Re: THEORY: genitive vs. construct case/izafe

> (Kind of like Nahuatl nouns that cannot occur "as such" ["naked" if
> you will]... there always has to be either an absolutive suffix
> [_xochitl_ "flower", stem _xochi_] or a possessive prefix [_toxochi_
> "our flower"] or some sort of plural marking [_xochime_ "flowers"; for
> other stems, there may be reduplication instead of a suffix].
This isn't true absolutely.  There are a number of words in
Nahuatl, such as _to:mi:n_ 'money' which have no absolutive
suffix, and they do not change when they are modified by
possessor or plural markers.

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier	       "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637