Naisek –
A Constructed Language
Derivational Morphology
This chapter covers the remaining morphology, none of which is strictly
inflectional. It ranges from fully productive and predictable suffixes to
lexicalized derivation.
- Derivations Using Suffixes
- Productive Prepositional Derivations
- Demonstratives and Related Words
- Additional Suffixes
- Compound Words
- Adverbial Compounds
Derivations Using Suffixes
Productive Prepositional Derivations
The state-change suffixes are applied regularly to any basic locational
preposition; the resulting words are also prepositions.
| -ToS | -ix | to location |
|---|
| -FrS | -of | from location |
|---|
| -Via | -adi | via location |
|---|
Some of these are:
| Gloss | Loc. | -ToS | -Via | -FrS |
|---|
| at | u | wix | wadi | wof |
|---|
| in | dema | demaix | demâdi | demauf |
|---|
| away | jabo | jaboix | jabwâdi | jabouf |
|---|
Demonstratives and Related Words
- Most of the demonstrative stems are derived by incorporating pronominal
roots: 1(X), 1N, 2, Def (anaphoric),
Uns (indefinite), Rel (relative), and Int
(interrogative). This provides a greater distinction than is usual.
- There's a distal demonstrative stem jaf of unrelated origin.
- The demonstratives themselves ("this/these", "that/those", "yon", and
"which") are declined as adjectives and used as determiners and pronouns.
- The indefinite stem is not used for determiners and pronouns.
| Kesi kloba sorgiti. |
- "This house is big." |
|---|
- The same stems are used for translating "here", "there", and "where",
using the verbal derivation -(i)t (-Vrb) for
predicates and the suffix -me for nouns.
| Johan ga kesti. |
- "John's not here." |
|---|
| Johannar sata klohok tesme. |
- "Joan was living there." |
|---|
- Adverbs are formed by prefixing the demonstrative stems to prepositions.
Note that the form with u is identical to a stem + the
adverbial suffix -Adv.
| Johana ga lalba tesu. |
- "John didn't sing there." |
|---|
| Tomasa si asok besjaboix. |
- "Tom's going far away." |
|---|
- Possibly, however, the demonstratives can be used after the prepositions
and still lack case marking.
| Tomasa si asok demaix tes. |
- "Tom's going inside there." |
|---|
- The demonstratives used with time words are bes,
tes, and ces.
| Cesu soudo lalbata Tomasa? |
- "What day did Tom sing?" |
|---|
| Root | Stem |
Demonstrative | Locational |
|---|
| 1 | kes |
this/these |
here |
|---|
| 1N | bes |
|---|
| 2 | nes |
that/those |
there |
|---|
| Def | tes |
|---|
| jaf |
yon | yonder |
|---|
| Uns | otes |
| somewhere |
|---|
| Rel | des |
which |
where |
|---|
| Int | ces |
|---|
Additional Suffixes
Suffixes that make nouns into adjectives include:
- -(h)ib makes adjectives meaning similar to the noun
Suffixes that make adjectives into nouns include:
- -(i)cu makes abstract nouns
- -o(t) makes animate nouns characterized by the adjective
Suffixes that make nouns into nouns include:
- -(i)kke, the diminutive suffix
- -lbe/-obe, the collective suffix (the first form is used
after vowels and the second after consonants).
Compound Words
Compound words (excluding some borrowed words) consistently have modifiers
preceding heads.
Adverbial Compounds
- The adverb eb(a) "back" occurs in ebarkax
"answer" and ebasax "return".
page started: 2007.Jan.07 Tue
last modified: 2008.Jun.22 Sun
content and form originated by qiihoskeh
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