Re: Cases and adpositions

Matthew Kehrt <matrix14@...> sez:

>My lang, Evíendadhail currently has a huge number of cases, something
>like 20-30.  It also has no adpositions.  The way the language currently
>works, all things that would be adpositions in English or French (my L1
>and L2) are simply cases.  To put it another way, the language makes no
>distinction between the two.  The way one would say 'object A is on
>object B' is not qualitatively different from the way one would mark the
>subject of a sentence.
>
>How unnatural is this?  Are there any natlangs that do not make this
>distinction?  I am considering dropping most of the cases and replacing
>them with prepositions.  Is this more 'natural'?  Comments would be
>appreciated. ;-)
>
Well, Finnish has a bunch of local cases (6 out of 15). I don't know about
any natlangs having as many as 20 or 30. I do know, however, of a
constructed language (which is not mine) called "Maltsegj" which replaces
all pre-/post-positions with suffixes, also using suffixes for direct
object, indirect object of a verb, genitive, instrumental etc. So it's like
having dozens and dozens of "cases".
I suppose you could make a language where you represented the postpositional
particles of Japanese as case suffixes; you'd end up with a similar result.
Some words in Finnish are said to have MORE than the usual number of cases
(in addition to the usual 15 I've managed to find such as the Superessiivi,
Delatiivi, Sublatiivi, Latiivi, Temporaali, Kausatiivi, Multiplikatiivi,
Distributiivi, T. Distributiivi, Prolatiivi, Situatiivi, and Oppositiivi).
So there appears to be a bit of a grey area as to what is and is not a
"case", and what is a suffix or particle.

>I am considering dropping most of the cases and replacing
them with prepositions. Is this more 'natural'? Comments would be
appreciated. ;-)

Try it the way it is now first. Seems a waste to scrap a cool exotic
grammar.

NS

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