Verbs
Incorporation is where I usually fail my langs. I'm not paying attention to it. It may appear but morphologically it is just positioning the object noun in the unmarked form before the verb.
All grammatical morphemes are suffixes.
The pattern
0[stem] 1[inchohative/cessative/voice] 2[aspect/negation] 3[mode] 4[tense/mood] 5[person agreement/imperative]
How the morphemes are actually joined is still undone.
"Long vowels" are morphologically especially tricky because sometimes they behave like a vowel and sometime like a vowel + consonant.
1[inchohative/cessative/voice]
Not handled now
2[aspect/negation]
There are two aspects: Habitual and Nonhabitual
But aspect is neutralized when negative.
Some verbs have unmarked Positive Habitual, others have unmarked Positive Nonhabitual. No verb thus have all the four values marked but all the values have a non-zero marker.
Positive Habitual -an (or -∅)
Positive Nonhabitual -uz (or -∅)
Negative -aenp' [ɛ:p']
(Would it be interesting if some verbs had the negative value unmarked. They could mean things like 'lack' or 'avoid'.)
3[mode]
The category of mode is optional. Alternatively, one can analyse that there is an unmarked "Neutral Mode".
There are three modes:
Potential -ucu
Necessative -uk'
Desiderative -eln(e)
It should be noted if the verb has Indicative Mood, the action is seen realis, i.e one does V because he can/must/want to do it. If there is Subjunctive Mood, only the condition (ability/need/will) is expressed, without stating anything on if the action really takes place).
4[tense/mood]
The slot has three values: Indicative Nonpast, Indicative Past, and Subjunctive (no tense defined).
Indicative Nonpast -∅
Indicative Past -(ao)l
Subjunctive -ed
With Imperative marker in the slot 5, either Indicative or Subjunctive can be used. Subjunctive is considered more polite.
5[person agreement/imperative]
There is only one paradigm for both intransitive and transitive verbs. It thus does not differentiate, if there is a sg3 object or no object at all.
The lang differentiates if 3rd person Topic is Proximate or Nonproximate. Nonproximate topics are usually inferred from the langauge-internal discourse, i.e. they are (somehow) mentioned earlier, while Proximate topics are usually inferred from from the language-external context, i.e. they are present in the place discussion takes place or are the speech partners family members or other ways identifiable. Proximate form is also used as a humbling form addressing your interlocutor. Proximate 3rd person is marked by -e instead of -a.
Code: Select all
Subject on the vertical line, Object on the horizontal line
1 2 3 REFLEXIVE
1 - -u-t -u/-we
2 -u-h(i) - -a-h(i)/-e-h(i)
3 -w-a/-w-e -a-t/-et -a/-e
IMPERSONAL -u-l -al-t -a-l/-e-l
Plural is expressed by Plural maker -dut
2nd person Imperative has no /i/ while Indicative does.