Re: possessors (was: Re: More about the morphology...)

JOEL MATTHEW PEARSON wrote:
>
> On Fri, 27 Aug 1999, Fabian wrote:
>
> > >                    long form               short form
> > >
> > > my (inanimate)     -(u)darc /(@)d@Rk/
> > >                                            -(a)c /(@)k/
> > > my (animate)       -(u)tarc /(@)t@Rk/
> >
> > This morphology looks decidedly Arabic. Here is the Maltese version:
> >
> > ktiebi - my book
> > ktiebek - thy book
> > ktiebhu - his/its book
> > ktiebha - her/its book
> > ktiebna - our book
> > ktiebkom - your book
> > ktiebhom - their book
>
> Indicating the person/number of the possessor by adding a suffix
> to the possessed noun is actually extremely common.  There's nothing
> peculiarly Arabic about it.  Malagasy does it too, as does my conlang
> Tokana:
>
> Malagasy:    ny tranoko      "my house"
>              ny tranonao     "your house"
>              ny tranony      "his/her/their house"
>              ny tranonay     "our (Excl) house"
>              ny tranontsika  "our (Incl) house"
>              ny tranonareo   "your (Pl) house"
>
> Tokana:      te katiama      "my house"
>              te katiako      "your house"
>              te katiana      "his/her house"
>              te katiakma     "our house"
>              te katiakia     "your (Pl) house"
>              te katiasa      "their house"
>
> (Note that "ny" is the Malagasy definite article "the", while
> "te" is the Tokana singular inanimate determiner.)
>
> This strategy for indicating the possessor seems to be
> particularly common among verb-initial languages like Malagasy,
> as well as languages which were once verb-initial and preserve
> a lot of verb-initial characteristics, like Arabic and Tokana.
> But it's also widespread among languages of other types.  I would
> even venture to say that it's just as common as having a separate
> set of possessor pronouns, like English "my", "your", etc.
>
        What you said is strange. I decided to have verb-initial word order and
possessive suffixes, but I those were seperate decisions.

> Matt.
--
        Christophe Grandsire

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