mēs
Latvian
editAlternative forms
edit- (dialectal, archaic form) mes
Etymology
editFrom earlier, and still dialectally attested, mes (with vowel lengthening, either expressively, or under the influence of jūs (“you pl.”)), from Proto-Indo-European *wéy (“we”), with the initial m- appearing due to influence from the first-person singular objective pronoun or the first-person singular verbal ending. For the non-nominative forms, the old Proto-Indo-European *nos was not conserved; new forms were created, following the second-person plural paradigm. Accusative mūs imitated second-person jūs (i.e., *múns after júns, yielding mūs); similarly genitive *mūsōn after *jūsōn, yielding mūsu, and dative mums < *mumus, paralleling jums < *jumus. Cognates include Lithuanian mẽs, Old Prussian mes, mas, Proto-Slavic *my, Old Armenian մեք (mekʻ).[1]
Pronunciation
editPronoun
editmēs (personal, 1st person plural)
- we; first person pronoun, referring to the speaker and other people
- mēs te strādājam ― we work here
- Eiropa mūs nesapratīs ― Europe will not understand us
- viņš dzīvo pie mums ― he lives with (lit. by) us
- mēs ar Juhanu un Kārli pārnesām savu mantību uz aitu kūti ― Juhans, Kārlis and I (lit. we with Juhans and Kārlis) took our possessions over to the sheep barn
- vai mūsu tauta pavisam zaudējusi balsi? ― has our people completely lost (its) voice?
Declension
editRelated terms
editSee also
edit
References
edit- ^ Karulis, Konstantīns (1992) “mēs; mūs”, in Latviešu Etimoloģijas Vārdnīca[1] (in Latvian), Rīga: AVOTS, →ISBN
- Latvian etymologies from LEV
- Latvian terms inherited from Proto-Indo-European
- Latvian terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- Latvian terms with IPA pronunciation
- Latvian words with level intonation
- Latvian terms with audio pronunciation
- Latvian lemmas
- Latvian pronouns
- Latvian personal pronouns
- Latvian terms with usage examples