Re: describing names

--- "Thomas R. Wier" <trwier@...> wrote:
> Quoting Majken M <blueelkgirl@...>:
> > 1. Her name is Mary
> > 2. Her name is beautiful
> >
> > There is no way to be sure that she isn't called
> > Beautiful, except that is an unusual name. How do
> > other languages solve this problem?
Note that in writing, English distinguishes by use of
the upper case in proper names. Also, we can use other
verbs (than be): She's called Mary; She's named Mary.

> There are two points to be made here. First,
> different languages often have very different ways
> of indicating the copulative relation. Some, like
> most IE languages and English, use a fully inflected
> verb. Others (like Chinese)  never use any copula,
> use invariant particles in the place of verbs, or
> (like Phaleran) use a mixture of these: copulative
> particle in ongoing or habitual actions, fully
> conjugated verb in other aspects.
You can distinguish in Kerno with the verb "llamar"
(call or name) which couldn't be used with a simple
adjective unless that _were_ her name:

llamateor Marea = she's called 'Mary'
llamateor Bounita = she's called 'Beautiful'

Otherwise, all the other possibilites, like the
copulative, are indistinct in that you can't tell if
it's her name or not:

et sew nom Marea = and her name 'Mary'
et sew nom bounith = and her name beautiful

A more literary form would be using the instrumental:

nomena Morris, poz sa entrar cecueir uniwersitatte =
With the name Morris, she can get into any uni.

nomena bounith, poz ty ynsacar mais custumba =
With the right name, you can bring in more customers.

[Andrew Morris is the richest man in the FK, so
naturally his children could get in anywhere they
wanted.]

> Second, as has been recently noted on the list it's
> important to know whether your language has
> adjectives or not. Phaleran doesn't except for a
> handful of particles, and many natural languages
> don't. If your language requires all attribution to
> be through verbs, then your question doesn't arise.
Indeed. Talarian has no adjectives, so they'd use a
circumlocution like "hexonomataahti maasana" = She was
named in a lovely fashion (lit., she is named with
beauty).

The verbal morphology is trivial here (it's 3s active
punctual aorist); but the noun/adjective has to be
instrumental in this instance to convey the adverbial
sense. Using the nom./acc. would yield an actual name
(Maasanar); using the abl. or loc. would indicate more
the state of mind of the namer (i.e., the abl. would
yield "She was named after something beautiful").

> Thomas Wier
Padraic.
--
Aci ce Kernow le ouygaint mil, et savuriont y pherque!


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