Test Sentences, 5

The next three sentences in Gary’s list have kittens:

15. The kitten jumped up.
16. The kitten jumped onto the table.
17. My little kitten walked away.

I have to confess that as much as I love cats, the Kēleni don’t have them. 🙁 I have not yet decided if the people who speak sodna-lɛni have cats as pets, but I think they will, by fiat. Even if it ends up not making sense. OK, so a word for cat and for kitten. Class II with the other animals….

idɛl for ‘cat’ and iddɨse for ‘kitten’. Those are motile singular forms.

Jumping is motion upwards, using tɨŋi.

15. iddɨse otni olaya.

16. iddɨse otni tɛbɛ olaya.

tɛbɛ ‘table’ is the destination. Destinations are always sessile.

17. leneya iddɨse ɨsa pɛstɛ.

In sodna-lɛni one would only specify ‘my’ in contrast with ‘yours’ or ‘his/hers’ or such. So I left it out of 17. And we have a third verb: pɛsi which means to move away from a required source. Since source is grammatically required, I added one, making “The little kitten moved away from me.” And it is in the sessile to denote that I didn’t send the kitten away. I am just another location in this sentence. Sources in previous sentences were motile, implying a degree of agency.

In Kēlen, using tūmse for the pet:

15. ñamma jatūmse rajōl;

16. ñamma jatūmse ra jatēwa ōl;

17. ñamma jatūmse rūjapēxa;