What is the equivalent of "to possess" in your language?
And please tell me if you know their basic and maybe ancient meaning.
And please tell me if you know their basic and maybe ancient meaning.
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And please tell me if you know their basic and maybe ancient meaning.
Bulgarian притежавам, Russian притяжать.
Bosnian / BCS: posjedovati.
Etymologically po + sjediti
The first part, po, has various meanings when used independently such as "over; across; at; for; after; by; according to". It derives from PIE *h2(e)po "off, away".
The second part, sjediti, means "to sit", from PIE *sed-
To me posjedovati seems like one of those 19th century calques, but I may be wrong.
These verbs are rare in both Bulgarian and Russian - they're used only to emphasize possession or in some formal contexts. The impersonal construction you mentioned is the basic in Russian indeed while Bulgarian uses the verb имам (equivalent of the verb "to have" in English and similar verbs in other Indo-European languages).Is the Russian one basic? I mean Russian say "У меня есть машина" (I have a car) but it is a noun clause. Unlike, English one is verb clause. They do not use a verb to state possession a property or something else. Is it correspondent to Bulgarian as well?
Bulgarian притежавам, Russian притяжать.
Bosnian / BCS: posjedovati.
Etymologically po + sjediti
In Portuguese: possuir (from Latin possidere, from the stem potis, being able, powerful, plus sidere, to sit) or more commonly ter (to have) (from Latin tenere, to hold).
Thanks for the contributionSo could you use the verb in a simple sentence? And is it a widespread verb? In translation of "I have a cat", do you use the verb?
It's pretty widespread, but as in English (as far as I know) it is used for a specific meaning - "to possess". We have a separate verb for "to have" - imati, so "I have a cat" would be Imam mačku. I don't think that "I possess a cat" sounds that good in English either. There are other words which in some contexts can replace it, such as vladati "to rule, to govern", držati "to hold" etc.Ja mislim, što nije s pravdom stečeno, ne može se ni s pravom posjedovati.
I think, that that which has not been obtained by just means, cannot be possessed by right/law either
Looks like a Latin calque?
There is no such a verb in modern Russian - притяжать, but it could exist in the past. In Russian we still have its derivatives and cognates: притяжательный - possessive (only as grammatical term), стяжать - to gain (bookish).
The base is тяга - attraction.
Modern Russian words are обладать, владеть.
Both derivate from Church-Slavonic владеть - to possess, to own.
Russian word was володеть and it is a cognate of:
Old-Prussian walduns (to inherit)
Gothic waldan - to rule
αλωτός - sway
Latin valeo - to be strong.
Спасибо за уточнения, Maroseika!Here's an example from 1949, taken from the Croatian Language Corpus:
It's pretty widespread, but as in English (as far as I know) it is used for a specific meaning - "to possess". We have a separate verb for "to have" - imati, so "I have a cat" would be Imam mačku. I don't think that "I possess a cat" sounds that good in English either. There are other words which in some contexts can replace it, such as vladati "to rule, to govern", držati "to hold" etc.
It could be, but it could also be based on German besitzen.