Tag: sentences

Continuing with Gary’s list:

92. At noon we ate our lunch by the roadside.

Hah. Already have a word for noon! And like any one-word time phrase, it can go in the source slot. And by the roadside involves a serial predicate. Since the food is also by the roadside dantɛndɛ tona, this works. Eating, by the way, uses ono.

92. lɨnanda lɛnna kye gogɨdiya tono dantɛndɛ tona.

Hmm. This could also mean “we ate the food that was by the road.”

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

91. A robin has built his nest in the apple tree.

Damn birds.

I have been thinking about the concept of building and making, and I think this uses the verb ɛmɛmɛ. ɛmɛmɛ is in many ways the opposite of evi, which means to emit (sometimes explosively), so ɛmɛmɛ is sort of “implode”. Sort of. More like multiple things come together to one thing. So, yeah, building and making fit with that. The structure of an ɛmɛmɛ clause in this context is S A ɛmɛmɛ (L). S is the “robin”, A the nest, and L the apple tree.

91. udle lomɨdɛn omɛt mɛdɛ da gadi dɛstɛ.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

89. The little boy’s father had once been a sailor.

This is relatively straightforward.

89. koda ɨsa ma soba sɛttɛ gɛdɛlɛ tilɛnya dɛstɛ.

So let’s do another:

90. I have lost my blanket.

Again, relatively straightforward. It is exactly like sentence 20 but with a source added to show some causality. Furthermore, the evidential bala is used rather than the zero-marked visual evidential as a way for the speaker (I) to distance her/himself from being deliberately responsible for the state of the blanket. That is I non-volitionally lost the blanket.

90. lene mudɨdɛn tɨŋi dovɨdɛn bala.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

86. Sugar tastes sweet.
87. The fire feels hot.
88. The little girl seemed lonely.

These all use ono and add a sense of “to me”.

86. buda le botsɨdi ono bodosɨdi bala.

One could also say botseba tɛndɛ bodoso bala. “Sugar is sweet”.

87. kɨbe le nolɨdi ono kyalɨdi bala.

88. lene laki ɨsa ono naddɛbal bala.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

85. The streets are full of people.

There is a construction involving evi prefixed with alamya: A alamevi D which denotes that D is filled with A.

85. ɛlɛna alamevi toni.

One could use this construction for yesterday’s sentences, but that would convey the idea that it is a bit unusual that the oranges are full of juice or the sea is full of salt.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

83. These oranges are juicy.
84. Sea water is salty.

These are simple N V ADJ sentences, and a verb of stance is fine.

83. dayi maŋi tɛndɛ kyeli bala.

84. agada daɬa kyoha bala.

The word for sea is agada and the word for water is gada and it would be infelicitous to put them both together.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

82. I am very happy.

There’s two ways to convey this temporary state. One uses the stance verb sɛdɛ with an adverb and the other the verb of motion tɨŋi with an adjective. I prefer the first way, but either one works.

82. lene sɛdɛ andabalya no bala.

82. lene tɨŋi aŋo andabal bala

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

81. A box of growing plants stood in the window.

Well, boxes don’t stand, they sit. And it’s in the entrance. And it’s flowers instead of the generic “plants”.

81. pede maladi eyoninɛn tɛndɛ edatta dɛstɛ.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

80. The spool of thread rolled across the floor.

This is also actually fairly straightforward.

80. bɛlnɨmɨdɛn ŋyoninɛn alamonnɨt lɛki bɛldɛnya dɛstɛ.

Questions?

Continuing with Gary’s list:

79. The west wind blew across my face like a friendly caress.

This is actually fairly straightforward.

79. soddɨŋi udan alantɨŋi ŋɛhɛ le go syana ma dalat.

In Kēlen:

79. ñi anūrān rūōrrie rā leŋē ālme honahan maxāna sakū;

Questions?