Re: An Excercise

Spoiler space, if you care...

The language is basically agglutinative.

Free:
fuso "wife"     no- -m -noka
musa "ox"       no- -noka -m
mana "arm"      -m no- -gika
wata "daughter" -gika no- -m
tata "father"   -gika no- -m
nanu "mother"   -gika no- -m
wala "horse"    no- -gika -m
noxo "head"     -gika -m
lama "soul"     -gista -m
pali "leg"      -gista -m
ruko "eye-glass/see" no- -gista -be -m? -si?

pika "clothe"   -t so- -noka
susi "box"      -noka so- -t
somi "wagon/drive" so- -noka -t -tu -be
pole "chair/sit" -noka so- -t -tu -be
dati "boat/sail" so- -nosta -tu -be
kulo "knife/cut" -noka -t -tu -be
hama "name/know" -t -gika -si -be

vito "food"     -nosta
lahu "house"    -noka
tigo "field"    -noka
soka "axe"      -nosta
tolo "spear/throw" -noka -be -tu?
nunu "son"      -gika
pimo "hand"     -gista

risu "hit"      -tu
riko "listen/hear" -tu -si -be?
lari "hate"     -si

bound:
-noka/-gika "my"
-nosta/-gista "your"
-m/-t singular (elided if possessive is present)
no-/so- plural
-be "tool for"
-tu verb, specific and intentional action
-si verb, ongoing or passive action
-k present
-lar past


Definitely some gender stuff going on here; some words take "no-" and
"-m" while others take "so-" and "-t"; of these, most M declension words
take possessives in -gi, while most T declension words take -no
possessives (with exceptions in both directions).

> can be translated: 'threw', 'my hammers', 'eye-glass', 'see', 'looked',
> 'my ear', 'axes'.
tolotular "threw"
sorisubenoka "my hammers"
rukobem "eye-glass"
rukosik "see"
rukotular "looked"
rikobenoka? "my ear" (or rikobegika?)
nosokabem? "axes" (or sosokabem?)


Neat exercise!

--
-=-Don Blaheta-=-=-dpb@cs.brown.edu-=-=-<http://www.cs.brown.edu/~dpb/>-=-
Modern man is the missing link between apes and human beings.