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I'm new to japanese and I'm having a hard time trying to figure what "彼女のいう天使に見え" means.
I don't know if the correct interpretation is either "She looked like an angel" or "She saw an angel". I'm not sure how ni particle is working here :/
For context purposes, this is the full description of the item:
王妃の聖女であったゲルトルードは彼女のいう天使に見え、その物語を知ったという.
Any help will be appreciated, thanks in advance!
Yes, I think your guess is correct :) Both can be true but in this context latter interpretation sounds more probable.
In normal Japanese に見える(ni mieru) would mean by 99% chance “she looks like...” but in literal, a bit old-fashioned Japanese に 見える(ni mamieru) means to meet someone.
Therefore the interpretation of the sentence would be, “Gertrud, who was a sacred woman (?) of the Queen, met what she calls an angel, and came to know the story.”
The sentence is very vague and hard to understand, maybe it is intended that this sentence makes us to think what it really means.
Related link: https://jisho.org/search/まみえる
見え is the continuative form (連用形) of the verb 見える.
The continuative form has several functions, one of which is to indicate that the continuative verb is relative to main verb. Therefore it is often used when the continuative verb is one action in a sequence of actions (or intuitions). You may be familiar with the how the te-form performs a similar function when listing a series of actions (i.e. V1～て、 ... V2～ました). So your example phrase could also be expressed using 天使に見えて. However, 見え is a little more formal sounding than 見えて, and thus is more likely to be used in written Japanese.
