Legend: Definitions, Terms, <Text>, [IPA], -Tags-, and "Glosses".
The following non-standard terminology is used here:
The syntactical word classes are mostly decoupled from the lexical word classes. However, for some words (such as quantity words and pronominals), the lexical class is syntactically significant.
The main syntactical word classes are finite forms, attributives, case-marked forms, and particles; these classes are determined by the ending of the word, rather than by the roots or the derivational morphemes (which determine the lexical and morphological word classes).
The lexical word classes are verbs, quantity words, nouns, pronominals, and particles. These classes apply to both roots and derived stems, so the morphological classes are basically the same as the lexical ones.
Verbs include all the words that are scalar, relational, or both. Verbs are static or dynamic and univalent, bivalent, or trivalent. Bivalent verbs are either direct, inverse, or relational.
All nouns are essentially bivalent, being able to take possessors. The morphological difference between verbs and nouns is that nouns can't be inflected for aspect or tense. Nouns are count or mass, common or proper, and animate or inanimate, although these distinctions aren't morphologically significant.
A word is constructed from initial, medial, and final morphemes. The initial morphemes include the roots of nouns, verbs, and quantity words and the pronominals. One of the pronominals is null; otherwise, initial morphemes are non-zero. The final morphemes classify the word syntactically and are always non-zero except with a limited set of roots and particles. The medial morphemes, of which there may be any number, are derivational or inflectional.
A final morpheme is either a vowel V or a vowel + a consonant VC. Medial morphemes are all VC, except for a very small set of verb inflections, which are C. Initial morphemes all end in a consonant ~C; noun roots may end in 2 consonants, which must be preceded by a vowel ~VCC.
The final morphemes are shown in the following table:
| Final | Tag | Name | Group |
|---|---|---|---|
| special word | limited | ||
| -e | -Fin | Finite | other |
| -o | -Att | Attributive | |
| -an | -Agg | Aggregative | |
| -el | -Alt | Alternative | |
| -au | -Com | Combining | |
| -a | -Abs | Absolutive | cases |
| -i | -Erg | Ergative | |
| -okh | -Dat | Dative | |
| -ak | -Abl | Ablative | |
| -is | -Ins | Instrumental | |
| -ai | -Loc | Locative | |
| -u | -Gen | Genitive | |
| -or | -Par | Partitive | |
| -ee | -Voc | Vocative |
The pronominals are iniital morphemes functioning as pronouns, determiners, or both. They're shown in the following table:
| Initial | Tag | Description | Group |
|---|---|---|---|
| m· | 1 | 1st person | pronoun but can be appositive |
| t· | 2 | 2nd person | |
| v· | Incl | Inclusive person | |
| y· | Rfx | Reflexive | pronoun only |
| yos· | Rec | Reciprocal | |
| k· | Rel | Relative | |
| d· | SCT | Subordinate Clause Terminator | |
| l· | 3 | 3rd person, Definite | pronoun or determiner |
| · | Ind | Indefinite | |
| ch· | Q | Interrogative | |
| in· | Now | now, this (time) | |
| ul· | then, that (time) | ||
| dor· | last (+ time unit) | determiner only | |
| vel· | next (+ time unit) |
A K-verb consists of only an initial verb root with a null final, except that a form of the polar question marker -che PQ can be appended. Other special words are conjunctions and other particles.
| Word | Tag | Description | Gloss |
|---|---|---|---|
| men | Pst | past tense | "remember" |
| foi | Fut | future tense | "expect" |
| der | EN | epistemic necessity | "deduce" |
| gut | EP | epistemic possibility | "guess" |
| jak | DN | deontic necessity | "require" |
| roth | DP | deontic possibility | "permit" |
| thas | VN | volitive necessity | "want" |
| fin | VP | volitive possibility | "okay" |
| bor | direct evidential | "see" | |
| thel | direct evidential? | "hear" | |
| - | - | "" | |
| - | Hrs | indirect evidential | "informed" |
The following summarizes the order of medial morphemes:
| -(Derivation)- | -(Aspect/Tense)- | -(Voice)- | -(Polarity)- |
Polarity is last medial inflection.
| Medial | Tag | Description |
|---|---|---|
| positive | ||
| -en· | -Neg | negative |
| -es· | -Aff | affirmative |
| -ech· | -PQ | interrogative |
If no grammatical voice medial appears, the voice depends on the default for the verb stem's argument structure class. Grammatical voice doesn't apply to finite predicates.
| Medial | Tag | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -t· | -Pas | passive |
The stative aspect is possible only for static verbs. The habitual and aoristic aspects are unmarked on habitual and dynamic verbs, respectively. The following table shows the aspect, tense, and mood medials:
| Medial | Tag | Name | Group |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stative | aspect | ||
| -al· | -Aor | Aoristic | |
| -uk· | -Prf | Perfect | |
| -im· | -Prg | Progressive | |
| -of· | -Pro | Prospective | |
| -esh· | -Hab | Habitual | |
| -iy· | -Now | Absolute Present | tense |
| -ozh· | -Jus | Jussive | mood |
The imperative mood is formed using the prefix ji- Imp- on the finite form, with no aspect marked.
Proper nouns for persons all begin with the prefix bo- N-, which can precede a cluster.
Derivation is accomplished using only suffixing; syntactical means are used instead of compounding and incorporation.
The following derive nouns from verbs:
The following derive nouns from pronouns and quantity words as well as from verbs:
Kinship terms are medials appended to possessor stems.
| Female | Male | Collective | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Medial | Gloss | Medial | Gloss | Medial | Gloss |
| -amm· | mother | -att· | father | -aav· | parents |
| -uthl· | daughter | -ukch· | son | -uuv· | children |
| -· | sister | -· | brother | -ess· | siblings |
| -· | wife | -· | husband | - | - |
The plural marker s· P- is a quantity word.
Cardinal numbers are quantity words:
| Value | Initial | Value | Initial | Value | Initial | Value | Initial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | yav· | 10 | yaad· | 100 | yavotk· | 1000 | yavishn· |
| 2 | soy· | 20 | soid· | 200 | soyotk· | 2000 | soyishn· |
| 3 | duz· | 30 | duzd· | 300 | duzotk· | 3000 | duzishn· |
| 4 | nan· | 40 | nand· | 400 | nanotk· | 4000 | nanishn· |
| 5 | rey· | 50 | reed· | 500 | reyotk· | 5000 | reyishn· |
| 6 | shil· | 60 | shild· | 600 | shilotk· | 6000 | shilishn· |
| 7 | ther· | 70 | therd· | 700 | therotk· | 7000 | therishn· |
| 8 | vim· | 80 | vind· | 800 | vimotk· | 8000 | vimishn· |
| 9 | khov· | 90 | khood· | 900 | khovotk· | 9000 | khovishn· |
Compound numbers are formed highest order to lowest order all but the last number taking the aggregate final -an -Agg, e.g. shilotkan nandan soyo "642". Zero is pukh·.
Fractional numbers represent denominators formed from cardinal numbers. They're formed by appending the derivational medial -asht -Den to the stem of the last part of the number, e.g. yavotkashto "1%".
Ordinal numbers are nouns formed from cardinal numbers by appending the derivational medial -ath -Ord to the stem of the last part of the number, e.g. reedan theratho "57th".
page started: 2017.Jan.03 Tue
current date: 2017.Jan.15 Sun
content and form originated by qiihoskeh
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