Re: The Language Code

Hello,

> My current conlang research project (*grin*) has nullar, singular,
> dual, trial, plural, paucal and 'any-number' (the default without
> morpheme is 'unspecified number').  By default, they are all
> distributive(?), but they can be applied more than once, making all
> but the last one collective:
>
>    cat.PLURAL       =   (several) cats
>    cat.PLURAL.DUAL  =   two (groups/sets/...) of (several) cats
>
> The 'any-number' makes collectives without constraining the number,
> so:
>    cat.PLURAL.ANY   =   (groups/group) of (several) cats
Nifty! But doesn't that call for two separate grammatical categories?
you'd need these grammemes to be in complementary distribution to be of
the same category. Cf. Breton _lagad_ 'eye', _daoulagad_ 'two eyes',
_lagadoù_ 'many eyes', _daoulagadoù_ 'many pairs of eyes'. That's
treated as categories of plurality and duality in grammars.

Pavel
--
Pavel Iosad               pavel_iosad@mail.ru

Is mall a mharcaicheas am fear a bheachdaicheas
                 --Scottish proverb

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