Silindion Verbal System, Infinite Forms

Infinite forms are more prevalant in Silindion than a
language like French or English. The situation is
vaguelly like Finnish, and vaguely like Latin.

There's an Infinitive of course, which is the
Infinitive Stem of the verb.

It's use is basically as compliments of main verbs
like:

apheleisi yalle
'I sought to go, I wanted to go'
a_phel_ei_si    ya_lle
Au_seek_past_1sg go_INF

Aug = augment.

It is sometimes used after the particle  _ina_
which means 'nearing' or 'in order to'. I'm not sure
of the distribution of this particle yet. I have to go
back through the texts and see how it's used.

(In Old Silindion, there were many Infinitives, past
ones and present ones and future ones, and so forth.
They were formed differently than the Modern forms,
and won't be discussed here).

After the Infinitive, comes the Gerund.
The gerund is used as an action noun. It's used when
the verb is the subject of a sentence. It's also used,
with a case marking appropriate to the verb and
pronominal possessor suffixes to replace clauses with
_ta_ + indicative or subjunctive (usually indicative)

Example:
avavissi i lio ninmanye
'The young woman was rumoring that she would get
married'

a-vavi-ssi     i   lio          nin-ma-nye
Au_rumor_past  the young-woman
getting-married+REL-her

REL = relative case 'about'


The accusative gerund is also used with the verb
_siello_ (su-) 'to want', replaced _ta_ + subjunctive

sunu sinti tandan i nistari
I want the king to rule

su-nu      sit-ni    tad-na-n     i nista-ri
want-IMP.  1stsg-DAT rule-GER-ACC the king-GEN.

Imp: impersonal.

There are many more uses of the Gerund, but that's a
good enough list for now. The form of the gerund is an
-na added to the VERBAL STEM

The Conjunctive Gerund is used to refer to actions
taking place at the same time as the main verb. It is
formed by prefixing the gerund with i-. It is
frequently found with the particle  _ve_ 'as, while'

The Anterior Gerund is used to refer to actions that
took place prior to the main verb. It is not much used
in Low Silindion. It is formed by adding -ise to the
VERBAL STEM.

The Abessive Gerund is used to translate 'without
doing X'

Example:
emanahya, eisi nayello vorollo.
Without striving, I might not have won.

e-ma-na-hya       ei-si           nai-yello vor-ollo
AB-strive-GER-my  not-past-1stsg  might-INF. win-INF.

Ab: abessive.

It is formed by adding e- to the gerund.

The Participles are:
Present Active: -ani
Past Passive: -De

They are adjectives (and occasionally nouns...though
secondarily)

The Verb of Necessity, or the Adverbial Gerundive, is
formed by putting the gerund in the Dative Case. It is
used to express the notion 'I ought to find him' in
colloquial Low Silindion. It is usually replaced by
the verbs _ayathendiello_ 'to be obligated to' and
_thiello_
'to be necessary to, to have to' in High Silindion.

The Adverbial Gerundive has the theme as the subject
and the agent in an oblique (allative) case. It is
always used with a form of _iello_ 'to be'

ie pornanu sinta
'I ought to heal him'

ie  por-na-nu    sit-na
was heal-GER-DAT 1st-ALL

'He was fit to be healed by me'
'He was for the healing by me'

Elliott









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