Optatives (Was: Re: Making Lots of Money (no spam!))

On Sun, Jun 30, 2002 at 07:24:28PM -0400, Nik Taylor wrote:
> Christian Thalmann wrote:
> > Bottom Line:  Do you guys think that this peculiar sentence structure
> > is plausible?  "Earning wants-he a lot of money" rather than "Wants-he
> > earning a lot of money"?
>
> I seem to remember reading that only languages that are consistently
> verb-final place auxilaries meaning things like "want" after the verb.
> Altho, Uatakassi suffixes auxilaries (including "want").  I explain that
> as being incorporation, the head verb is actually made into part of the
> verb, just as an instrumental *noun* can be incorporated into the verb.
[snip]

In Ebisedian, there is not really a verb for "want"; instead, there is a
"strong optative particle", _0so'_, which indicates desire, exhortation,
or command. So, to want to do something would be rendered
        0so'  co'mi ...
        (opt) he    ...

There is also a "regular optative particle", _oso'_, but in this context
it sounds a bit wishy-washy: "I wish I could earn a lot of money". The
"weak optative particle", _uso'_, wouldn't make sense in this context: "I
really prefer to earn a lot of money, but I won't insist on it."


T

--
And life still goes on...

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