130 THE PREDICATIVE INFINITIVE WITH DATIVE SUBJECT. 
fleeted active infinitive with a dative after (1) certain verbs of Commanding 
(i beodan, ‘ command ; 9 hatan, ‘command’) and (2) certain verbs of Causing 
and Permitting ( aliefan , ‘ allow ; 1 don, ‘ make/ ‘ cause; ’ Icetan, ‘ let/ ‘ cause ’). 
I quote only a few examples: — 
beodan: — Chron. 173 ra , 1048 E c : se cyng . . . bead heom cuman to 
Gleaweceastre. — A. S. Horn. & L. S. II. 15.280 b , 281: Da het se gerefa hio 
genimon (sic!) and bead heom hire clabes of niman and hi up ahon bi bam 
fotum= 217.312 a> b : Praefectus dixit: Exspoliate earn et in aerem suspendite. 
hatan: — Wcerf. 202.13: ba het he heora eeghwylcum gesomnian his byrbene 
wyrta = 245 C 2 : Quos statim colledis oleribus onustari fecit. — Mart. 210.6, 7: 
ba het he hym gebindan anne ancran on his sweoran and hyne forsendan on 
sae. — AZlf. Horn. I. 416*: Da faerlice het he his gesihum bone biscop mid his 
preostum samod geandwerdian. 
aliefan: see Mat. 8.21 and L. 9.59, as given above in connection with the 
comment on the Latin permitto; in these examples, of course, me may be con¬ 
sidered accusative instead of dative, but it is more probably dative. 
don: — Chron. 266 b , 1140 E c : be biscop . . . dide heom cumen bider.— 
lb. 262 b , 1132 E a> b : king . . . dide him gyuen up baet abbotrice of Burch 7 
faren ut of lande. — AElf. L. S. 464.376: gif him byrste, bu do him drincan (or 
is drincan a noun?). — Lcece. 141.5: do sumne dael pipores 7 do him ete (sic!) 
breo snaeda on nihtnyhstig. 
laetan: — Chron. 56 b , 796 F a * b : Ceolwulf Myrcna cing . . . gefeng Ead- 
berht Praen ... 7 let him pytan ut his eagan 7 ceorfan of his handa. — lb. 
116*, 963 E d : se arcebiscop . . . com ba to be cyng, leot him locon (sic!) ba 
gewrite be acr waeron gefunden. — lb. 210 b , 1075 D b : se scirgerefa ... let him 
findan mete. — lb. 225 b , 1090 E: he . . . let heom swa weor&an. 
Some of these examples are doubtful. But a few (those with don and Icetan) 
admit of no other explanation than to consider that we have an infinitive with 
dative subject, unless we hold that at that stage in the history of the language 
the dative form, him, had already begun to supplant the accusative forms, 
hine and hie, — a possibility suggested by the fact that most of the clearer 
examples (those after don and, in a less degree, Icetan) occur in the later Chronicle 
and, usually, in the later manuscripts of that work. With the verbs other than 
don and Icetan the infinitive seems to me objective, not predicative; and the 
examples have been included in Chapter II. Aside from the confusion of the 
dative and the accusative forms of the pronouns already suggested, the dative 
instead of the accusative seems to be due to the fact that in some instances we 
have verbs (beodan and Icetan) which are sometimes followed by a dative as well 
as by an accusative, and that in other verbs of kindred signification (hatan 1 ) the 
same usage arose out of analogy. 
Concerning this idiom with personal verbs in the kindred Germanic lan¬ 
guages, see Chapter XVI, section ix. 
At times, too, we have an inflected active infinitive with a dative after 
(1) certain verbs of Commanding (bebeodan, ‘ command; * beodan, 1 command ; 9 
and forbeodan, 1 forbid ’); ( 2 ) one verb of Sense Perception once (hieran, 1 hear 9 ); 
and (3) certain verbs of Causing and Permitting (aliefan, ‘ allow ; 9 gedon, 
* cause; ’ lief an, 1 allow; ’ and wyrean, 1 make/ * cause ’). 
1 Cf. Zeitlin, 1 l. e., p. 56. 
