny Cash thread. You may well have seen the same (type of?) programme, over here, that set me thinking. Let's have some input from ye there, please

 

Christ mate, In the countryside your meant to take life easy, let the world pass you by, etc. etc. i don't know if it's the drink or socratie's on the other end of this thread

[Guest Macnas]

It's because "be", or "to be", is in the same family tree as "am", as in to exist.

 

If you are wondering how "be" as a word came to be the infinitive form of the intransitive verb, then you should investigate Old German, the original of the species where the english language is concerned. Once again, Mirriam-Webster says "Etymology: Middle English, from Old English bēon; akin to Old High German bim (am)".

 

I don't know enough about Romanes as a language even begin to ponder why there is this seemingly shared verb, but it may be possible that there was a migration of word forms in the other direction, as in from English to Romanes. Not impossible, but then I don't know how pure a language Romanes is these days.

 

Languages often share words and meanings, even though there is no etymogical connection. For instance, the Irish for chalk almost exactly the same as the word and meaning in Greek, there may be historical reasons, but at this stage nobady can say for sure.

[SNAP SHOT 194]

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

:notworthy: :notworthy: That may well be it then! Thankyou! So; It's quite probably either a sheer linguistic fluke that the Roma word happens to match the 'English' word of German derivation ~ or else the Rom's may equelly have picked 'Their' word up in passage? Effectively gaining the very same word / meaning directly from the same root source? There's something to contemplate as I wander round my rat boxes!

 

Of course; The one missing piece of this puzzle apparrent now is Sanskrit! I've never come across any profferred linkage between that and base German. IF the Sanskrit threw up a comparative? What a f*cking can of worms That would be!

 

Either way ye look at it, we're half way there. You've shown how the English came by it. That's that bit sorted out then. Now we just have the Romanes to figure. And that bit could prove a bit more of a bitch!

 

Either way, much more fun than trawling through reams of " Nice Dog, Mate. Howz It Bread " and streams of repeated f*cking photographs with such a comment stitched onto the bottom, surely?

 

Perhaps Ian could open a new board here? " The Reading Room ". Ye know what I'm saying ....?

[BlueCoyote 0]

ok someone beat me to it

Edited November 14, 2007 by BlueCoyote

[Guest baldie]

I,m a fan of that irish sage meself...................father jack.

 

DRINK.........FECK..........GERLS.

 

ditch........get a cold one down ye mate

[Guest Ditch_Shitter]

Just about to crack open my fourth ~ before vanishing into Chat for another brain numbing session, el Bald One

 

Drink doesn't come into it though. I've genuinely wondered about that one, particular usage most of my life. Just thought I'd throw it up here and see what happened. And look; Result!

 

Now, I wonder what might happen if I go to the Classifieds and ask for a full edition of Eric Partridge? Bit of a lifes ambition of mine, that one!

[Guest Macnas]

You forgot "ARSE".

[Guest baldie]

i had my little lad saying "arse" at two year old, much to the male side of the family,s delight, macnas. They didn,t find it funny [the ladies] when he recited it parrot fashion at the christmas table. oh boy, did i cop it.

[Guest Macnas]

"Now so, little Baldie jnr, what bit of the turkey would you like??"

 

"Arse!"