Re: Verbs derived from noun cases

Peter Bleackley wrote:

> Suppose for each case of a noun, there is a verbal form, which turns
> CASE-X
> into BE-CASE-X. For example BE-NOM-X = "to be X", BE-GEN-X = "belong
> to X".
> How many cases would the noun need before verbs were no longer needed
> as a
> separate part of speach?
>

Hey, I was thinking exactly that yesterday.  Weird.

I was going with a number of affixes, similar to '-tuq' (eat), and
similar, in Inuktitut.  For instance, 'he is eating seal' is
'natsiqtuqtuq' (seal-consume-3s).

We'd need a number of cases, and a few affixes.  So, we'd have an affix
that turned a noun into a verb signifying transportation.  So,
'go-ACC-water'  means 'swim'.  However, 'go-NOM-water' means 'splash'
(in the former, the water is being gone in, the latter, the water is
going).  We'd also need a placeholder noun, to signify the simplest
forms of verbs.  So, 'go-ACC-something' simply means 'go'.  I don't
think you could do it solely with cases.

If we take, say, the North Wind and the Sun as a starting point (I love
adlibbing conlangs) :

ke u kelihamura ketoni o  le'hikudali meka kekalo ikemutlinhari
ke u ke.liha.mura ke.toni o le'.hi.kudali meka ke.kalo i.ke.mut.lin.hari
PAST ( NOM-north-wind NOM-sun ) say-ACC-argument about NOM-which
have-NOM-SUP-large-might

You see? The brackets, by the way, are clauses covered by an 'and' idea.