is0'i eb3' l3li's nu co'mu d3 jolu'r Ke. keve fww't3 ebu' n0 kyy'kh du pii'z3d0 ve.chi'd0 ha~'3 ebu' ta pi'ly ebu' t3 milu'e chi'du ni sulu d3 juli'r. t3m3. tama ke.
eb0' taw'ma chi'du t3 0so' eba' milu'e. t3m3 ce. keve zukyy' eb3' chi'du jolu'r re.
icu'ro juli'r ha~'a fww't3 ebu' n0 chi'du d3n0 jibeogwmar33' di mizot0' Ke.
keve vi'ty ebu' t3 m3zot3' gii'j3li. t3m3 ve.
LEGEND ------ Line 1 Orthographic text Line 2 Word function. The first character indicates word category, and may be one of: N noun V verb 1 single-case particle 2 double-case particle X indeclinable particle The subsequent characters indicate inflections. For verbs, the first character indicates domain: (P)hysical, (I)ntrovertive, (A)bstract. The second character marks focus: (I)ncidental, (D)eliberative, (C)onsequential. The 3rd character marks aspect: (I)nceptive, p(R)ogressive, (P)erfective. For nouns and single-case particles, the first character marks gender: (M)asculine, (F)eminine, (E)picene, (N)euter, (D)ouble. The 2nd character marks number: (1) singular, (+) plural, (0) nullar. The 3rd character marks case: (O)riginative, (R)eceptive, (I)nstrumental, (C)onveyant, (L)ocative. For particles, a dash (-) is used where an attribute is not applicable. For double-case particles, the first 3 characters are the same as for nouns (above). The 3rd character marks referent case, and an additional 4th character is added to mark functional case. The 4th character uses the same character designations for noun case. Line 3 Root word(s) in lexicon form (as they appear in glossary). Separate root words are delimited by dashes (-). Paragraph breaks are marked by a double slash //. TEXT ---- is0'i eb3' l3li's nu co'mu d3 jolu'r Ke. keve fww't3 ebu' NN1L NM1C VPIR 1-1R NM1R 1--C NN1R X X VPIP NM1R is0'i ebi' le's ni jumi' di juli'r Ke keve fa't3 ebi' n0 kyy'kh du pii'z3d0 ve. // 1-1O VPIP 1--R NM1O X ni ke'kh di bis33'di ve chi'd0 ha~'3 ebu' ta pi'ly ebu' t3 milu'e chi'du ni sulu NM1O NN1C NM1R 1--I VIIP NM1R 1--C VAIP NM1R 1-1L 2-1RR jhidi' ha~'i ebi' ti pa'li ebi' ti mil0'e jhidi' ni sili d3 juli'r. t3m3. tama ke. // 1--C NN1L 1--C 1--R X di juli'r timi timi ke eb0' taw'ma chi'du t3 0so' eba' milu'e. t3m3 ce. keve zukyy' NM1O VPCP NM1R 1--C X NM1I VAIP 1--C X X VPDP ebi' ta'ma jhidi' ti 0so' ebi' mil0'e timi ce keve zoke' eb3' chi'du jolu'r re. // NM1C NM1R NN1R X ebi' jhidi' juli'r re icu'ro juli'r ha~'a fww't3 ebu' n0 chi'du d3- -n0 X NN1L NN1I VPIP NM1R 1-1O NM1R 1--C 1-1O icu'ro juli'r ha~'i fa't3 ebi' ni jhidi' dini jibeogwmar33' di mizot0' Ke. // NN1C 1--L NF1O X jibeo-gamarai' di miso'di Ke keve vi'ty ebu' t3 m3zot3' gii'j3li. t3m3 ve. // X VIIP NM1R 1--C NF1C NN1L 1--C X keve va'ti ebi' ti miso'di gii'j3li timi ve
is0'i Temporal noun. Marks past tense. Literally, "in the past"; but it can refer to something as recent as the English "just now". Whether or not to directly translate this word is up to the discretion of the translator. [CAVEAT: temporal nouns / tense markers in Ebisedian are usually not used except to establish the timeframe within which the text happens. Ebisedian verbs are not inflected for tense; but that does NOT mean sentences without tense markers are necessarily in the present time. Rather, the tense depends on the context established by a previous temporal marker.] ebi' 1st person masculine singular pronoun, "I". le's Verb, "to go". Note that the *conveyant* case is used for the person or thing undergoing the motion; the originative/receptive nouns indicate source and destination of this motion. ni Particle introducing a subordinate clause. See the relevant section in the concise grammar (and/or relevant sections of other documents). jumi' Intimate pronoun. See section on pronouns in concise grammar. di Subordinate clause terminator. See section on subordinate clauses in grammar. juli'r "House". Ke 1st correlative particle for dichotomies. See section on correlatives in grammar. keve Conjunction, "and", "and so". _keve_ carries more of a forward thrust than the English "and"; it usually implies a cause-effect relationship between the conjoined sentences. fa't3 "To see". Note that the originative noun is the thing SEEN, and the SEER is in the receptive. ke'kh Verb, "to injure", "to hurt". Keep in mind that Ebisedian does not have active/passive, and is free to omit any unnecessary noun case "slots" in a sentence. Hence, the case of the noun(s) that *are* present is very important in determining whether the noun is the one inflicting the injury, or the one suffering from injury. bis33'di "Person"; masc. "man", fem. "woman", etc.. ve 2nd correlative particle for dichotomies. See section on correlatives. jhidi' Distant pronoun. See section on pronouns. ha~'i "Surprise", or "confusion". ti Particle introducing a subordinate passage. See section on subordinate passages. pa'li "To plead", "to request help". Request is in the originative; the request itself is in the conveyant, and the requestee is in the receptive. mil0'e "To help", "to assist", "to perform a chore". The helper is usually in the instrumental case; although the originative can be used to indicate an indirect source of help. The assistance rendered is in the conveyant case. The helpee may be in either the conveyant or the receptive. The latter case is most frequent; the former occurs when the helpee is directly involved in the helping action (e.g., the grandmother(cvy) was helped to cross the road). sili Reflexive particle. Think of it as an intra-sentence, short-term pronoun. It is inflected for two cases: the first case is the *referent* case, which matches the case of the noun in the sentence that it is referring to. The second case is the *functional* case, marking its case function in the sentence. For example: pii'z3d0 tww'ma s0lu. NM1O VPIP 2-1OU "Man speaks to-himself." timi Marks end of a subordinate passage. See section on subordinate passages. ke Correlative particle for trichotomies. See section on correlatives. ta'ma "To speak". Case functions are analogous to that for _pa'li_. 0so' Strong optative particle. See section on optatives. ce Correlative particle for trichotomies. See section on correlatives. zoke' "To follow" (physically). The follower is in the conveyant; the followee is in the receptive. The destination, if present, is also in the receptive. Context will have to determine which is which. re Correlative particle for trichotomies. See section on correlatives. icu'ro Preposition, "in", "inside", "within", "at". dini Contraction of _di_ and _ni_. See section on subordinate clauses. This compound particle is used mainly for attaching multiple modifier clauses to a single noun. jibeo- Suffix indicating an advanced stage of something. There are 5 degrees of completeness: (1) origin, the beginning of a process, or just before the beginning of a process; (2) the first stages of the process, (3) the intermediate stage or (approximate) mid-point of a process, and (4) the advanced stage, close to completion, and (5) completion. gumarai' "Pregnancy", "conception". miso'di "Spouse". va'ti "To realize", "to perceive", "to recognize". The inner registration of the significance of what one sees. Cognate with _fa't3_, "to see". gii'j3li "All the mess", "all the happenings", "all that tomfoolery", "the whole shbang", "chaos". This is a bit difficult to translate in English. The basic meaning of the word refers to any set of convoluted events or happenings that is inordinately complex, such as the stunts one has to do during an obstacle course. Derivatively, it refers to any overly-complex or chaotic happenings, and from thence, "noise", "trouble" (of the complex, mind-bending, heart-rending kind), "problems", "suffering", "annoyance", etc., etc.. Furthermore, _gii'j3li_ can also be used jocially, sarcastically, as an interjection of exasperation, or as a boast (as in, "I overcame all those messy challenges!). There are so many diverse and often divergent and contradictory ways _gii'j3li_ can be used that one can only translate it on an instance-by-instance basis, by examining its context and getting a feel for the tone of the passage surrounding it.
======================================================
Ebisedian Crash-course Grammar (Revised for Relay 7)
======================================================
NOUNS
-----
Nouns have 3 attributes: gender, number, and case.
There are 5 genders: masculine, feminine, epicene, neuter, double.
- Noun gender always reflects biological gender.
- Epicene is used when the noun referent is either masculine or feminine
- Neuter is for genderless things and abstract concepts.
- Double is for hermaphroditic creatures and collective nouns referring to
couples. (Does not occur in present text.)
There are 3 numbers: singular, plural, nullar.
- Plural is often used as an intensive ("much" or "very").
- Nullar indicates the absence of the noun referent. Where possible, the
nullar is preferred over verb negation ("I see none-of-him" is preferred
over "I do not see him").
There are 5 cases: originative, receptive, instrumental, conveyant,
locative.
- Noun case is semantic, and operates according to the Noun Case Model (see
below). IMPORTANT: understanding how noun cases work is *ESSENTIAL* to
making any sense of Ebisedian.
VERBS
-----
Verbs in Ebisedian describe *state changes*. They do NOT describe a static
state of things; for that, nouns are used, and possibly, gerunds derived from
a verb are used. Verbs have 3 attributes: domain, focus, aspect.
There are 3 domains: physical, introvertive, abstract.
- Physical is for physical events
- Introvertive is mainly for psychological events, although it can also refer
to actions performed for one's own sake (similar to Indo-European's middle
voice).
- Abstract is for "collective" events (e.g. verb "to plan" is abstract; it
consists of other actions such as talking, writing, drawing, thinking, etc.)
There are 3 focii: incidental, deliberative, consequential.
- Incidental is for events that just happen
- Deliberative marks events that happened "for a purpose"
- Consequential marks events that result from preceding events.
There are 3 aspects: inceptive, progressive, perfective.
- Inceptive is for events that are starting, or about to start. It is also
used sometimes as an imperative (as in, "start doing this!", or "may this
start happening!").
- Progressive is for events in progress, either interrupted or simultaneous
with another event. It is NOT used for uninterrupted, isolated, continuous
actions; for that, the gerund is used instead.
- Perfective is for complete events, even if completion is in the future. The
progressive is only used when (1) describing "while X is happening, Y also
happened" (2) the event is interrupted.
NOUN CASE MODEL
---------------
Understanding of this model is essential to understanding the meaning of
sentences in Ebisedian. Every sentence fits in the following "mental
model":
Originative: the originating point of something
Receptive: the destination point of something
Instrumental: the thing fuelling the current action from origin to
destination. If a verb is present, instrumental often used as adverb.
The instrumental case of a gerund acts as a participle of the verb it
is derived from. Participles are frequently used to describe a
continuous, unchanging action. (Unchanging in the sense that it is
continuing indefinitely.)
Conveyant: the thing being propelled.
Locative: the place where the conveyant noun is in currently.
To visualize this, think of the conveyant noun, currently sitting in the
locative noun, having come from the originative noun, and heading towards
the receptive noun, being propelled by the instrumental noun (and verb, if
there is one).
This mental model applies both to physical descriptions as well as abstract
concepts. See also the section on Stative Sentences to get a feel for how
this works.
SENTENCE TYPES
--------------
There are a few distinct sentence categories which one should be familiar
with.
Nominator Sentence:
-------------------
Single locative noun or noun-phrase. Sets the topic of subsequent
discourse. Often used as a title, but also used when the speaker wishes to
make several statements about a single topic.
A favorite Ebisedian construct is: <locative noun>. kili <comment>.
kili <comment>. E.g., "That house. It is red, it is big, it has many rooms."
(_kili_ is the back-referencing particle, inflected for two cases.)
Stative sentence:
-----------------
Describes a continual state of things. Stative sentences do not have
verbs. Very idiomatic interplay between noun cases. Common idioms:
1) noun A locative, noun B locative:
A is B.
2) person A, originative; adjectival noun B, conveyant:
A shows forth B. (B is "expressive" attribute)
3) noun A conveyant, noun B locative:
A is in B. Or, B belongs to category A; B is an instance of A.
4) adjectival noun A conveyant, person B receptive:
A is a "receptive attribute" of B.
(E.g. th0't33 ebu' - I(rcp) am tall(cvy).)
5) thing A conveyant, person B receptive:
B is the owner of A (possession).
6) person A conveyant, person B receptive:
A is B's special friend / spouse.
Additionally, a verbal sentence (see below) may be turned into a stative
sentence by replacing the verb with a gerund in the instrumental case. The
arguments to the gerund usually appear in the same cases as they do in a
verbal sentence.
Verbal sentence:
----------------
Only used for events (changes of state). For unchanging state of
things, stative sentences are used instead. Verbal sentence consists of verb
with any combination of nouns. NOTE: multiple nouns in the same case has
"implicit conjunction": _A B_ = "A and B".
Noun cases are chosen according to Noun Case Model. Things to watch out for:
1) _fa't3_ "to see" -- the seer is in the RECEPTIVE, the thing seen in the
ORIGINATIVE.
2) _zota'_ "to look" -- looker in ORIGINATIVE, thing looked at in RECEPTIVE.
3) _le's_ "to go" -- the thing/person going is in the CONVEYANT; originative
and receptive marks the source/destination of the journey.
SUBORDINATE CLAUSES
-------------------
Because of the flat structure of sentences in Ebisedian, almost every noun
modifier has to expressed using subordinate clauses.
Subordinate noun-clauses are marked by the particles _ni_ and _di_. The clause
appears between these two particles. _ni_ introduces the clause, and _di_
terminates the clause. The clause itself may contain nested subclauses; it is
never ambiguous because the particles always match up. (In practice, however,
it rarely goes beyond two levels.)
_ni_ is inflected for number and case, which must agree with the noun being
modified.
_di_ is inflected for case. This case marks the function of the modified noun
within the clause. For example:
ni juli'r d3 biz3tai'.
(loc) (loc) (cvy) (loc)
"The woman in the house." (Literally, "the who-is-in-the-house
woman".)
Here, _ni_ (singular locative) matches biz3tai' (feminine singular locative).
The function of the modified noun (biz3tai') in the subclause is the conveyant
case, because _d3_ is the conveyant of _di_. Therefore, the subclause is
equivalent to:
juli'r b3z3t33'.
(loc) (cvy)
The woman is in the house. (See examples from the "Noun Case Model"
section.)
CORRELATIVES
------------
Correlatives are sentences parallel to each other, that either describe a
chain of successive events, or different views/aspects of the thing being
described. It is similar to the English "on the one hand ... on the other hand
...", except more concise and elegant.
Ebisedian has two kinds of correlatives: the dichotomy (equivalent to the
Classical Greek correlatives _men_ and _de_) and the trichotomy.
Correlatives are marked by correlative particles, which appear at the *end*
of a sentence. Dichotomy particles are _Ke_ and _ve_ (in that order), and
trichotomy particles are _ke_, _ce_, _re_.
OPTATIVES
---------
Ebisedian has 3 optative particles: _uso'_, _oso'_, _0so'_.
The weak optative, _uso'_, marks a sentence as a polite request. It
conveys preference, but without insistence: _uso' lyy's eb3' loo'ru_ --
"Please, I would like to go outside. (But I won't if you insist.)" It is
regarded as very polite.
The regular optative, _oso'_, marks a sentence as a wish. For example,
_oso' cwsa'n3 ebi'_ -- "I wish I were smart."
The strong optative, _0so'_, marks a sentence as an opinion, or a hortative.
It carries a flavor of insistence:
0so' 3jhid33' lyy's moo'ju. "They should have gone to the city."
0so' le's eb0'. "I want you to go away from me!"
0so' cu'm0 tww'ma esa'nu. "I advise you to speak to Esani."
It also carries an implication of want or desire for something to happen.
The strong optative may be considered to be second in strength to a direct
verbal imperative (marked by the inceptive aspect of a verb).
SUBORDINATE PASSAGES
--------------------
A subordinate passage is a group of sentences circumscribed by the particles
_ti_ and _timi_, respectively. It acts as a single noun-phrase in a parent
sentence. Note that there may be multiple sentences between _ti_ and _timi_;
they are collectively regarded as a single noun-phrase in the sentence.
***CAVEAT: Ebisedian convention fully punctuates such circumscribed sentences;
so that a sentence break is always found before _timi_. This should NOT be
regarded as the end of the parent sentence.
Subordinate passages mainly act as QUOTED DISCOURSE; as such, you will
probably always see them with the verb _ta'ma_, "to speak". For example:
mil3d30' tww'ma t3 `ymai'. ghi' jwb3? t3m3.
"The girl said, `Mother! where are you?'.''
Note that _ti_ and _timi_ are both inflected for case, appropriate to the its
function in the parent sentence. Notice here that _ti_ and _timi_ enclose two
sentences here. Note that occasionally, you may see correlative (or other)
particles following the _timi_; in such cases, they must always be regarded as
belonging to the parent sentence.
Another use of subordinate passages is to explain the cause or goal of an
event. Examples:
1) t0 jhit0' kyy'kh co'mu is0'i t0m0 cw'm3 g3ma'raa jhitu'.
"*Because she had harmed him before*, he (continually) thinks harm to
her."
2) b33'l3n3 ryy's jolu'r tu tww'ma pi'du tumu.
"The boy ran into the house, *to speak to (his) father*."
Notice that the subordinate passage is inflected for case, to function as a
noun to the verb in the sentence.
Be aware that sometimes subordinate passages may be NESTED.
PRONOUNS
--------
Ebisedian has an unusual pronominal system. It has first person singular
pronouns as usual; but the other pronouns are not divided by person. Instead,
they are classified as "intimate" or "distant".
Intimate pronouns are always used to refer to those whom the speaker regards
as close to him, on his side of a debate, in his "inner circle" of friends,
regardless of whether he is addressing them or not. Similarly, distant
pronouns are used for those he regards as distant and impersonal, regardless
of whether he is addressing them. Distant pronouns are also used in formal
settings, where intimate pronouns are deemed inappropriate.
Pronouns are frequently used as a form of address. When used in this way, it
establishes the terms on which the speaker will deal with the audience;
whether he regards the addressee as distant or intimate, whether he will speak
to the addressee intimately or impersonally.
The intimate pronoun may be (very crudely) understood as "my dear" or "my
fellow"; and the distant pronoun may be (very crudely) understood as "my dear
stranger" or "my dear opponent".
END OF CRASH COURSE
===================
This should be enough. If you need more information, consult the reference
grammar at:
http://quickfur.yi.org:8080/~hsteoh/conlang/grammar.pdf
http://quickfur.yi.org:8080/~hsteoh/conlang/grammar.ps
The lexicon is available at:
http://quickfur.yi.org:8080/~hsteoh/conlang/lexicon.pdf
http://quickfur.yi.org:8080/~hsteoh/conlang/lexicon.ps
While I was coming to your house, I saw a man who was injured.He surprised me by requesting me to help him in his own house.
I answered, "I will help." And I followed him to the house.
In the house, I saw in surprise his wife who was in an advanced stage of pregnancy.
Then I realized that the wife was in much turmoil.