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Re: THEORY ago (was: Most common irregular verbs?)

From:<veritosproject@...>
Date:Tuesday, January 17, 2006, 20:57
On the question about French and "il y a + time", another way I've
seen it is "time + en avant", literally "time in before".

As for my isolating language that I made up in an hour and that
doesn't have a name yet :), I would probably say "time + before" or
something like that.

In my very-much-inflecting-and-agglutinating conlang, I have a
temporal case.  I would probably just use something like
before-month-3-TEMP for "three months ago."

On 1/17/06, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
> Mark J. Reed wrote: > > On 1/17/06, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote: > > > >>But, with the best will in the world, I still cannot fathom how 'ago', > >>in its modern use, can be analyzed as an adjective. So far no one has > >>explained this analysis. > > > > > > I think the idea is that "three years ago", the "ago" is telling you > > what kind of "years" are under discussion, > > Sort of like "ago years", as opposed to any other sort? The 'full form' > "a-gone" could be used with 'to be', e.g. "Fours years are a-gone" = > 'Four years have passed'. But we do not say *"Four years are ago". It's > rather strained IMHO to call 'ago' an adjective. > > > and the adverbial > > relationship is merely implied. I could be wrong. It's not a very > > good analysis, in any event. :) > > Well, I think most of us are agreed on that one, so it's probably best > not to flog this aspect of the thread further. > > >>Meanwhile, it's interesting seeing how this is done Conlangs. How, just > >>out interest, does Esperanto do it? > > > > > > With antaŭ (=antaux if you can't see the last symbol; it's a U with a > > breve), literally "before". So "Three days go" is "antaŭ tri tagoj". > > Right - that's like the German method, I think. > > I have since discovered that Novial simply has 'X-time before now'. The > example given in 'Novial Lexike" is: "_multi yares ante nun_ = many > years ago." > > So 'long ago' would be: longitem ante nun > > > A more interesting question to me is this: how does Lojban do it? > I agree. > > 'long ago' is apparently expressed by _puzu_ from the two cmavo: pu > (time in the past) + zu (long time distance). the example I have found are: > {quote} > 4.7 le nanmu puzu vu batci le gerku > The man [past] [long time] [long space] bites the dog. > Long ago and far away, the man bit the dog. > > Alternatively, > > 4.8) le nanmu batci le gerku puzuvuku > The man bites the dog [past] [long time] [long space]. > The man bit the dog long ago and far away. > {/unquote} > > I've found an example of 'puzi' for "a short time ago" (Guess what the > cmavo 'zi' means!): > 4.2) le nanmu puzi batci le gerku > The man [past] [short distance] bites the dog. > A short time ago, the man bit the dog. > > But, altho I've looked at several sites, I haven't discovered what > happens with the Lojban equivalent of phrases like "three years ago". > (BTW I get really put off by the use of all terms like cmavo, bridi, > sumti, gismu, selma'o etc. :=( > > -- > Ray > ================================== > ray@carolandray.plus.com > http://www.carolandray.plus.com > ================================== > MAKE POVERTY HISTORY >