Re: Kench declensions (long), was Two YANCs: Para-British
| From: | Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Friday, June 9, 2000, 8:49 |
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At 14:46 08/06/00 -0400, you wrote:
>As I already reported recently, Kench is a language that has evolved
>from one of the Old English dialects, and most of its phonetic
>development followed the lines of the evolution of English rather
>strictly. One of the funny things with Kench (at least for me) was to
>see how different from English it can become, despite the above.
>
I understand the fun of it very well :) .
>Nominal groups in Kench normally include article or another
>determinative. Nouns without a determinative (except anthroponyms
>in Sg.) occur mostly in fixed collocations that resemble compounds.
>
It looks a lot like French then :) . In French too nominal groups appear
almost always with a determinative of some kind.
>1) Substantives and adjectives with definite article:
>
>a) Sg.:
> ‘the good day’ ‘the foreign language’ ‘the long arrow’
>
>Nom. ze goode day þet vremþ rerd zhe long streal
>Gen. þes gooden days þets vremþen rerds þer longhen streal
>Dat. þem gooden day þem vremþen rerd þer longhen streal
>Ac.1 þon gooden day þets vremþen rerds þo longhen streal
>Ac.2 þon gooden day þet vremþ rerd þo longhen streal
>
Can you give a hint of the pronunciation? I suppose the thorn stands for
/T/ (do you have edh for /D/? or only thorn for both?), and <e> in an
ending stands for /@/ (by comparison with other Germanic langs), but are
the diphtongs the same as English? and the <h> in <zhe> and <longhen>, what
does it stand for?
I suppose also that "day" is an example of a masculine declension, "rerd"
of feminine declension and "streal" of a neuter declension. Am I right or
completely out? :))
>b) Pl.:
> ‘the good days’ ‘the foreign languages’ ‘the long arrows’
>
>Nom. þo gooden days þo vremþen rerd þo longhen strealen
>Gen. þor gooden day þor vremþen rerd þor longhen strealen
>Dat. þom goodom daym þom vremþom rerdom þom longhom strealom
>Ac.1 þor gooden day þor vremþen rerd þor longhen strealen
>Ac.2 þo gooden days þo vremþen rerd þo longhen strealen
>
Interesting that plural is not marked on nouns in general (except in a few
cases). It's quite different from German at least.
>
>2) Substantives and adjectives with indefinite article
>(Sg. only):
> ‘a good day’ ‘a foreign language’ ‘a long arrow’
>
>Nom. o goode day o vremþ rerd o long streal
>Gen. ons goods days ons vremþes rerds or longher streal
>Dat. om goodom day om vremþom rerd or longher streal
>Ac.1 en gooden day ons vremþes rerds on long streal
>Ac.2 en gooden day o vremþ rerd on long streal
>
Interesting strong declension. Kench really looks more Germanic than English.
>In Pl., the indefinite article is not used. The construction with
>partitive article (see below) is used instead:
>
>‘(some) good days’ ‘(some)foreign languages’ ‘(some) long arrows’
>
>Nom. ot gooder day ot vremþer rerd ot longher strealen
>Gen. ots gooder day ots vremþer rerd ots longher strealen
>Dat. ottom gooder day ottom vremþer rerd ottom longher strealen
>Ac.1 ots gooder day ots vremþer rerd ots longher strealen
>Ac.2 ot gooder day ot vremþer rerd ot longher strealen
>
>
>3) The partitive article has neither numbers nor genders (formally,
>it is always in Sg.n.). The substantives and adjectives immediately
>follow it and are always in Gen.:
>
That's a nice idea, looks a bit like French again ("un peu DE vin",
"beaucoup DE gens", for instance). Was French a source of inspiration for
you or is it plain coincidence?
> ‘(some) white snow’ ‘(some) fresh water’ ‘(some) black soil’
>
>Nom. ot whites znaws ot vreshes weters ot zwarter yerþ
>Gen. ots whites znaws ots vreshes weters ots zwarter yerþ
>Dat. ottom whites znaws ottom vreshes weters ottom zwarter yerþ
>Ac.1 ots whites znaws ots vreshes weters ots zwarter yerþ
>Ac.2 ot whites znaws ot vreshes weters ot zwarter yerþ
>
>(examples in Pl. are given above)
>
>
>4) Some remarks on the declension of adjectives.
>
>The forms of adjectives that combine with the definite article are
>also used with demonstrative determiners. This paradigm is termed
>‘weak declension’.
>
>The other, ‘strong’ declension is used, besides indefinite article,
>with some other indefinite determiners like _eany_ ‘some, any’. The
>full Pl. paradigm is as follows:
>
> ‘some good days, foreign languages, long arrows’
>
>Nom. eany goode days, vremþ rerd, long strealen
>Gen. eanier gooder day, vremþer rerd, longher strealen
>Dat. eanim goodom daym, vremþom rerdom, longhom strealom
>Ac.1 eanier gooder day, vremþer rerd, longher strealen
>Ac.2 eany goode days, vremþ rerd, long strealen
>
>When a substantive has several adjectives with no coordinating
>connection felt between the latter, only the first adjective can have
>the ‘strong’ forms, while others follow the ‘weak’ declension, e. g.:
>
>om goodom warmen day ‘for a good warm day’
>ot vokener zmealen men ‘some evil mean men’
>
Quite interesting.
>Substantivized adjectives follow the regular substantive declensions
>for each gender.
>
>
>5) Some comments on the substantive declensions.
>
>The above paradigms only represent the most regular types for each
>gender. Some m. and f. nouns alter their stem in Pl. (e. g. _ze man_
>‘the man’ - _þo men_, _ze booke ‘the book’ - _þo beech_), some neutra
>take on the Pl. suffix _-er_ (sometimes with vowel change: _þet lam_
>‘the lamb’ - _þo lemmer_), and some masculines take on the f. endings
>in Pl. (e. g. _ze time_ - _þo timen_).
>
Like French "le grand amour" vs. "les grandEs amours"? (amour - "love" - is
masculine in singular and feminine in plural. There are a few very rare
words like that in French. But generally one of their number is hardly
used) Or do they only take the feminine endings and keep their masculine
gender? (I'd think that analogy would tend to make them really feminine in
plural)
>The personal names (Sg. only) that are used without article are declined
>as follows:
>
> Feminine Masculine
>
>Nom. Mary Peter
>Gen. Marin Peters
>Dat. Marin Petern
>Ac.1 Marin Petern
>Ac.2 Marin Petern
>
>
>6) Some pronouns:
>
> ‘I’ ‘thou’ ‘he’ ‘it’ ‘she’ ‘we’ ‘you’ ‘they’ ‘this’
>
>Nom. idge þouw hee hit hy wee yee hise þiss
>Gen. mine þine hees hits har ouwer yewer hir þisses
>Dat. meem þeem heem hittom har ouzom yewm him þissom
>Ac.1 mee þee heen hits hay ouz yew hir þisses
>Ac.2 mee þee heen hit hay ouz yew hise þiss
>
Wow! Could you give a hint for their pronunciation?
>7) Possessive pronouns coincide in Nom. with the Gen. of the respective
>personal pronouns. They normally follow the substantive. Possessives of
>the 3rd person are indeclinable. Possessives of 1st and 2nd person are
>mainly declined like ‘strong’ adjectives, but have a few contracted
>forms: _mime_ and _þime_ instead of *minom and *þinom, _ur_ and _yur_
>instead of *ouwerer and *yewerer.
>
>8) Case usage.
>
>Nom. and Dat. are used... hmm... as Nom. and Dat. Dat. can also follow
>certain prepositions (some of them can alternatively be used, with a
>difference in meaning, with Ac.2).
>
>Gen. is used with the partitive article, with some prepositions, in
>some types of quantitative and distributive constructions, and in
>numerous fixed collocations.
>
>Ac.1 (or simply ‘accusative’) is the case of direct object.
>
>Ac.2 (or ‘the old accusative’, or ‘directional’) is only used with
>certain prepositions.
>
Strange distinction between two accusatives... Where do they come from
historically speaking?
>Nom. and Ac.1 never combine with primary prepositions.
>
>
>Five cases, three genders, three articles - as promised. Historical
>comments are available upon request.
>
Yes please! Especially about the evolution of the case system.
Christophe Grandsire
|Sela Jemufan Atlinan C.G.
"Reality is just another point of view."
homepage : http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr
(ou : http://www.bde.espci.fr/homepages/Christophe.Grandsire/index.html)