Some was a sam or som, a set or upmingled mass; and some men was a sam or som of men.
Now if the speech is about the set, it may be onely, as ‘There is a great many,’ ‘there is a small few,’ or ‘a few’; but if the speech is about the bemarked things, the mark-word may well be somely—‘many men are’; ‘few men are’; ‘some men are.’
In the queer wording, ‘many a man,’ ‘many a flow’r is born to blush unseen,’ it is not at all likely that a is the article. It is rather a worn shape, like a in a-mong (an-menge), or a-hunting (an-huntunge), of the Saxon case-word an or on, meaning in; and it is not unlikely that man has, by the mistaking of a for an article, taken the stead of men—‘an maeng an men,’ a many or mass in men; as we say ‘a herd in sheep,’ ‘a horde in gold.’ So far as this is true the mark-word may be somely—‘many a man or men,’ ‘a main in men are.’
None (Saxon na-an, no one) should have a singular verb—‘None is (not are) always happy.’
Some mark-words are for a clear outmarking (as single or somely) of things outshown from among others.
Outshowing Mark-words.
| (Near things.) | |
| Single. This man. | Somely. These men. |
| (Farther off.) | |
| That. | Those. |
| (Still farther off, or out of sight.) | |
| Yon. | |
The so-called definite article the is a mark-word of the same kind as this, that, these, and those.
The word the in ‘the more the merrier’ is not the article the—to a name-word. It is an old Saxon outshowing mark-word meaning with that (mid þy). ‘The more the merrier’; þy (with that measure), they are more; þy (with that measure), they are merrier.
In the wording ‘the man who’ or ‘the bird which was in the garden,’ who and which are not the names, but are tokens or mark-words of the things—who of the man, and which of the bird.