Re: N!à (was Re: question about (Navajo-like) vocab)

Trebor Jung wrote:

> Merhaba!
>
> Eddy,
>
> Could you please give me as many more examples as possible? I need em for a
> (poly)conlang of mine, and I'm totally stuck on where to start.
>
> Could you give me possible literal translations of these words:
> fish, child, house (dwelling place?), book (that which is made to be read?),
> rock, water, metal/money, berries, mountain (big hill?), lake, ocean,
> star/sun/moon, time?
Fish could be slick-animal-that-swims, book could be one-reads-it. The best
advice I can give you is to think of a verb that the noun does or possibly is
done to the noun. It probably won't be very specific, so add something to
clarify it, like an incorporated noun or derivational affix. N!à also allows
productive compound verbs(fly-battle, listen-study). To use an example, let's
look at a CD. The verb might "store". Since it-stores isn't very specific, a
verbal compound might be used, so it could be it-spin-stores. If your conlang
doesn't allow verbal compounds, it could be it-stores-data. Use your imagination
often.