Re: Knowledge-related roots in sabyuk

On Wed, 7 Aug 2002 09:23:43 -0400
"H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh@...> wrote:

> In Ebisedian, you can have several
> degrees of distinction, using optatives and imperatives:
>
> 1) uso'  kuta'me   eb0'         [?u"so ku"tam& ?&"bA]
>    <opt> listen<v> me<pronoun,org>
>    "Please listen to me." - _uso'_ is the weak optative particle, marking
>    the sentence as a polite request.
>
> 2) oso' kuta'me eb0'            [?o"so ku"tam& ?&"bA]
>    "I wish you would listen to me" - _oso'_ is the regular optative
>    particle, which expresses a wish.
>
> 3) 0so' kuta'me eb0'            [?A"so ku"tam& ?&"bA]
>    "I think you should listen to me" - _0so'_ is the strong optative
>    particle, and conveys a sense of exhortation or expression of opinion.
>
> 4) kuta'me eb0'!                [ku"tam& ?&"bA]
>    "Listen to me!" - here, no optative particle is used; rather, the
>    incidental inceptive verb is used alone, as an imperative.
>
This is a fine system. Is |kuta| related to french /ekute/ and/or spanish
/escut^Sar/ or is just a coincidence (of course you can keep your receipe
secret!)? I must confess that my favourite game around here is to try to guess
from which languages roots are borrowed, if they are.

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