zompist bboard

0. Head-final languages usually have OV word order. In modern Japanese prose, it is near impossible for the object, or for that matter, anything but mood particles to come after the main predicate. This is unusually restrictive, in SOV languages. 4. Generally, adjectives (and genitives) come before ...

Japanese , Japonic languages Intervocalically: pa ? wa pi ? i pu ? u pe ? o po ? o Monophthongisation: (via [p] ? [p\] ? [w]) apu, au ? o: epu, eu ? jo: ipu, iu ? ju: opu, owo ? o: opo ? o: (orthographical reflex, <oo?) upu ? uu The most obvious reflex of this change is the Kansai adverbial form: (...

It is an absolute factual truth (bearing in mind the frame of reference, since it is "I") -- it holds for any temporal context.

Contrast "I was born 14 years ago".

So, I gather that aorist aspect is like oblique case -- anything else that doesn't fit.

The verbal aspect is how time flows in the event with respect to others. Therefore "time" in context of verbs is aspect.