Talk

Flip

Pedants' corner

A Race of Gerunds

4 replies

prism · 30/03/2013 20:28

I've just watched a documentary on BBC4 about the Vikings. During the opening few minutes I idly mused about whether, strictly speaking, they were a race of gerunds.

Blow me down if it didn't turn out half way though that they actually were.

OP posts:

Report

SconeRhymesWithGone · 30/03/2013 22:15

I haven't seen it ( I am in the US), but I assume you are referring to something along the lines of "Vikings like to go viking." [buwink]

Report

prism · 31/03/2013 00:44

Exactly. Apparently that's where the name comes from. I can't think of another group of people named after a gerund; it's very distinguished.

OP posts:

Report

princessx · 02/04/2013 14:15

I didn't see the prog but I heard Viking was their word for pirate, did they mention that on the show?

Report

prism · 02/04/2013 14:31

No- the explanation on the programme was that it was to do with "let's go a-viking" and such, which agrees with what it says on Wikipedia, which I have now bothered to look at. Without a detailed knowledge of the grammar of Old Norse it's hard to say definitively what part of speech this is, but I'm going to sweep that aside and declare that they were, in fact, a race of gerunds.

I can't tell you how exciting this is.