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"Suffix" in Grammar is confusing and incomplete.  #110

@DavidIB

Description

@DavidIB

At present, the grammatical definition ends with "Suffix", eg:
Luke.10.30 "Jesus" in THGNT has

Grammar
Function Noun
Case Nominative
Number Singular
Gender Masculine
Suffix Personal

The "Suffix" is the last bit of the morphology, as described here
eg "Jesus" in the example above is N-NSM**-P** ie Noun, Nominative Singular Male which is a Person
or N-ASF**-L** is a Noun, Accusative Singular Feminine which is a Location - eg Corinth

At present, "-P" is marked as "Personal" rather than "a Person". This is currently correct for ESV because all that are proper nouns are marked as "-P", even if they are places.
But in THGNT which has the latest tagging, which will soon be applied to all tagged texts, the proper nouns are divided up into
-P = Person, eg Levi
-PG = Group based on a Person eg Levite
-L = Location eg Greece
-LG = Group based on a Location eg Greek
-T = Title - ie any Proper noun other than a Person or Location, eg Satan, or Pharisees

Examples in THGNT:
-P as at Luk.10.30 Ἰησοῦς (Jesus) - ie a Person Ἰησοῦς
-L as at Luk.10.30 Ἱεροσολύμων (Jerusalem) - ie a Location Ἱερουσαλὴμ
-PG as at Luk.10.32 Λευίτης (Levite) - ie a group based on a Person Λευείτης
-LG as at Luk.10.33 Σαμαρείτης (Samaritan) - ie a group based on a Location Σαμαρείτης
-T as at Luk.10.18 σατανᾶν (Satan) - a Title - ie any other Proper Noun not a Person or Location

The term "Suffix" is confusing because these details do not depend on the ending of the word. Actually, they mostly represent something about the meaning, rather than anything in the form of the word. So they are probably better called a "Detail"

The changes needed are:

  • Change "Suffix" to "Detail" (perhaps there is a better term but I'm not sure what).
  • Change "-P" = "Personal" to "Person"
  • Add -LI = Letter Indeclinable (alpha, omega etc.)
  • Add -NUI = Number Indeclinable (one, two etc.)
  • Add -HEB = Hebrew (a Hebrew word)
  • Add -ARAM = Aramaic (an Aramaic word)
  • Add -ATT = Attic (ie classical Greek)
  • Add -ABB = Abbreviated (eg "12" for "twelve")

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