BircFs-Eye View of Teutonic Grammar 263

terminal of the third person singular present disappeared early in North
Britain. The -$ ending had already replaced it in the fourteenth
century. During the eighteenth century, the Northumbrian form came
everywhere into its own

Another difference between the Old and the modern English verb is
that the former had a special infinitive form The infinitive, which is the
dictionary form of the verb, does not always correspond to the dic-
tionary form of tiie modem English verb The latter (except that of the

1
ANGLO-
BIBLE

AMERICAN
ENGLISH
OLD ENGLISH
GERMAN

1 > do you j
I do thou doest
ic do
thu dest
ich tu^ *du tusr

he does
he doeth
he deth
er tat

we "^
we "I
we "I
wir tun

you >• do
you V do
ge \- doth
*ihr tut

they]
they]
h.e j
sie tun

I I

I did
ic dyde
ich tat

you

thou didst
thu dydest
du tat(e)st

he
> did
he I
he dyde
er tat

we

we ! - ,
we 1
wir taten

you

you **
ge > dydon
ihr tatet

they

they J
hie J
sie taten

I have done
I have done
ic haebbe gedon
ich habe getan

I had done
I had done
ic haefde gedon
ich hatte getan

(to) do
(to) do
don
(zu) tun

verb to be) is also the present tense-form of all persons other than the
third singular and is used as an imperative. The Oxford or Webster
dictionary verb corresponds to the typical Teutonic infinitive (a) after
the preposition to (e g try to do this), (b) after certain helper verbs
(p IS0)^ (e g I shall do so myself, if I cannot make him do it). In such
situations other Teutonic languages require a form with its own charac-
teristic terminal In Old English this infinitive ending was ~ians -an
(or -TZ), corresponding to the Dutch or German -en or -/?
* In German the du and ihr forms are used only between intimates and
relatives The Sie form replaces both in other circumstances (see p 146) The
pronoun sie and the possessive ihr (with their case-forms) are always written
or printed with a capital if they stand for the second person, and so are du, ihr>
and detn, eu&r when aced in letters