(L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here [2010-2019]

[Aevas]

This thread is for quick questions related to the forum topic; Post your question and hopefully receive an answer here.

Edit: Continued in this thread. -Aevas, 2020-09-06

[Maximillian]

In my conlang there is no morphological distinction between adjectives and adverbs. So, my question is, how to call a word that is both an adjective and an adverb?

[LetoAtreides]

An adjective.

Spoiler:

In Nolikan, there is no distinction between not only adjectives and adverbs, but also nouns. I call them all nouns, they have however an adverbial case. You may want to introduce such a case into your conlang.

[Maximillian]

An adjective.

Nah, there must be something more interesting! Qualifier, maybe?

In Nolikan, there is no distinction between not only adjectives and adverbs, but also nouns. I call them all nouns, they have however an adverbial case. You may want to introduce such a case into your conlang.

Hmm... What does cat+adverbial-case mean? "In a cat-like manner"? I don't think there is such a thing, cause it's just an adverb that way.

[LetoAtreides]

In Nolikan, there is no distinction between not only adjectives and adverbs, but also nouns. I call them all nouns, they have however an adverbial case. You may want to introduce such a case into your conlang.

Hmm... What does cat+adverbial-case mean? "In a cat-like manner"?

Yes.

There are also natlangs with an adverbial case.

[reizoukin]

An adjective.

Nah, there must be something more interesting! Qualifier, maybe?

I've always heard it called a modifier. Because it modifies.

[masako]

I am looking for any and all relevant information to the Ancient Egyptian language. Scholarly/Academic is preferable, please.

Thank you.

I also accept PM's.

[Maximillian]

I am looking for any and all relevant information to the Ancient Egyptian language. Scholarly/Academic is preferable, please.

Here you go:
Demotic Egyptian Guide
Historical Dictionary of Ancient Egypt
Conjunction, Contiguity, Contingency: On Relationships between Events in the Egyptian and Coptic Verbal Systems
A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian
Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs
Password: uztranslations

[Maximillian]

About possession. On Wikipedia it says that "The Yabem language of Papua New Guinea, for instance, distinguishes alienable from inalienable possession when the possessor is human, but distinguishes inherent from non-inherent possession when the 'possessor' is not human." What is this inherent vs. non-inherent possession, and how it differs from alienable vs. inalienable?

[Sankon]

Alienable vs. inalienable (A-I) possession depends on whether the possessed item will stay possessed by the possessor or will later be somehow unpossessed.

Inherent vs. non-inherent (I-NI) possession depends on whether the possessed item is a part of the possessor or not.

Take the sentence "I will have my dog forever." If you are distinguishing between A-I, "my dog" would probably be inalienable, since the sentence is trying to convey how the dog will never be away from you, and thus be inalienable.

But if you are distinguishing between I-NI, "my dog" would probably be non-inherent, as the dog is not inherently a part of you. If you had the sentence "I petted the dog with my hand", "my hand" would be inherent, as a hand is inherently a part of the speaker's body (assuming that the speaker has hands, of course).

You could say A-I depends on whether or not the possessed item will not be there in the future, whereas I-NI depends on whether or not the possessed item was there since the beginning.

[MrKrov]

What Proto-Indo-European root would Sanskrit vāṭa derive from?

[sangi39]

What Proto-Indo-European root would Sanskrit vāṭa derive from?

I could be completely wrong about this and it's just a guess but could it possibly come from *worto/eh2-. It's the o-grade form of *wr.to/eh2 which Sanskrit v.rti (enclosure) comes from and since vāṭa also means "enclosure", at least according to Wiktionary, it seems possible. IIRC the regular outcome (*rt becoming a retroflex ṭ and the first *o merging into *a: in the new open syllable) but again, I could be wrong. I'm not great with Sanskrit-related stuff.

[MrKrov]

'k. It's a start. Thanks.

[Maximillian]

Is there an example of a language that had definite article, but it fell out of use?

[Czwartek]

Is there a European language which has uvular stops?

[MrKrov]

No.

[masako]

No.

Wrong.

Firstly, which languages are considered "European"?

Chechen has /q/.

[MrKrov]

Wrong again. Isn't that just the easiest thing to do? Buy a geography book.

[masako]

If you consider Chechnya to be in Europe ((most people do) Southeast to be exact), then you answered the question "Is there a European language which has uvular stops?" incorrectly.

Accept it and move on.

[MrKrov]

And I don't. So I didn't. So suck it.