Re: Complement clauses

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Daniel Andreasson Vpc-Work

<daniel.andreasson@V...> wrote:

> Anyway, I'm still interested in how y'all form complement
> clauses in your conlangs, so I'll repost this question.
> All intricacies are more than welcome!
>
> Here's how it's being done in Piata.
>
> "Lekituu eiloo luachishi ite."
>
> le -kitu -u     e-    ilo    -o     luachi     -shi  ite
> 1>3-think-PAST  COMPL-be:dead-PAST  thread/yarn-PEJ  DEM.SG.INANIM.
> 'I thought that this darned thread was dead.'
>
> Word order changes from SVO to VSO in the complement clause. The
> {e-} prefix introduces the clause.
Cool.  I like grammar-dependent word order.  Too bad I don't have
such a lang (yet!).


Jovian:

The conjunction |ud| bundles up clauses for use as noun phrases.
It's derived from Latin |ut|.

|Crezivo ud id flueme era mordun.|
[kre'zi:vA ud i fly@m e:r 'vArd@]
"I_believed that it flow was dead."

You can also use the ACI construction, though it sounds somewhat
high-brow.  Then again, that fits most Jervans just fine.

|Crezivo id flueme ere mordun.|
[kre'zi:vA i fly@m e:r 'mArd@]
"I_believed it flow to_be dead."


Obrenje:

The conjunction |tsi| bundles up clauses for use as noun phrases.
Although Obrenje wasn't intended to make excessive use of IE
concepts, this was a comfort I wasn't willing to pass up.

|Randuze u tse ponde pacie.|
[ran'du:Z M tS= 'pOnd@ pa'si:]
"I_believed (PRE) that is_dead the_thread."
(PRE = predicative case marker)

Obviously, Obrenje requires reported speech to mark its tense
wrt the time at which it was spoken rather than the time at which
it's reported.  It's basically identical to the tense that would
be used in direct speech.  Therefore |ponde| must be present.

One might also exploit Obrenje's cases to resolve the clause into
two objects:

|Randuze u pon i pacie.|
[ran'duZ M pOn i pa'si:]
"I_believed (PRE) dead (OBJ) the_thread."
(OBJ = objective case marker)

A real Obrenaj would front the predicative object, making the case
marking obsolete:

|Pon randuze i pacie.|
[pOn ran'du:Z i pa'si:]


Oro Mpaa:

The serial verb syntax of Oro Mpaa provides a natural solution to
this problem.  Unfortunately, I don't have my vocab online.  =(
With English glosses instead of Oro Mpaa words:

{I think+ course be_dead+}

Where + denotes the finite form, and {course} is the all-purpose
word "course (of a river; of action), case, thread, sequence of
events".  Oro Mpaa uses lots of nature analogies in this way.


-- Christian Thalmann