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In the following sentence:

La grand guerre ne cessera que mort ne soit vengée.

A direct translation is "The great war will not stop until the death is revenged". However, I do not understand the role of the second ne since it would mean "...until the death is not revenged".

jlliagre
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E Zhang
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1 Answers1

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Nostradamus verses isn't an easy path to to learn French.

The actual text doesn't contain what you wrote but:

La grande peste de cité maritime
Ne cessera que mort ne soit vengée
Du juste sang, par pris damne sans crime
De la grand dame par feincte n'outragée.

The style is obscure, even by 16th century standards but DeepL gives this translation:

The great plague of the maritime city
Will not cease until death is avenged
Of the just blood, by taken damned without crime
Of the great lady by feint not outraged.

The ne your question is about is what is called a ne explétif.

See When/why is "ne" used by itself in dependent clauses?

jlliagre
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  • Why does the ne in the last quetrain "De la grand dame par feincte n'outragée" matter? – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 22:06
  • The beauty of the French ne is that sometimes it is explétif and sometimes it is not, not to mention old French could also use a non split negative where ne alone could be enough to state a negation. The last verse is non grammatical by current French standards. I believe this ne would be replaced by a non or pas in modern French: de la grande dame pas outragée (outrée) par la feinte (tromperie). – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 22:26
  • Is the first ne not effective because it is used with soit (subjonctif of etre)? – E Zhang Apr 25 '21 at 22:30
  • There is no definitive rule to know if a ne is explétif. Sometimes, the logic leads to the right interpretation. This verse is missing an implicit word that couldn't be omitted in modern French: ne cessera avant* que mort ne soit vengée* or in a less literary way: ne s'arrêtera pas avant que la mort [ne] [ se ] soit vengée, i.e. ne s'arrêtera pas tant que la mort ne se sera pas vengée. – jlliagre Apr 25 '21 at 22:46