Talk:सेने

RFV discussion: July–August 2020
Please advise where I should query if this query is in the wrong place. --RichardW57 (talk) 15:51, 5 July 2020 (UTC) The meaning of this is given as "perfect active third-person singular of सन् (san)", which verges on gibberish and is difficult to understand. Both the word-form of the entry and the untranslated grammar notes in the entry make it clear that the form of the entry is a not very remarkable perfect middle 3rd singular. So why is this described as 'active'? Recent discussions on how to use cause me to be unsure that the word 'active' in the description is not a simple blunder for 'middle'. --RichardW57 (talk) 15:51, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Now, there is a request of the definition of the meaning of the root, but when I look it up in Monier-Williams, I find three meanings: I can only guess how this would be wiktionarified. Now, I presume meaning 3 is possible for a middle form. But with regards to meanings 1 and 2, will the result of wiktionarification be intended to say that a perfect tense middle form is only to be understood as the passive of 1 or 2, or that it may also have meanings 1 and possibly even 2? Will interpretation require the user to pay attention to the 'type' of the verb? I have asked, on its discussion page, how the 'types' (Anglice 'voice') P, A and U recorded via are to be interpreted. (The Sanskrit words these letters abbreviate appear, in this context, to have the meanings 'active', 'middle' and 'either/both' respectively.)  --RichardW57 (talk) 15:51, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) to gain, acquire, obtain as a gift, possess, enjoy, RV. ; AV. ; Br. ; ŚrS. ;
 * 2) to gain for another, procure, bestow, give, distribute, RV. ;
 * 3) (Ā.) to be successful, be granted or fulfilled,  ib.  :
 * I'm not a position to comment on everything above, but I do think the "active" label at is simply a mistake and can be changed to "middle" without further discussion. —Mahāgaja · talk 05:44, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree with Mahagaja again. The person who created the entry made a mistake. The active counterpart would be . -- Bhagadatta (talk) 07:49, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Which just leaves some simpler immediate questions, neglecting the issue of looking up a meaning. Should we refer the perfect forms to a finite verb or to the root (and what do we then do for compound verbs)?  Mahāgaja changed the apparent lemma form from root to a 3s present active.  If a finite verb, do we refer to the present tense form(s) or to the 3s perfect active (when it exists)?  Should it depend on whether a perfect has a meanings of its own?  Isn't the label A/P (or A/P/U?) redundant for an entry for a verb form? --RichardW57 (talk) 09:59, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * What do you mean, ‘when it exists’? When it’s attested? At least in Classical Sanskrit, the 3s perfect active virtually always exists by fiat. Or do you mean ‘exists on Wiktionary’? Hölderlin2019 (talk) 10:15, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * When it's attested. I'm not sure how we handle citation forms that would be words if they existed in the language but don't actually exist - there's an unresolved challenge to Latin  for this very reason.  There are a few deponent verbs in Classical Sanskrit (one set of examples gives the roots labh ās kṣam vas sac), but Rigvedic or Epic Sanskrit mostly supply an active perfect when Classical Sanskrit has a middle perfect, which may not be entirely suitable.  However,  (currently not in Wiktionary) has a middle perfect  (is this sanctioned by Panini?) for which the active perfects of the homophonous roots are quite inappropriate.  Panini does not dictate what words are recorded in Wiktionary, though his adherents may by what they have written.--RichardW57 (talk) 11:52, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * We do usually allow lemma forms that are themselves unattested, especially when the lemma form itself is in no real doubt. For the problem is that the nominative singular could conceivably have been  or . But if there was a Latin word whose accusative singular was attested as, say,, with dative and genitive singular , I think no one would bat an eyelash at our putting it at the unattested nominative singular . As for Sanskrit, we should have separate entries for roots and verbs, and inflected forms of verbs should point to the verb entry, not to the root, so the current version of  calling it an inflected form of  and  is right; it shouldn't be called an inflected form of the root . —Mahāgaja · talk 12:16, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * There's a difference between non-existence and an attestation gap. It gets awkward when all the speakers of a language are L2-speakers.  Still, we can defer those arguments until the debate over which of,  and  to refer  to. --RichardW57 (talk) 13:18, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * What I often do for similar cases in Ancient Greek, where an aorist or perfect stem is associated with multiple present stems, is to assign them to the most commonly attested present stem, and then at the entries for the other present stems, I leave a note saying "For other tenses, see [most common present form]". And the less common present stems are listed as Alternative forms at the top of the page for the most common present form. —Mahāgaja · talk 13:51, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * That works well when the present stems are synonymous. I suppose Greek  is an exemplar for different perfects having different meanings.  With my limited knowledge, I looked to Latin  and  for cognate presents having different meanings, but their common perfect  doesn't point back to both of them :-( --RichardW57 (talk) 15:17, 6 July 2020 (UTC)
 * That's because it was bot-generated (in fact, the page institi has only ever been edited by bots!): it created the forms of one of the two verbs first, and when it got to the second verb, it didn't create any form that already had a Latin entry. —Mahāgaja · talk 15:41, 6 July 2020 (UTC)


 * RFV-resolved. As far as I can tell, this never belonged here in the first place. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 22:15, 24 August 2020 (UTC)