Arabic:
رأيت البيت الذي بناه جاك.
/ra?ajtu l-bayt-a llaDi: bana:-hu dZa:k/
see.PERF.1SG DEF-house-DEF.ACC REL build.PERF.3SGM[Jack]-3SGM[house] Jack.NOM
'I saw the house that Jack built.' (baytun 'house' has masculine gender)
أعلم أن جاك بنى ذلك البيت.
/?a?\lamu ?an:a dZa:k bana: Da:lika l-bajt-a/
know.IMPERF.1SG SUB Jack.ACC build.PERF.3SGM[Jack] that DEF-house-DEF.ACC
'I know that Jack built that house.'
رأيت البيت حيث ولد جاك.
/ra?ajtu l-bajt-a X\ajTu wulida dZa:k/
see.PERF.1SG DEF-house-DEF.ACC where bear.PASS.3SGM[Jack] Jack.NOM
رأيت البيت الذي ولد جاك فيه.
/ra?ajtu l-bajt-a X\ajTu wulida dZa:k fi:-hi/
see.PERF.1SG DEF-house-DEF.ACC REL bear.PASS.3SGM[Jack] Jack.NOM in-him[house]
'I saw the house where Jack was born.' (The second one is more like "...the house that Jack was born in".)
أعلم أنك تعلمه.
/?a?\lamu ?anna-ka ta?\lamu-hu/
know.IMPERF.1SG SUB-2SG know.IMPERF.2SG-3SG
'I know that you know.'
أعلم ما تعلم/تعلمه.
/?a?\lamu ma: ta?\lamu-(hu)/
know.IMPERF.1SG what know.IMPERF.2SG-(3SG)
'I know what you know.' (If the relative pronoun "what" is an object of the verb or a preposition, the anaphoric pronoun is optional.)
I don't think Arabic is typologically that interesting here. Perhaps something about anaphoric pronouns ("I saw the house that Jack built {it}", "...the house that Jack was born in {it}"), but not really.
It's not idiomatic but it's grammatically correct. In formal contexts I see "that which" used just like "what..." all the time at least...finlay wrote:It's not idiomatic in English.Guitarplayer wrote:TBH I wasn't really sure what the OP was aiming at. I would've translated "I know that you know" as Ich weiß, dass du es weißt 'I know that you know it' first, but then, since this is about relative clauses, I thought it was supposed to be the example for a headless relative clause and maybe idiomatic for 'I know that which you know', which is why I translated it as Ich weiß, was du weißt 'I know what you know'.Imralu wrote:I'm not a native speaker of German, but I'm positive that it's:
Here's a couple examples from The Guardian:
"There have been controversies, not least that which befell online giant Absolute Poker" (September 5th, 2011; "that which" is the subject of "befell")
"This raises an obvious question: do these epic photographs deliver that which they capture?" (July 1st, 2011; "that which" is the direct object of "capture")