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-n ending on adverbs

by mvk20, December 18, 2008

Messages: 6

Language: English

mvk20 (User's profile) December 18, 2008, 7:40:38 PM

Can someone explain to me the usage of the accusative n ending in the last word of this sentence that I found on the "Pri Eventeo" page of that site:

"La novaĵoj kiuj aperas en EVENTEO devenas el la plej diversaj fontoj de la internacia gazetaro, kompilitaj, resumitaj kaj tradukitaj esperanten."

Thanks!

mnlg (User's profile) December 18, 2008, 7:58:15 PM

The -n conveys movement. You can see it, for instance, with "tie" and "tien".

Compare these two:

Mi iras en la parkon
I am going into the park. (I am not in the park, and I am going there)

Mi iras en la parko
I am going [around] in the park. (I am in the park, and I am going)

So, applied to the example you have provided:

Mi tradukas ion esperanten
I am translating something into esperanto.

Technically however even without a trailing -n it would still be correct. Mi tradukas ion esperante would roughly mean "I am translating something in-an-esperanto-sort-of-way", which is close enough to be basically the same.

ceigered (User's profile) December 19, 2008, 1:25:19 AM

I know I just learnt something new, thanks mnlg for beating me here otherwise I would have answered this question COMPLETELY incorrect.

mnlg (User's profile) December 19, 2008, 10:06:30 AM

Addendum: One possible reason to add the -n to esperanten is that "mi tradukas ion esperante" could also mean, roughly, "I am translating something while being hopeful". Normally the context makes it clear whether "esperanto" is used to mean the language, or as a participle of esperi. To be perfectly sure, however, my advice is to sacrifice elegance for clarity and prefer a more verbose form, like for example "mi tradukas ion al esperanto".

jan aleksan (User's profile) December 19, 2008, 6:47:06 PM

An other possible reason is that "Mi tradukas esperante" can mean "I translate using esperanto", ekz English > esperanto > french. With the -n you don't have this problem.

mvk20 (User's profile) December 19, 2008, 7:26:02 PM

Thanks, mnlg, I knew about the -n for movement, but I didn't realize it could be considered more conceptually like that; I thought it was just for actual physical movement from one place to another, so your explanation was very helpful.

Jan, I get what you're saying, but I don't think that's what they were trying to say given that this is from eventeo.net and it appears that they only publish in Esperanto on the site.

Thanks!

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