Re: I luv u

En réponse à "Matt M." <matt_mcl@...>:

> > > If I may make a suggestion, make that sentence "I love you". For
> > > some reason it seems to be among very the first people learn in a
> > > new lang ...
>
I take "you" to be always singular.

In Reman, the direct translation of "I love you": "T'emu" (from the verb emri:
to love) is a little bit too colloquial. There are more romantic ways to say it,
like:

Degu ì kor a ti: I give you the (my) heart,
/'degu i'kOr a'ti/

or, in a very solemn situation:

Degu ì kor ad'ì purte dy ti: I give you the (my) heart to your purity.
/'degu i'kOr adipur'te dy'ti/

In Narbonósc (the language of Romantic love in Ill Bethisad if the powers that
be accept its application :) ), the verb "amâre" is the verb for romantic love,
and to say "I love you", you use an expression remarkably near to French:

(iou) t'aime (amâre is one of those verbs, like mourîre, which undergo vowel
/(ju) 'tEm/  weakening in their stem in part of their conjugation)

In Moten:

Koga bdan inu|n ito. /koga bdan inun_j ito/
means-I you-acc love-inf-nom be-present

or even

koga bdan invu|n ito. /koga bdan invun_j ito/
means-I you-acc love-inf-gen be-present

meaning: "I have to love you", "I can't stop loving you".
In both sentences the subject is not in the nominative case but prefixed with
the instrumental marker ko- (not really a case, more a preposition) to show the
lack of volitionality of the subject (he didn't want specially to fall in love,
but it happened anyway). Using the nominative case (ga bdan inu|n ito) would be
considered quite rude since it would mean that the subject decided to fall in
love, the object of that love becoming thus unimportant.

Finally, in Azak:

Vem-esh-as. /'vemeSas/
love-you.abs-certainty

The absence of a subject marking shows the lack of control of the subject, while
the contextual affix -as shows that the subject is sure of his/her love towards
the "you". Still, this expression is a little abrupt for a mark of love, and
adding the subject directly in the verb (the sentence would be "Vem-esh-ef-as":
love-you.abs-I.erg-certainty) doesn't work since it means that the subject is in
full control of this action. A good compromise is:

Vem-esh-as n-ef-ak. /'vemeSas 'nefak/
love-you.abs-certainty lexicalizer-I.erg-erg

The root n transforms the ergative personal suffix -ef into a personal pronoun
(to which you have to add the ergative case marker -ak to show its function in
the sentence). This way of putting the subject out of the main verb shows well
his/her lack of control, and thus lenghthened the expression is less abrupt and
ore elegant, perfect for romance :) . It is also a little familiar, but in a
love declaration familiarity is considered needed in Azak.

BTW, I just remembered that normally I kept all the posts of the Valentine's Day
thread, so if you want i can make a list of all the "I love you" translations
done at that time and send it to you.

Christophe.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr