| Jeffrey S. Jones |
Swala jemor stor leikin cefklape linkwaripe kori fusbelum,
biyoku glohax har taujer swam jemum tai
kori hilum raxmigilum swam jemum joufam.
Stor hostin leikax fraspingo cefklape linkwaripe kori fusbelum,
juku darbitoku hil brumel taujelum talum.
Nage pyali jemli stwe gamlin kwim raxmigim;
stwe glohin kori tim.
Ga moldiki.
Every person behaves with compassionate concern about failings,
the heart of each person making him or her understand
about the virtues of each other person.
They try to behave determinedly with compassionate concern about failings,
the needs of their hearts being very important.
But few persons doubt one virtue;
they understand about it.
I'm not sure.
Note: Although I use ergative-type terminology in the grammar, Naisek is more of a direct role alignment language (i.e. the case of an argument doesn't change when the verb becomes passive) with some fluid-S behavior.
Naisek is an agglutinative language with some incipient fusion, and is mostly suffixing.
The order of phrases within a clause is determined pragmatically. The word order within phrases (when all types appear) is:determiner, quantifier, noun, adjective.
Nouns have implicit gender (animate and inanimate) and are marked for number (singular and plural) and case (only the absolutive, dative, ergative, genitive, and instrumental occur here). The partly fused suffixes are given below. There are different suffixes for vowel stems and consonant stems.
Adjectives, quantifiers (here), and the definite article agree with the noun in gender, number, and case. For all of these, the gender suffix (consistently -a for animate and -i for inanimate) comes first. The number and case suffixes are the same as those for vowel-stem nouns.
The only other declined forms occuring here are given in the vocabulary section.
The number and case suffixes occurring here are as follows, with the vowel-stem suffixes given first (if both occur in the text).
| Absolutive Plural: | -l |
|---|---|
| Dative Plural: | -li |
| Ergative Singular: | -r |
| Ergative Plural: | -la, -or |
| Genitive Singular: | -m, -um |
| Genitive Plural: | -lum |
| Instrumental Singular: | -pe |
Phrases in the instrumental case specify the means or instrument.
Adjectives can take a suffix -ingo denoting adverbs of manner.
Participles can take a suffix -u making the participle the head of an adjunct clause.
Class V5I verbs are regularly derived from adjectives using the suffix -(i)t.
The relevent finite verb stems are:
| -0 | basic stem (all present indicative here) |
|---|
| 1st person singular dative: | -(i)ki |
|---|---|
| 3rd person plural ergative: | -tor |
| 3rd person plural dative: | -twe |
| -ax | infinitive |
|---|---|
| -in | verbal noun (habitual aspect in compound tense) |
| -ok | progressive participle |
| A | adjective |
|---|---|
| ADV | adverb |
| C | conjunction or particle |
| D | determiner or pronoun |
| NA | noun, animate |
| NI | noun, inanimate |
| P | preposition |
| Q | quantifier or number |
| V#$ | verb, where # = argument structure class and $ = TAM class |
| 2 | Ergative subject, Absolutive object |
|---|---|
| 3 | Dative subject, Absolutive object |
| 4 | Ergative or Absolutive subject |
| 7 | auxiliary; subject agrees according to the content verb |
| P | basic stem represents imperative |
|---|---|
| M | basic stem represents present imperfective indicative |
| I | basic stem represents present imperfective indicative |
| bili | V2P | make (irregular) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| brume | NI | need, necessity | |
| cefkla | NI | concern, responsibility | |
| darb | A | important | |
| frasp | A | determined (set on doing something) | |
| fusbe | NI | fault, failing | |
| ga | ADV | not | |
| gaml | V3I | doubt | |
| gloh | V3I | understand (empathetically) | |
| h | D | definite article | |
| host | V7P | try (attempt) | |
| jem | NA | person | |
| jouf | A | other | |
| juku | ADV | very | |
| kori | P | about | |
| kw | Q | one | |
| leik | V4P | behave | |
| linkwar | A | compassionate | |
| mold | V3M | be sure of | |
| nage | C | but | |
| py | Q | few (plural only) | |
| raxmigi | NI | virtue | |
| s | V-- | copula (only in compound tenses) | |
| sw (singular) | Q | each | |
| sw (plural) | Q | all | |
| tai | D | 3rd person animate singular dative | |
| talum | D | 3rd person animate plural genitive | |
| tauje | NA | heart (metaphorical only) | |
| tim | D | 3rd person inanimate singular genitive |
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page started: 2008.Nov.27 Thu
last modified: 2008.Dec.09 Tue
form originated by qiihoskeh;
content copyright Jeffrey S. Jones.