the verbal system of cein

* The verbal system of Cein *

There are two types of verbs in Cein, basic and derived. Basic verbs
are typically monosyllabic and end in a consonant. Derived verbs
are typically disyllabic and end in a vowel. A special type of
derived verbs are the ya-verbs, which in Quenya ended in -ya. The
difference is insignificant except that the -idd suffix may be
dropped for ya-verbs in the infinitive.

The difference between the basic and the derived verbs is seen in
the past tense where derived verbs get an _-an_ suffix, and the
basic verbs get a nasal infix (or at least derived from a nasal
infix).

There are five tenses, two of which are actually a mix of a tense
and an aspect: present continuative, aorist, past, perfect and
future. There's also an infinitive and an imperative.

All sorts of weird things happen due to vowel-affection. Below
are examples of three conjugated sample verbs.

     BASIC          DERIVED          DERIVED -YA
     ceth- 'say'    toll- 'summon'   meid- 'put an end to'

INF  cedidd         tyllidd          meid(idd)
PRS  cuid           toll             meid
AOR  cyd            tyll             meid
PST  centh          tollan           meidan
PRF  eguid          utull            efuid
alt  guididd        dullidd          fuididd
FUT  cedow          tullow           meidow
alt  lleil cedidd   lleil tyllidd    lleil meid(idd)
IMP  cead           toll             meid
alt  a gead         a doll           a feid

In dictionaries, verbs are typically listed like this:

cuid - cyd - centh - eguid - cedow - cead

Traditionally the future is formed by adding the suffix _-ow_.
However, a new future is also on the march, but is still
mainly used in the spoken language. It is formed with _lleil_
'go' plus an infinitive.

I'm not sure which of the two perfect tense alternatives I
will choose. Both are equally possible (from _equeetie_).
Perhaps I could use one for the perfect and the other one may
have developed into a pluperfect. What do you think?

The imperative is most often the same as the present tense,
but context will take care of that problem. Sometimes a
particle _a_ (pronounced [@]) is added in front of the verb
causing soft mutation.

Some other verbs conjugated:

PRS      AOR       PAST       PERF     FUT        IMP

mad    - meid    - manth    - afad   - madow    - mad     'eat'

sil    - sil     - sill     - isil   - sylow    - sel     'shine'

tul    - tyl     - tull     - udyl   - tulow    - tol     'come'

llanth - lleinth - llanthan - alanth - llanthow - llanth  'fall'

I think this makes for an interesting verbal system. This
means that I have to rework the pronominal system entirely
since it was based on clitics attached to the verb, when all
verb forms ended in a vowel, which they don't anymore. Oh well.

So what do you guys think?

||| daniel

--
<> Math llammgalf! <> daniel.andreasson@telia.com <>
<>     Onth llamm! <> www.geocities.com/conlangus <>

Replies