摘要：

Seven Afrikaans translations of the Gospel according to Mark are compared in order to determine to what extent they reflect the development of Afrikaans during the past century or more. The method employed is to identify sections of the text that seem amenable to comparison in the various translations, with due regard to the fact that the translations are not representations of one another and that there are underlying diverse theoretical approaches and implicit ideals. The following translations are compared: (i) Die Evangelie volgens die beskrywing van Markus (the Gospel according to Mark) (CP Hoogenhout) (V1878); (ii) Di Evangeli follens Markus (the Gospel according to Mark) (SJ du Toit and collaborators) (V1908); (iii) Die Vier Evangeli en die Psalme (The Four Gospels and the Psalms)(V1922); (iv) the 1933 translation of the Bible (the first official translation of the entire Bible) (V1933); (v) the revised edition of the last-mentioned (V1953); (vi) the Nuwe Vertaling (New Translation)(V1983), and (vii) Die Nuwe Testament en Psalms, 'n Direkte Vertaling (The New Testament and Psalms, a Direct Translation) (V2014) The phenomena that are subject to change are discussed under the following headings: (1) Adjectival and nominal morphology, (2) Pronominal forms of address, (3) Verbal morphology, (4) Selected verbal constructions, (5) Selected non-verbal constructions and (6) Selected lexical items. (1) Adjectival and nominal morphology The -e ending of a number of attributive adjectives is dropped from one translation to another, but the change does not occur at the same time in all adjectives nor does the change occur in every adjective. On the one hand, for instance, the -e of ou(w)e "old" is dropped from V1922 onwards, but on the other hand that of dowe "deaf"is maintained in all translations (as it is in present-day language). Derived nominals such as skrifgeleerde "scribe(s)", which also served as plural in the earliest translations, had the plural -s added from V1922 onwards. (2) Pronominal forms of address The old form gy "you" (singular or plural), which was used in the Cape until the late 18th century (Ponelis 1993:207), occurs only in V1878 and V1922. In all translations but V1908 and V1922 both the familiar forms of address, e.g. the 2nd person pronominals jy "you" (subjectform, singular), jou "you/your" (object/possessive form, singular) and julle "you/ your" (personal/possessive form, plural), and formal u "you" (singular, plural and possessive) are used. V1908 uses informal jy/jou in all contexts, and V1922 uses formal u in all contexts. (3) Verbal morphology In verbs such as sterf/sterwe "to die" the -we variant is generally replaced by the -f variant from one translation to another, the latter becoming the dominant form in V2014. V1983, however, shows preference for the -we variant. The early translators seem to have employed the -we forms, such as sterwe, as infinitives, e.g. hy sal sterwe "he will die", and the -fforms as finite forms, e.g. hy sterf "he is dying". It also seems as though Hoogenhout (V1878), in his use of verbs such as gaan "to go", staan "to stand" and doen "to do", reserved the -t ending for finite forms (singular as well as plural) and the imperative (e.g. hy/hulle gaat "he/ they are going"; gaat heen "go forth") and the -n ending for infinitival usage (e.g. kan gaan "can go" and om te gaan "to go"). Het "to have" is used as imperative of the main verb hê "to have" in the oldest translations, but is later on replaced by jy/julle plus the modal verb moet, e.g. Het sout in julle self"("Have salt in yourselves", V1908) is replaced by "Julle moet sout in julle hê" ("You must have salt in you") from V1933 onwards. While in Dutch the negative imperative, which expresses a prohibition, consists of the imperative form and negation, a contracted form moenie (from moet "must" and nie "not") is used in present-day Afrikaans, e.g. "Gaan nie in die dorp nie" ("Go not into the village") in V1922 is replaced by "Moenie in die dorp gaan ... nie" ("Must-not into the village go") in V1933. In the early t

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