English needs a preposition “atto”

[pne]

I thought of a gap in English: it has no preposition corresponding to German “an”+accusative.

In some cases, what is one preposition in German with dative or accusative (for position vs. movement) is the same preposition in English (The cat is under the table vs. The cat runs under the table; The bird is over the table vs. The bird flies over the table) or is differentiated with -to for the movement version (The ball is in the box vs. The ball falls into the box; The pen is on the table vs. The pen falls onto the table).

But for “at”, there’s only the “position” meaning, and there’s no “movement” variant.

For example, in German, you could say, “Schieb den Karton an die Wand”; in English, you’d need a circumlocution such as “Push the cardboard box all the way to the wall” or “right up to the wall”. “Push it at the wall” wouldn’t have the same meaning, and there’s no *“Push it atto the wall” or *“Push it to at the wall”.

There is “to”, but it’s more similar to German “zu” or Esperanto “al” rather than to German “an” or Esperanto “ĝis” with their connotation of touching at the end.

Comments

[ewx]

'push the box against the wall'?

[birke]

"Push it up to the wall" is how I would usually express your example.

English needs a preposition "atto"?

[(Anonymous)]

"Push the cardboard box to the wall" does imply it's going all the way there. Otherwise you'd say, "push the cardboard box towards the wall."
As for the bird flying over the table, if it's flying round and round over the table, you'd probably say, "The bird is flying about over the table." Same with the cat. "The cat's running about under the table." Having said that, "the bird flies over the table/the cat runs under the table" are slightly ambiguous in English.