Re: Subordinate clauses

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Barrow" <davidab@...>

> David says
> You may have missed something about my sentence
> Your sentence
>
> 'The dog that I saw that was with the man was green'   breaks down thus:
>
> the dog was green
> I saw (the dog)  (the dog) is replaced by the first 'that'
> (the dog) was with the man  (the dog) is replaced by the second 'that'
>
> 3 sentences so embedding 2 relative clauses
>
> whereas my sentence
>
> 'The dog that I saw was with the man was green'    breaks down thus:
>
> the dog was green
> I saw [that (the dog) was with the man] [object clause]   (the dog) is
> replaced by the only 'that'
>
> 2 sentences so embedding 1 relative clause
Wouldn't it be easier just to say "The dog that I saw with the man was
green"?  After my fervent posting on Wittgenstein, I feel unenergetic about
arguing this distinction, I'm afraid.  But I'll try to absorb your comments.

> The relative pronoun is not the object of I saw,  it is the subject of
> the object clause
It's still an infelicitous sentence that is confusing, especially with the
two "was"s.  I find it almost unreadable.  The dog that I saw was with the
man was green.   Your other sentence about the missing money is better
because it doesn't involve this ugly double copula.  And your sentence
below, because it substitutes who/whom clarifies the relationship (to a
person instead of an animal/thing) and introduces case.   When I said
"nobody" would say that, of course I was using hyperbole, and yes I was
appealing to spoken discourse; but I do believe that an editor of a formal
essay would call you on this sentence and ask you to reword it.  It's only
really interesting because of the super subtleties you are expressing in it,
but as a workable written sentence, I think it stinks.  I'm a stylist, see,
and Teonaht reflects that propensity!  :)

> If I swap the dog and the man and use who/m instead of that
>
> your sentence would be
>
> the man (whom) I saw who was with the dog was green
Point taken.  That's the problem with "that."  It doesn't have the case
marking that who/m does.

[snip]


> >If by "the man as companion" you mean "I and the man" who see together,
then
> >that would be: vyrm li kohs kelry hain uo le zef: "Green the dog saw-I
which
> >and the man.  The "le" article shows that the man is a volitional
subject.
> >A variant: vyrm li kohs kelsoyts, yryi le zef-jo:  "green the dog we saw,
I
> >and the man."  Slightly more emphasis on our seeing it together.
> >
>
> David asks:
> Why isn't 'hain'  after 'kelry uo le zef'  'saw I and the man' since 'I
> and the man' is a compound subject
Style, David.  Teonaht cares more about cadence and style than it does about
compound subjects.  "And the man" is tacked on, here, yes; this is
permissible.  That the article is the volitional "le" makes it clear that
the man is also a watcher along with me.

I suppose it could be put afterwards-- vyrm li kohs kelry uole zef hain--but
that sounds utterly abominable in Teonaht, partly because "ry" is affixed to
"kel."  That's why I preferred the second sentence: vyrm li kohs kelsoyts,
yryi le zef-jo.  Green the dog we saw, I and the man."

I think the problem with this exercise is that it forces Teonaht (or any
other language) to be what it's not: have the same density that English has
in some of its expressions and to express restricting or embedded clauses in
exactly the same way.  Teonaht regards restriction and emphasis somewhat
differently and possibly imprecisely according to English standards.  This
is because Teonaht has its own quirky laws that have to be obeyed.  This is
indeed a difficulty of  close translation.

Here's your verbum-pro-verbo of my sentence; I've added distinctions of
meaning in CAPS:
> translating 'vyrm li kohs kelry hain uo le zef'  word for word:
>
> vyrm  = green
> li  = the   NON-VOLITIONAL SUBJECT
> kohs = dog
> kelry = saw-I
> hain = which  IT, ACTUALLY, AND IT'S IN THE ACCUSATIVE
> uo = and
> le = the  VOLITIONAL DETERMINER
> zef  = man

> vyrm li kohs kelsoyts, yryi le zef-jo
>
> vyrm = green
> li = the
> kohs = dog
> kelsoyts = saw-we
> yryi  = I  in a tense? which one?  EMPHASIZED VOLITIONAL
> le = the  VOLITIONAL DETERMINER
> zef-jo  = the man + tense? the man + and?  AND
The much preferable sentence.

> >
> David asks:
> And if you translated my sentence in the sense I originally intended?
"The dog that I saw was with the man was green"?  Wouldn't be accurate, for
the reasons I explained above.  The closest I can come is: li kohs, elry ke
nelai pomil zef, vyrm elletsa.  Or... vyrm ai.  "The dog,  I saw was it with
the man, green same/ green it."  "The dog, I saw that it was with the man,
that one was green/ it was green."  I think I prefer my pithier
constructions.

Etsa is a great reference, it can mean "the first one we were talking about,
the same."

Hey.  Grateful that you're interested in Teonaht.  ;-)  Of course T. has
deficiencies compared to the subtleties of English.  And I am unpracticed in
this process of sentence analysis.  Perhaps I should adopt it; but a lot of
T. is built up by intuition and "what works."  But I'll try it.  You have:

The money has been found.
I thought the money was missing.
Ergo, the money that I thought was missing has been found.

Teonaht:
The money has been found:  Li nirrilbet aid nrinar uarretsa lis.  "The money
its finding PERF-same get."  "The money has gotten its finding."

I thought the money was missing:  "Li nirrilbet ry kare nelai ferrefib" (old
past participle, used in subordinate clauses): "the money I thought was it
lost."

Ergo:  Li nirrilbet elry kare nelai ferrefib; aid nrinar uarretsa lis.
"The money PAST-I think was it lost, its finding has same got."
The money I thought was lost; it has been found."

It can only really be done gracefully in two sentences, or rather, an
embedded sentence.

And as you can see, it's fairly analogous with the "green-dog" sentence:

li kohs(,) elry ke nelai pomil zef, vyrm elletsa
Li nirrilbet(,) elry kare nelai ferrefib, aid nrinar uarretsa lis.

(commas in there to express the divisions of the clauses.  Teonaht in its
own script is skimpy on punctuation)

And I think that does it for the day.  Have to go pay off my traffic ticket.
Maybe I have one more post.

Sally
scaves@frontiernet.net
Niffodyr tweluenrem lis teuim an.
"The gods have retractible claws."

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