Re: Noun cases in Tirelat

2008/9/18 Herman Miller <hmiller@...>:
> Another lesser used case (dy/daj) is one that I haven't had a name for, but
> I'm thinking of "ablative". Typically, it's used for non-volitional agents,
> or the agent of a passive verb, which according to Wikipedia are possible
> uses of the ablative case in Latin, and I've also considered using this case
> to represent the "source" of an action (one translation of English "from" or
> "out of").
The Latin ablative is a merger of IE instrumental, locative and
ablative. It seems to me that your uses all fit the instrumental sense
of the Latin ablative, so that would be a more informative label.

> The last case (u/aj) is one that I've been calling "oblique", as it
> typically is not associated with a verb; its most typical use is as the
> object of a locative noun phrase.
>
> vë     lak  u      łivi žeġ
> LOC.SG over OBL.SG lazy dog
> over the lazy dog
I'd be tempted to call it genetive, unless you already have one that
you use for possessors. (Etymologically, of course, 'genetive' has to
do with origin or source, not possession).

--
Lars

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