Re: Basic vocabulary when starting a conlang

On Sat, Aug 31, 2002 at 07:48:18PM +0200, Philip Newton wrote:
> On 31 Aug 02, at 15:23, Roberto Suarez Soto wrote:
>
> >         What do you think is the basic vocabulary to start a conlang?
> >
> >         I was thinking that there are a few verbs that, because of its
> > everyday use or significance, should be the first to be "created": to
> > be, to have, to live, to die, to go, to come.
>
> Careful there. Some of those high-frequency verbs are used in special
> ways in English and related languages which you may or may not wish to
> duplicate. For example, there are a number of languages which need no
> copula (so "I doctor" means "I *am* a doctor"), so "to be" is not
> necessarily universal. Also, adjectives need not necessarily be
> attached to a noun by a verb ("The tree *is* green"); they could be
> verbs themselves (as in Japanese), or one could use a case construction as in
> Ebisedian. (I imagine that languages which have no noun copula do the same
> thing with adjectives; certainly Russian does -- "the tree green".)
In Malay (and Indonesian, I believe), that is precisely what you do:
        pokok itu  merah.
        tree  that red
        "That tree is red."

(Note that _itu_ is a demonstrative; in Malay, demonstratives come *after*
the noun.)

Interestingly, Malay *does* have a copula _ialah_. Just that it's not used
in such contexts. So the distinction is finer than just either having a
copula or not having a copula.

> Also "to have" -- the meaning as a full verb is possession, which some
> languages render by constructions such as "X is on me" or "X is to me" rather
> than "I have X".
[snip]

Ebisedian uses the equivalent of "X is to me". Of course, with Ebisedian
noun cases it is much more compact: "X(cvy) me(rcp)".


T

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