# Romance Languages: There To Be / To Have / To Bear



## ronanpoirier

Take a little look at this.

I just realized that Portuguese and Spanish have the verbs "ter"/"tener" to express "to have" and the verb "haver" to express "there to be". However, in French and Italian, we'd have "avoir"/"avere" to express "to have" and a particular construction to express "there to be": "il y avoir"/"c'essere"*.
And about "to bear", all languages seems to have something related to Portuguese "portar", but it seems to have more uses than in Portuguese, but I may be wrong.

So from where that "ter"/"tener" thing came? And what happened to "haver" in Portuguese and Spanish? And what about other Romance Languages, what's their situations? What was the situtation in Latin? Aaaahhh, lots of questions! 

PS.: I've just realized! English --> HAVE... HAVE + R = HAVER  It may have nothing to do but it's really interesting... The weird things about our stepsister English...


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## robbie_SWE

Ok, quite a lot of questions, but I will give you the “full” spectrum of the Romanian language (which resembles Portuguese in the sense that it's the farthest to the East instead of the West, geographically speaking  ). 

"TO HAVE"

*a avea* = in the case of the Laura Pausini song it would look like this: 

_"Muzica devine forţa/puterea pe care o ai înăuntru, care va elibera toată_ _energia."_

"THERE TO BE"

*este/e* = a bit confused  . In Romanian we use forms of "to be" ("*a fi*"). Ex: 

_IT: C'è molti alberi. _
_FR: Il y a beaucoup d'arbres. _
*RO: Sunt mulţi pomi. *

"TO BEAR"

*a purta* = used in many constellations everything from _"poartă în minte"_ (bear in mind) to _"a purta (o) discuţie"_ (have a conversation). 

I really don't know where "ter/tener" came from. In my ears it could have something to do with the Latin "tenerus" (if it exists). "Haver" makes even less sense to me if it doesn't correspond with the same meaning and usage as in the other Latin languages. You'll have to wait and see what the other foreros have to say about this. 

Hope I shed an ounce of hope anyway! 

 robbie


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## Outsider

"Ter/tener" is from Latin _tenere_, which originally meant "to hold", as in to hold something in your hand. See here.


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## Frank06

Hi,


ronanpoirier said:


> PS.: I've just realized! English --> HAVE... HAVE + R = HAVER  It may have nothing to do but it's really interesting... The weird things about our stepsister English...



I can only give a short comment on the PS (English 'to have', German Haben, Dutch hebben etc.). It's rather funny indeed, but it's sheer coincidence as you might have suspected. 
The Germanic words come from PIE *kap- (meaning to hold), Latin habere (and English 'to give') from PIE *ghabh- (meaning to give/to receive!).

Groetjes,

Frank


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## betulina

Hi!

The situation in Catalan is a bit of a mix, I think.

- We have "*tenir*" with the same meaning of "ter/tener". As Outsider said, it comes from Latin "tenere". Italian still has it (tenere) but with the original meaning (to hold).

- We have "*haver*" as an auxiliary verb (like in Spanish "haber" -"he cantat"), but only as an auxiliary verb, like the English auxiliary role of the verb.

- We have "*haver-hi*" for "there to be", like "il y avoir" and "esserci". 

Hope it helps somehow!


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## elroy

robbie_SWE said:


> _IT: Ci sono molti alberi. _


 Small correction.


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## jazyk

Io non lo direi mai, però Mauro Magni, in _Così si scrive_, _così si dice_, afferma:

_Ci possono essere incertezze, e anche di queste non mette conto di parlare a lungo, poiché, in fatto di concordanza, quando v'è incertezza significa che tutt'e due i costrutti possibili sono corretti. Così si potrà dire: o la paura o la fame ti fanno (anche: ti fa) parlare così; Carlo si è pulito (o: puliti) i piedi; la barba che Antonio s'è fatto (fatta) crescere; ho scritto (meno bene: scritte) molte lettere; *non ci sono (anche: non c'è) pretesti che valgano *ecc._

Ricordo aver letto da qualche parte che questa concordanza è comune in Toscana.


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## 0ana

Hi, 

There isthe verb _a tine _in Romanian which means to hold, to keep, equivalent to _tenir _in French; I guess it has almost the sae meaning as its Latin ancestor, _tenere_.


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## vince

It looks like sometime in the history of the Iberian Romance languages, people started using "to hold" as a synonym of "to have". Eventually it settled on: the further west you go, the more "tenere" has replaced "habere".

Extremes:
French:
"Tu as faim"
"Tu as chanté"
"Il y a un chien"

Portuguese:
"(Tu) tens fome"
"(Tu) tens cantado"
"Há/Tem um cão"


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## riccio

ronanpoirier said:


> I just realized that Portuguese and Spanish have the verbs "ter"/"tener" to express "to have" and the verb "haver" to express "there to be". However, in French and Italian, we'd have "avoir"/"avere" to express "to have" and a particular construction to express "there to be": "il y avoir"/"esserci"*.


One little correction more.

It's very interesting, for me, as a clue that Italian is closer to French than to Iberian languages, while people generally link it to Spanish.
I've not much to add but something that you probably still don't know: in southern Italian dialects, the verb corresponding to 'ter/tener' is often used in  a similar way, with the meaning of 'to have'. I think this usage comes from the Spanish domination.


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