Pazmat mk.II (NP: Roadmap for future posts)

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Chagen
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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: The Third Declension and The Imperativ

Post by Chagen »

Syllabic Expanding

Yes, I worked on the syllabics AGAIN. This time I've decided to add a little wrinkle to them that adds some irregularity to this lang.

Unlike the other vowels, syllabics do not gain a linking -y- when next to vowels. Rather, they simply expand. This expansion also applies, however, when the syllabic is next to its corresponding consonant (so something like -rṛ-). I'm just gonna give you a list of the possible situations, starting with the most common. I'm using ṛ as my example, and remember that syllabics sometimes expand to iR or Ur!

r + ṛ > rra
ṛ + r > ār
ṛ + i > ari
i + ṛ > ira
ṛ + ṛ > *arṛ > arra

The following are extremely rare/basically nonexistent, but if they were to happen:

rṛr > rār
ṛrr > ārr
rrṛ > rrā

The only one of these to ever appear really is the first, with something like dhanāna "I am stumbling", which is dhan + ṇ + na

To provide an example, take a look at the root jṛ- "to shiver", which is irregular. Irregular roots form the perfective by simply suffixing the 2nd-conjugation endings to the root. Normally this results in a linking -y-: śra > śrayū "he/she/it does", but jṛ-, with that syllabic on the end, simply expands it to jirī. Note that this expansion occurs after anything lengthening does as part of derivation or inflection.

To provide another example, the perfect active participle ending is L, -ṛt-:

wers- > wūsṛt- "having defended"
mat- > mētṛt- "having spoken"
gṛḥ- > garḥṛt- "having killed"
thi- > thawṛt- "having seen"
ṣṇd- > ṣundṛt- "having wandered"
dhṇ- > dhanṛt- "having stumbled"

But with roots ending in either a syllabic or consonantal /r/, something different happens; the final /r/ collides with the <ṛ> of the ending and the resulting <rṛ> combination expands to <rra> (or just <ra> for ar-stems and er-stems):

tor- > *tārṛt > tārrat- "having hit"
nar- > *nōṛt > nōrat- "having lived"
ver- > *vūṛt > vūrat- "having cheated"
dhir- > *dhaurṛt > dhaurrat- "having released"
jṛ- > *jirṛt > jirrat- "having shivered"
nṛ- > *narṛt > narrat- "having guarded"

A similar thing can be seen with the present passive participle, marked by B, -rīt-; for most roots, this is simple enough (and roots with final consonantal /r/ act normally this time):

wers- > wersrīt- "being defended"
mat- > matrīt- "being spoken"
gṛḥ- > gṛḥrīt- "being killed"
thi- > thirīt- "being seen"
tor- > torrīt- "being hit"
dhir- > dhirrīt- "being released"

But, with roots ending in syllabics, the <ṛr> combination results in <ār> (or <īr ūr>)

nṛ- > *nṛrīt > nārīt- "being guarded"
jṛ- > *jṛrīt > jīrīt- "being made to shiver" (passive participles of intransitives almost always have a causative meaning)
smṛ- > *smṛrīt > smūrīt- "being pointed at"

This of course applies to derivation too: irub- "soft", from ṛb- "hard (of form)" prefixed with i- "un-" (so "not hard"), jīman "woman" from jṃ- "bring to life" and -man, a rare suffix related to the common -an, narō "guard", an -ar stem noun from nṛ- "to guard", jhurratan "military", root unknown, but given the existence of words such as jhṛmū "order, command" and jhurō "commander" it's clearly a present passive participle of some verb jhṛ-, presumably "to command", making it "that which is commanded".

Verbal inflection is where this can get particularly tricky; to show off the differences, here's jr- compared to the "regular" irregular root śra- "to do":

Image

To provide another example, this other chart compares the two roots nar- "to live" and nṛ- "to guard", which are both regular. Despite looking so similar in their root form, they end up looking completely different when inflected:

Image

Also, comparing their participles (or at least the three I actually have endings for):

narar- "living"
narar- "guarding"

narrīt- "being made to live"
nārīt- "being guarded"

nōrat- "having lived"
narrat- "having guarded"
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Syllabic Resonant Expansion)

Post by Chagen »

More Minor Tweaks

Yup, even more. I'm changing nearly every aspect of this language in some way as I move on. I'm thinking of making a new thread eventually so this one doesn't seem so incoherent. Anyway, moving on:

First of all, -er stem nouns have been changed. Their indefinites remain the same. However their definites now use completely new case markers: -ir- for the singular, and -rau for the plural. Interestingly enough, -ir- is infixed but -rau is not: the definite singular and plural for narū "life" are narirū narūrau. Remember that the -rau of the plural breaks to -aw- before the dative: narūrawīm "for the lives".

Some -er stem nouns DO retain the old system however, where the markers are -o- and -yeṣṣ. These are, for whatever reason, almost exclusively masculine names (most -er stem names are feminine) like Zūjhramūyo or Braqūyo (compare the feminine names Śṛdirū Śreyamirū Narirū Vanirū)

Second, the desiderdative has been changed again. Now it's B, -ara-. Good grief I cannot stop changing this thing.

Next, I never clarified every form of the negative verb -i so here you go, conjugated in the first person singular because everything else can be gotten from that:

Imperfect: yina
Perfect: auvyī
Perfective:
Future: iyyī
Pluperfect: iṣruna
Desiderdative: irī
Perf.Desider.: iranī
Pluperf.Desi.: ivyayī
Potential: awiyī
Stative: ūbbī
Deontic: yaumī

Infinitive: i-

There is only one infinitive, which is used with all three other voices:

bādhvūya itṛ "lest (I) attack
bodhibāsya itṛ "lest (I) be attacked"
bādhaṣvāsya itŗ "lest (I) make (s.one) attack"

That last voice is the causative...you'll learn about that later.

Next, now adjectives formed with -(r)am can have nouns created from them! The noun is always an ablauting suffix in -an, which lengthens the -(r)am to -(r)ēm much like it does for verbal roots:

nidh- "big, large" > nūdhram- "satisfied" > nūdrēman "satisfaction"
jṛ- "to shiver" > jīram- "terrified" > jīrēman "absolute fear, horror"
bu- "be happy" > būram "overjoyed, incredibly happy" > būrēman "bliss, ecstasy, amazement"
vajō "tree" > vajram- "wooden, resilient" > vajrēman "woodworking"

Moving on, at least for now, the genitive now can act as an ablative, and by extension can mean "because, due to":

ṣundnātṛ danśtnāyīm eyū
city-DEF.SG-GEN countryside-DEF.SG-DAT go.AOR-3S
He goes from the city to the countryside

ḥrāsitavaṣrīṣṣtṛ zrawarīṣṣ narẓēyavyaṣṣi
terrorize-PTCPL.FUT.PASS-AR-DEF.PL-GEN name-DEF.PL.NOM bad-CAUS-PERF-3P
Our names have become worthless because of those who will let themselves be terrorized
(Lit. "Out names have been made bad, because of the ones who will be terrorized")

Also in regards to the genitive is that it is the genitive of a pronoun which is used when directly possessing a noun, not the possessive adjective of it. The possessive adjective is only used as a pronoun (i.e "mine, yours, etc.") agreeing with the noun in question. For instance, both of these sentences are correct and mean "I played with my friend (zrēyan)":

zrēṣnāva jhīṣrāva nartṛvyī
friend-DEF.SG-LOC 1S.POSS-AR-DEF.SG-LOC play.PERF-1S
jhat zrēṣnāva nartṛvyī
1S.GEN friend-DEF.SG-LOC play.PERF-1S

...But the second is by far the more common of the two. Actually, it's rather common to not use a genitive here at all and just say "I played with the friend" (the definite article here restricting the reference to one specific friend, with context filling it in that the friend is yours). However, if you wanted to say "I read yours" (let's assume it's a book; vegū), only the first sentence is correct:
krīyirūya vagī
2S-ER-DEF.SG-ACC read.AOR-1S
*kṛnāt vagī
2S.GEN read.AOR-1S

Of course, since the possessive pronoun inflects to agree with the noun it's referencing, this can be used to disambiguate in a way English cannot. Imagine that you're with a friend, looking for an instrument (xesar) and she asks you "did you find it?". You didn't, but you did find a knife (vauran) or a book (vegū) that you know is hers. You could say:

au, woḥīm krīṣrāya
NEG.INTERJ only 2S.POSS-AR-DEF.SG-ACC
Nah, only that knife you have
Or:
au, woḥīm krīyirūya
NEG.INTERJ only 2S.POSS-ER-DEF.SG-ACC
Nah, only that book you have

These literally translate to "No, only that thing of yours which is an ablauting suffix noun" or "No, only that thing of yours which is an -er stem noun". It takes context for her to know that you're talking about the knife or the book, but she at least knows that you didn't find the instrument because xesar is a syllabic-type third declension noun.

Moving on from the genitive, I'm christened the perfective with the alternate name of "aorist" which is why I've been glossing it in this post as <AOR>.

I have also changed exactly one verbal ending. The first-person plural exclusive in the first conjugation is no longer -zzir but -ẓẓa:

thiyaraẓẓa!
We want to see it!

sīprīṣṣtṛ yaśiruẓẓa, jhurarā, dṛk karaśēmnāsit, sīpnāya adrāya zgīnevyantu.
Thanks to our soldiers we had succeeded, commander, but without reinforcements we lost the following battle.
(Wow that is one compact sentence...)

////////////

Athematics have gotten a minor change. Going back to the super-early post on them, they underwent these ablaut patterns:

INDEF.SG: long root, inflections directly on
DEF.SG: short root, article -ā-
INDEF.PL: short root, inflection, then -vo plural ending
DEF.PL: overlong root, inflection

This has been changed to:

INDEF.SG: Monolong root, inflections directly on
DEF.SG: short root, article -ā-
INDEF.PL: Monolong root, inflection, then -vo plural ending
DEF.PL: short root, article -ī-

So there's that. The lengthening of the indefinite singular has been extended by analogy to the plural, and the definite plural no long has an overlong root, but simply the article -e- applied to it (since the historical stress always falls on the the article, it always reflexes as -ī-).

But what is this monolong root I mention? It's a very particular form of ablaut that is very rare, and functions not really with but apart from the standard short-long-overlong ablaut. As of now, only two things use it: athematics, and the causative voice inflection.

The monolong acts like this: the root is put in its overlong form unless this would create a diphthong. If it would, it gets put in simply the long form. <a>, <e>, <o>, <ar>, and <er> are the particular offenders, as they are diphthongs in their overlong forms. Thus, for instance, the root dhir- "to release, drop" forms the causative dhūray- "to make s.one release, drop", using <i>'s overlong form, but mat- "to speak" forms the causative mētay- "to make s.one speak", using just the long form.

However, it is acceptable if an overlong diphthong immediately breaks. For instance, geg- "to believe" forms the causative gīgay- "to make s.one believe, instill thoughts". However, se- "to have" forms the causative sayay- "to make s.one have, gift" because the <ay> diphthong can break. Likewise, the casuative of śtars- "to move around" is śtōsay- but the causative for nar- "to live" is naway-. This is called monolong ablaut because it happens to always result in a monophthong.

I am not even going to try to hide that this is because I think most of the diphthongs in this language look ugly in writing. <au> is cool and <eu> is too though that one is crazy rare anyway, but <ay ey oy> when bunched up against consonants like soybuna "I am learning" or gaygubbaṣṣi "they begin to believe" are just...ugh. I didn't mind it in Heocg but here it bugs me to the point of making few u-roots because I just cannot stand how they look when long, which sucks because I like <u>. Regardless, they stay because cool things can be done with them like getting ayam- from e-.

To demonstrate, what was once:

kārmi "with a blade"
korāmi "with the blade"
kormivo "with some blades"
koyrmi "with the blades"

is now:

kārmi
korāmi
kārmivo
korīmi

And, say, for yed "sword" you'd get yīdmi yedāmi yīdmivo yedīmi. That -e- article in the plural is connected to the ablauting suffix class -īṣṣ/īyy- (historically *-eppj), by the way.

This is important for two reasons:

1: It allows adjectives to actually agree with athematic nouns fully. Before they couldn't:

pīzva sensva "near a happy person"
pezāva sensāva "near the happy person"
pezvavo sensvavo "near some happy people"
payzva sensva "near the happy people"

Now they can:

pīzva sensva
pezāva sensāva
pīzvavo sensvavo
pezīva sensīva


This is really important for things like participles: when two or more nouns that are in different classes agree with participle, that participle defaults to an athematic plural:

Zūjhramarā Macavayirū urbnāya mantraḥarrāya śtōsayaśamīva...
NAME-NOM NAME-NOM stone-DEF.SG-ACC obstruct-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-AR-DEF.SG-ACC move.around-CAUS-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.PL-LOC
After Zujhramara and Macavayiru have moved the stone blocking them...

But if the participle agrees with nouns that are all the same class, it simply agrees with their class:

Zūjhramarā Zriyuvarā urbnāya mantraḥarrāya śtōsayaśamrīṣṣva...
NAME-NOM NAME-NOM stone-DEF.SG-ACC obstruct-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-AR-DEF.SG-ACC move.around-CAUS-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-AR-DEF.PL-LOC
After Zujhramara and Zriyuvara have moved the stone blocking them...

Vatrītirū Macavayirū urbnāya mantraḥarrāya śtōsayaśamūrauva...
NAME-NOM NAME-NOM stone-DEF.SG-ACC obstruct-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-AR-DEF.SG-ACC move.around-CAUS-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ER-DEF.PL-LOC
After Vatritiru and Macavayiru have moved the stone blocking them...

2: I have an idea in my head for a class of athematics formed with suffixes that undergo the same ablaut. This allows me to make them and still have them inflect in all four number+definiteness categories. One such example could be tanis, which would be tanūs tanisā tanūsvo tanisī or sṛthel: sṛthīl sṛthelā sṛthīlvo sṛthelī.

//////////

In the third-declension post, I never actually gave an intstrumental for those nouns. Indeed I forgot to make one entirely. Anyway, I've fixed that. It's -na, with the added oddity that it makes vowel stems have a long suffix: najṛna "with an adult", vipīna "with a try", on n-syllabics this has the anomalous ending -(ā/ī/ū)na: yājhītāna "with an examination (yajhītan, actually a fossilized nominalization of the passive participle of yoj- "to measure, test"!) ", yaśīna "with an act of heroism (yaśin, from yaś- "do heroic things, succeed, pass a test")", thapūna "with a smack (thapun, from thap- "to lightly smack")

There is not much else to say, though I have a few ideas still bouncing around in my head.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Syllabic Resonant Expansion)

Post by Chagen »

Participles

Yes, people, it's finally here: the participles post! These have been completely changed in like the last week when I tore them down and remade them completely.

Participles are verbal adjectives, which may simultaneously modify nouns and verbs while also taking objects. Each verb has six: participles can have one of three tenses (present, perfect, and future), and one of two voices (active and passive). All verbs form their participles with the same ablaut and morphemes, though the specifics of some roots will result in different surface appearances, as the syllabic resonant expansion post above already showed. The endings are:

PRES.ACT: B, -ar-
PRES.PASS: B, -rīt-

PERF.ACT: L, -ṛt-
PERF.PASS: L, -iv-

FUT.ACT: B, -aśam-
FUT.PASS: B, -avay-

At first glance, the endings here have nothing to do with the endings used for verbal conjugation, but the -iv- of the perfect passive and the -v- of the future passive are actually connected albeit distantly to the -ib passive formant.

Before we get into the specifics, we might want to review what they look like. The following massive chart shows off several different verbs covering all of the possibilities. They are:

-mat- "to speak", which is 100% regular

-tor- "to hit", which demonstrates what happens when the root ends in -r but IS NOT an -ar root or -er root (they're almost exactly the same as above except in the perfect active)

-nar- "to live" and ver- "to cheat" , which demonstrate what happens when the root is both an -ar root or -er root and ends in -r (if it ends in something else like wers- "to defend" it has completely regular participles). Ignore the causative shades of nar-'s participles for now.

-kṛ- "to fill" which demonstrate what happens when a root ends in a syllabic ṛ

-śṇ- "to carry", which exemplifies roots that end in a syllabic that is not the rhotic

-thi- "to see", which shows off vowel-final i-roots, which mostly act like normal vowel-final roots (a lot of linking -y-'s) except in the perfect, where their long -au can break into -aw- (vowel-final u-roots like bu- "be happy" are similar but with -oy- instead of -au-; this so long already that I'm gonna ignore them)


Image

The participles inflect like normal adjectives, but the present active in the 3rd declension indefinite accusative, genitive, and instrumental (I forgot to make one for this class but it's -na, by the way, with vowel stems long before it) has the anomalous form - arra- because normally these forms create the unacceptable *-arṛ(ṣu/bas/na).

With their formation out of the way, onto using them. All participles are thematic adjectives. They agree in class, number, definiteness, and case with their referents and may be used as simple qualifiers; though Pazmat participles can take entire clauses to translate:

jinbēn verarō "a cheating child"
vēgirū otavayirū "the book which is to be given"
qiḥāva thawivāva "next to the man who was seen"

najiddarat ḥīsṛtaddarat woḥīm kāna
adult-DEF.PL-DAT live.at-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-3RD-DEF.PL-DAT only know.IMPERF-1S
I only know of the adults who lived (here).

mi jirgnīṣṣmi sīpṛtrīṣṣmi gdataubivyū?
who person-DEF.PL-INSTR fight-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-AR-DEF.PL-INSTR kill-PASS.PERF-3S
Who has been killed by those who were fighting?

The future participles often have a sense of allowing. This often has a negative meaning:

najir zṇvaśamur
adult-INDEF.SG.NOM doubt-PTCPL-FUT.ACT-3RD-INDEF.SG.NOM
An adult who lets themselves be doubted
(lit. "An adult who will be doubted")

Participles may also be used on their own as nouns. Usually the adjective is in the -ar stem form:

ṣṇdararīṣṣ allā ūgya wṛthāya thawivyaṣṣi
travel-PTCPL-PRES.ACT-AR-DEF.PL.NOM many thing.DEF.PL-ACC beautiful-ATHEM-DEF-ACC see.PERF-3P
Those who travel have seen many amazing things

(All adjectives may be used this way, I could have dropped the noun for "thing" and just said ṣṇdararīṣṣ allā wṛthrīyya thawivyaṣṣi)

ḥuyavayarīṣṣ ḥīsnayyōya nidhōya seyyaṣṣi
choose-PTCPL-FUT.PASS-AR-DEF.PL.NOM civic.duty-INDEF.SG-ACC large-AR-INDEF.ACC have-FUT-3P
The ones who are to be chosen shall hold a civic duty

ḥīsnayyō is a rather uniquely Pazmat noun that literally means "the state of being a citizen" but refers to the civic duty to their country and city the Paz believe that all citizens should fulfill. Shirking it is considered abominable, to the point where the Paz have very large reservations to things like moving to a new town and the like (traditionally, a moving Paz would perform a religious ceremony called bentarat the purpose of which was release them from their current civic duty and bind them to their new one). The word is derived thusly: ḥes- "to live at (+LOC)" > ḥīsan "citizen" > ḥīsnī "civic" > ḥīsnayyō

Pronouns may take participles (they are considered definite athematics) as well. They're often used with plural pronouns to give off a restrictive sense ("those of us who X"..., etc.):

udhusī sepaśamā, olva gwenīsa; udhusī kṇsaśamā, kodhrītīm fejīsa.
2P.NOM fight-PTCPL.FUT.ACC-ATHEM-DEF.NOM upwards stand-IMP.PL 2P.NOM die-PTCPL.FUT.ACC-ATHEM-DEF.NOM sit-PTCPL.PRES.PASS-ATHEM.INDEF-DAT wait-IMP.PL
Those of you who will fight, stand up; those of you who will die, remain seated

With the very basics out of the way, I'm going to take a short stop to explain some of the intricacies behind participial semantics for special roots.
/////////

All roots take all six participles. This has two major implications:

1: Verbs with have intransitive meanings like "moan", "cry", "die", "rain", and the like can still form passive participles, even though something like "*having been died" doesn't make much sense. Well, their passive participles, as you saw a little earlier with nar-, have causative meanings: sarjiv- "having been made to cry", voystivrīṣṣva "alongside those who have been forced to walk":

īyam qa sunnōpṛtrīṣṣva woḥīm nōvūtṛ ḥīsam
go-IMP.SG and prostitute.oneself-PTCPL.PERF.PASS-AR-DEF.PL-LOC only live-INFIN-GEN live.at-IMP.SG
Then go and live amongst those who have been forced to prostitute themselves just to live

If the action in question is simply an unsentient thing that "just happens", like "rain" or "fall", then the passive participle can often have an applicative meaning or even a locative meaning: vajarā oycivarā can mean either "the tree which was made to fall" or "the tree (under/near/by/etc.) which (s.thing) fell.

One could also turn the verb causative and use the new causative verb's passive participle as well, which can serve to disambiguate the above situation: vajarā ūcēyivarā is unambiguously "the tree which was made to fall" or the "the felled tree"

2: Root adjectives may also form participles by dint of being roots. Their active participles can be used to show when something was that quality; the past and future are obvious, but the the present active, though it may seem superfluous, can give off a poetic flavor and can be used to give a gnomic sense:

narū nidhū "a great life" (normal adjective)
narū nidharū "a life which is great" (present active participle)
narū naudhṛtū "a life which was great"
narū nidhaśamū "a life which will be great"

The passive participles of root adjectives have a sense of becoming, not a causative one; "getting/becoming X'er" is often a good way to translate: wurfō jagrītō "a boy who is becoming strong" > "a boy who is getting stronger", bīntū naudhivū woḥīm "a problem which has only (woḥīm) gotten bigger", etc. To get a causative sense, you must form that root adjective's causative verb and then use its passive participles: wurfō jēgaṣrītō "a boy who is made to get stronger".

Derived adjectives of course can not benefit from this at all.

/////////////

The negative verb i-'s participles* are used with participles to negate them much like its infinitive negates other infinitives. However, its participles always agree in every way possible with the negated participle.

*yar- irit- awṛt- awiv- yaś- yav-

Going back to using participles, they may be used alone to add information to a sentence, many times taking different case forms depending on their usage. When like this they are usually inflected as athematic singulars, sometimes definite, sometimes indefinite. If they are agreeing with something though they are whatever class that thing is.

First of all, the dative can be used to adverbially modify actions like any regular adjective; this is most common with certain verbs like bent- "to stop", and the participle is indefinite:

kajarīm bīntevyī qa ḥesrāsam eyī
drink-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-INDEF.SG-DAT stop.PERF-1S and house-DEF.SG-ABLOC go.AOR-1S
I stopped drinking and went out of the house

vīritnāva ḥesarīm vatēyyī sīmma sadhva mūtṛ marjhnāya śṛśnarḥī
apartment-DEF.SG-LOC live-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DAT
I will continue to live in this apartment until I can find a better job
(lit. "I will look towards living in this apartment until I can find a job which is at being good")

With an instrumental participle, you can make an absolutive clause. This can be used to express an action before/after the main verb; the participle agrees in class and number with whatever the subject is (pronouns are athematic definites) BUT NOT case:

kādhṛtāmi Urbnāyīm fījevyū
sit-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-DEF-INSTR NAME-DAT wait.PERF-3S
Having sat down, she waited for Urbana
After sitting down, she waited for Urbana

Kūraseṣu mūlēyavyī karayaśamāmi Madharirūya jrūqīxīṣṣmi
NAME-ACC lie.down-CAUS.PERF-1S fill-CAUS-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ATHEM-DEF-INSTR NAME-ACC water.jar-DEF.PL-INSTR
I made Kurasi lie down and then had Madharirū replenish the water jars
I made Kurasi lie down before having Madharirū replenish the water jars

This sentence has two tricky things about it: since the speaker is still the subject of the second clause (which happens to be a causative sentence), the participle karayaśamāmi is athematic to agree with them (since "I" is considered an athematic definite in Pazmat). In addition, the word jrūqīxīṣṣmi "water jars" is instrumental, but it is not agreeing with the participle and is indeed the object of the second clause: causative sentences put their displaced object in the instrumental.

With just a few changes, this sentence could mean something entirely different: Kūraseṣu mūlēyavyī karayaśamirūmi Madharirū jrūqīxīṣṣmi: "I made Kurasi lie down and then Madharirū made me replenish the water jars"


Zūjhramarā bādhivrāmi, urva śrayarīm vētvūya awiyaśva
NAME-NOM hurt-PTCPL-PERF.PASS-AR-DEF.SG-INSTR always do-PTCPL-PRES.ACT-DAT look-INFIN-ACC NEG.POT-1S.INCL
With Zujhramara injured, there's no way we can continue to do this

uḥḥīm murasāna klurēḥivāmi, nidhīm seuram yēna...
before dumbass-DEF.SG-INSTR dispose-PTCPL-PERF.PASS-DEF-INSTR large-DAT suspicious be.IMPER-1S
Having been abandoned before by that jackass, I'm pretty suspicious...

qrāsraḥarīmi jhāṣ wersirūyīm źāthovyaṣṣi
fear.for.ones.life-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.PL-INSTR 1S.ACC protection-DEF.SG-DAT pay.PERF-3P
Fearing for their lives, they paid me for protection

The privative provides a short way of negating this:

glīsrāya drēḥṛtrāsit jimanā bobodh
warning-DEF.SG-ACC hear-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-AR-DEF.SG-PRIV woman-DEF.SG.NOM vulnerable
Having not heard the warning that woman is vulnerable

śnṛḥavayāsit mētnīyyīm Nūdhrēmnāya sīyēyam
discover-PTCPL.FUT.PASS-ATHEM-DEF.SG-PRIV word-DEF.PL-DAT NAME-ACC have-CAUS-IMP.SG
Go and deliver these words to Nudhremana without being caught
(Lit. "Without being caught (in the future) cause Nudhremana to have these words")

///////////

A future participle can be used in a copular sentence to give off a vague sense of obligation (cf. Latin's gerundive) e.g narō adwar nruḥavayō "A guard is to be sent (lit. thrown) tomorrow" i.e "A guard must be sent tomorrow", but this is can also be expressed with the construction ḥṛsū na [clause] e.g ḥṛsū na narō adwar nruḥibauyyū, literally "It is needed that a guard is sent tomorrow".

/////////////

The locative has one of the most important uses: it denotes, depending on the tense, either before an action, after an action, or during an action. The locative present participle usually means "while/when X'ing":

ḥuyirū jīmnīṣṣmi arsrītirūva, mūrdēmnāmi allirūmi mṛjhaṣṣi, kāraddmusi dūramuddmusi allu
statue-DEF.SG-NOM woman-DEF.PL-INSTR make-PTCPL.PRES.PASS-ER-DEF.SG-LOC precision-DEF.SG-INSTR absolute-ER-DEF.SG-INSTR work.AOR-3P cut-DEF.PL-PRIV unnecessary-3RD-DEF.PL-PRIV INTENSIVE
While the statue is being crafted by the women, they work with absolute precision, without any unnecessary cuts

Gṛddhrōmāva ḥesarāva vajrēmnāya slūyevyī
NAME-LOC live-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC woodworking-DEF.SG-ACC study.PERF-1S
While living in Grdhhroma I studied woodworking
I studied woodworking while I was living in Grddhroma

The past participle in the locative often means "before":

Kansṛtāva selqtāva ṣṇdarana
die-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC world-DEF.SG-LOC travel-DESI-1S
Before I die, I want to travel the world

Būramusī Māksrīṣrāmi vūyivusaram aṣīṣ awur zanvṇvyū
NAME-NOM NAME-INSTR cheat-PTCPL.PERF.PASS-3RD-DEF.SG-LOC 1P.INCL-ACC never doubt.PERF-3S
Before Buramusi was cheated by Maksriyara she had never doubted us

The future participle has the sense of "after":

Kwitrāva breqaśamāva jṛgōya nṛẓōya sayubbī
room-DEF.SG-LOC enter-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC feeling-INDEF.SG-ACC bad-AR-INDEF.SG-ACC have.STAT-1S
After I had entered the room I got a bad feeling

Ātrīḥarā kādhayavaṣrāva nucīm garḥam
NAME-NOM sit-CAUS-PTCPL.FUT.PASS-AR-DEF.SG-LOC quick-DAT kill.IMP.SG
After Atrihara has been seated kill (her) quickly

The ablocative can be used to negate these in a short way, but note that it often has a negative feeling e.g garḥṛtāsam is "before (he/she) doesn't kill..." literally, but has a sense more of "before (he/she) fails to kill..."

////////////

One very important use is for relative clauses. Yeah, remember that genitive-infinitive construction a few posts up? That is less common than this method, and is indeed on the way out except in super-formal speech.

Forming a participial relative clause is easy: you just...use the participle like a normal adjective with any arguments of the relative clause inbetween the noun and the participle. If there are no other arguments then it looks exactly like a normal attributive participle. In other words, where English says "The man who sees the boy" and "The girl who ran to the store", Pazmat says "The man, seeing the boy" and "The girl, having run to the store" (in this last case, the literal English translation sounds like an absolutive but we already have seen that that would require an instrumental participle in Pazmat):

Royī na wurfōya, ūṣrāya kthreyarōya,otot
want.AOR-1S=SUB boy-INDEF.SG-ACC nothing-DEF.SG-ACC fear-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-AR-INDEF.SG-AC bring.AOR-2S
I want you to bring me a boy who fears nothing
(lit. "I want that you give a boy, fearing nothing")

However, remember this: Pazmat does not like to have a nominative in the relative clause. For instance, let's say you have the sentence "The woman sold the bag" and you wanted to relativize "the bag". In English you can just say "The car sold by the woman" or "The car which the woman sold" but Pazmat hates this. To explain this hatred, let's try copying English:

*(?)Kṛtirū, jimanā soynṛtirū
bag-DEF.SG.NOM woman-DEF.SG-NOM sell-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-ER-DEF.SG.NOM

Seems simple enough...but who or what should the participle agree with? At first you would assume that it should agree with "bag", like it does above, since "bag" is the thing being relativized...but "woman" is the actual subject of the participial clause! Then maybe it should agree with it (...soynṛtarā)?

Well, rather than deal with that mess, Pazmat just forces the original object to be the subject of the relative clause through passivization. In other words, Pazmat almost always prefers to say "The bag which was sold by the woman":

Kṛtirū, jimnāmi soynivirū
bag-DEF.SG.NOM woman-DEF.SG-INSTR sell-PTCPL.PERF.PASS-ER-DEF.SG.NOM

Unfortunately we run into a problem here. This method can only relativize nominatives and accusatives. Anything above requires the genitive-infinitive construction...if it weren't for a new construction which blends the two. Said construction has only existed for about 100 years (barely any time linguistics-wise). It involves simply using the relative pronoun uźa and then making an entirely new relative clause after it (using the participial method). So we can take this clause:

cṛsū frēthōva gwīnevyū
girl-INDEF.SG.NOM river-INDEF.SG-LOC stand.PERF-3S
A girl was standing by a river

And relativize "river" like so:

frēthō, uźav cṛsū gwīnṛtū
river-INDEF.SG.NOM rel-LOC girl-INDEF.SG.NOM stand-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-ER-INDEF.SG.NOM
A river by which a girl was standing
(lit. "A river, a girl having stood by which")

Another example, this time in a full-on sentence:

narōyīm uźat mūrdēmnāya draḥaśamā matarana
guard-INDEF.SG-DAT rel-GEN truth-DEF.SG-ACC hear-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG.NOM speak-DESI-1S
I wish to speak with a guard from whom (I) will hear the truth

///////////

Oh my god I've finally finished this. INCREDIBLE.

Like always I have no real idea where I'll go from here.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Participles)

Post by Chagen »

The Causative

Alongside the passive formant -ib, the causative formant in -ay holds special place in the realm of Pazmat formants, as it can show up on any verb, even those which have already taken a formant. In reality, it shares its semantic space with another formant, -it, already mentioned a long while ago. However, the difference between the two lies in their semantics. -it (which may randomly lengthen the root) generally makes a verb with a special meaning slightly removed from the basic sense of "cause to [verb]". For instance, the root cṛs- "to help" may form the verb cirsit- "to employ", wherein the causative sense "cause to help" is clear, but the meaning is specialized; compare to the "true" causative cīrsay- which means nothing but "cause to help" or "make help" (and yet, sometimes the "true" causative still has a special meaning! Absolutes are never true when it comes to languages). In addition, -it has no special infinitive, simply taking the regular O, -vau (cirsūtvau, cirsautvūya, etc.), whereas cirsay- takes the special causitive infinitive -vos (cīrsēṣvos, cīrsaṣvāsya, etc.).

As for the causative, forming it requires putting the root in the monolong grade (mentioned a few posts above) and then suffixing the formant -ay, which like any other formant now inflects like a normal a-root verb itself, the root remaining invariable. It also forms participles according to the same normal rules as other verbs. The infinitive is in a short grade with -vos, which acts like the other infinitives as an indefinite athematic (resulting in a nominative in -ēṣvos, then the other cases built to a stem in -aṣvās). The causitive is relatively simple to form. To demonstrate it, below is the verb kodh- "to sit (down)" in both its active and causative form (kādhay- "make sit, place down"), in the third-person singular:

kādhotha "She is sitting down"
kādhēyatha "She is making (s.one) sit down"

kādhovyū "She sat down"
kādhēyavyū "She made (s.one) sit down"

kodhū "She sits down"
kādhayū "She made (s.one) sit down"

kodhāyyū "She will sit down"
kādhayēyyū "She will make (s.one) sit down"

kodhirutha "She had sat down"
kādhayirutha "She had made (s.one) sit down"

kodharatha "She wants to sit down"
kādhayaratha "She wants to make (s.one) sit down"

kodharanītha "She wanted to sit down"
kādhayaranītha "She wanted to make (s.one) sit down"

kodhavyarayū "She had wanted to sit down"
kādhayavyarayū "She had wanted to make (s.one) sit down"

kākodhū "She can sit down"
kādhēyayū "She can make (s.one) sit down"

koydhubbū "She begins to sit down"
kādheyyubbū "She begins to make (s.one) sit down"

kodhāmū "She should sit down"
kādhayēmū "She should make (s.one) sit down"

And wrapping off with the imperative, participles and infinitives:

kādham! kodhēm! kodhīsa! kodhesē!
kādhēyam! kādhayēm! kādhayīsa! kādhayesē!

koydhvau kādhvūya kādhvūyīm kādhvūva kādhvūtṛ kādhvūsam kādhvūsit
kādhēṣvos kādhaṣvāsya kādhaṣvāsīm kādhaṣvāsva kādhaṣvāstṛ kādhaṣvāssam kādhaṣvāssit

kodhar- kodhrīt- kādhṛt- kādhiv- kodhaśam- kodhavay-
kādhayar- kādhaṣrīt- kādhēyṛt kādhēyiv- kādhayaśam- kādhayavay-

Almost no Pazmat verbs are ambitransitive. Whereas in English one may say "The window breaks" and "Mary breaks the window with a hammer", using the same verb, Pazmat does not. It must use the simple transitive verb kapp- for "shatter" in the first", and then the causative kēppay- for the second. Likewise, "A tree grows" uses the root vṛkṣ- while "Mary grows the tree" uses its causative vūrkṣay-.

The causative may be made passive, either through its participles or using the passive formant after it. A causative's passive participles have the meaning "being made to X, having been made to X, etc.". Pazmat can form a "causative passive" verb in one of two ways: going passive, then causative (kodh- > kodhib- > kodhūbay-) or vice versa (kodh- > kādhay- > kādhayib). Sensu stricto, these have two distinct meanings, the first being "made to be X'ed" and the second "made to X", but in practice the distinction is blurry; matūbayaṣṣi means "they are made to speak" as much as it does "they are made to be spoken(?)".

However, there is one specific use of the second kind, where it gives off a sense of necessity but only in past sentences; the semantics of, say, "I was made to work (by s.thing)" (marjhayaubivyī) going to "I had to work (because some unstated thing made me work") should be obvious; this is a rather literary/poetic construction, not something you'd find in casual speech.

The causative's meaning, of course, is to increase a verb's valency and introduce a causer to the sentence, and thus can often be translated in English as "make X/cause to X":
mat- "to speak" > mētay- "make speak"
tor- "to hit" > tāray- "to make hit" (Pazmat prefers saying "X made Y hit Z" for "X hit Z with a Y; tor- is reserved for hitting with things that aren't exclusively weapons like body parts, table legs, cars, etc. or when a weapon hits without an actual agent, such as a sword falling and hitting someone)
dhir- "to release, drop" > dhūray- "make s.one drop" (compare the idiom kāṣrāya dhūray- "make s.one drop their mind" > "drive someone crazy/insane").

Root adjectives may also form causatives (they are roots after all), also with the sense "make [quality]":
nidh- "big" > nūdhay- "make big, increase, amplify"
vṛk(ī)- "bold" > vūrkay- "make bold, exaggerate"
sens- "happy" > sīnsay- "make happy, cheer up"

Causative verbs may form, much more frequently than the passive verbs (nouns formed from a verb's passive meaning usually nominalize a participle). A common method is forming a vowel-stem 3rd-declension noun with L, -rī,; this usually has an agentive sense: kādhēṣrī "authority (< "that which makes people sit down")", nūdhēṣrī "amplifier (< "that which increases")", kējēṣrī "dehydration" (< "that which makes people drink; kaj- to drink"). Adjectives may be formed from these with bumping the suffix up to overlong: kādhēṣray- "authoritative", kējēṣray- "dehydrated".

Incidentally, this is how to form adjectives from any vowel-stem 3rd-declension noun: murā "dumbass (but once merely "stupid person") > muroy- "idiotic, incredibly dumb, nonsensical"

The trickiest part of causatives is not forming them but dealing with their arguments. Most simply, the causer is in the nominative, with the causee (the subject of the underlying sentence) in the accusative:

braqtirū kappū
door-DEF.SG.NOM shatter.AOR-3S
The door shatters

Vṛkīṣrā braqtirūya gēśrāmi kēppayū
NAME-NOM door-DEF.SG-ACC arm-DEF.SG-INSTR shatter-CAUS.AOR-3S
Vrkiyara shatters the door with (his) arm
(lit. "Vrkiyara makes the door shatter with his arm")

These sentences could also mean "The king shatters" and "Vrkiyara shatters the king with (his) arm". The words for "king" and "door" happen to both be braqtū as they both are formed from two homophonous roots, braq- "to lead, rule" and braq- "to enter". Due to this the Paz often used door metaphors for their kings; such as the ancient sayings Braqtū ēchnīyya fevrīyya mantraḥū; Braqtū vrēzāstnāya gṛḥreḥnāya mantraḥū "A door obstructs thieves and animals; A king obstructs slavery and genocide" and Ḥesō braqtūsit zṛzgā; madhrī braqtūsit īcca zṛzgā "A house without a door is nonsense; a kingdom with no king is nonsense as well"

If the underlying sentence contained an object, it shows up as a dative. If it contained a dative indirect object as well, that shows up as a dative too, context being the only way to solve ambiguity:

Nūdhayarā vēgirūya Kūrasayat ātivyū
NAME-NOM book-DEF.SG-ACC NAME-DAT give.PERF-3S
Nudhayara gave the book to Kurasi

Wṛthasē Nūdhaṣrāya vēgirūyīm Kūrasayat ātēyavyū
NAME-NOM NAME-ACC book-DEF.SG-DAT NAME-DAT give-CAUS.PERF-3S
Wrthase made Nudhayara give the book to Kurasi

However, there is one wrinkle to this. If the subject of the underlying sentence is in the locative, then it has the shade of being forced to do the action due to some unintended consequence. In others words, if your friend did something and that made you do something, then you would use this to show annoyance:

Kurasi: Jma ḥrituv allu?
why tired=INTENS
Why are you so tired?

Vrkiyara: Aḥ, Nūdhaṣrā ganzarrāmi, jhāv isāye marjhēyavyū!
EXCL NAME-NOM sick-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-AR-DEF.SG-INSTR 1S.LOC DEM.SG.-DAT work-CAUS.PERF-3S
Ugh, thanks to Nudhayara being sick, he made me work in his place!

Here, the use of the first-person pronoun in the locative shows that Nudhayara didn't intentionally make Vrkiyara work; it's just that being sick forced Vrkiyara to work in his place. If Vrkiyara had put the pronoun in the accusative like usual for a causative sentence, it would have sounded like Nudhayara directly went to him and forced him intentionally to work in his place, which doesn't really make sense: he's sick!

In other respects, causatives work like simple verbs. They are negated with an infinitive plus i-:

cṛsirūya jrūqīxāyīm dhūraṣvasya auvyī
girl-DEF.SG-ACC water.jar-DEF.SG-DAT drop-CAUS.INFIN-ACC NEG.PERF-1S
I didn't make that girl drop the water jars

urmas dhuṣaddayat, antusīt mṛjhuddau źāthōsit marjhayibāsya iṣruguḥ
despite lie-DEF.PL-DAT 1P.EXCL-GEN worker-DEF.PL.NOM pay-INDEF.SG-PRIV work-CAUS-PASS-INFIN-ACC NEG-PLUPERF-1S
Regardless of those lies, our workers had not been forced to work without pay

Their participles act like regular participles:

Kūraseṣu kwitrāsam ayēyṛtāmi, sīyēṣreṣu ōbiye mūceyyubbī
NAME-ACC room-DEF.SG-ABLOC go-CAUS-PTCPL.PERF.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-INSTR present-INDEF.SG-ACC DEM-DAT prepare-STAT-1S
Having made Kurasi go out of the room, I began to prepare a present for her

vṛkaddā, kṛnām vūrkṣaṣrītaddā, ajiwar ukrītva allu purguḥ
plant-DEF.PL-NOM 2S.INSTR grow-CAUS-PTCPL.PRES.PASS-3RD-DEF.PL-NOM these.days popular-DAT=INTENS become.IMPERF-3P.
Plants which you grow yourself are becoming very popular these days
(lit. "Trees which are made to grow by you are becoming very popular these days")
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP:The Causative)

Post by Chagen »

The (Revised) Pazmat Numeral System

Another day, another thing torn down and rebuilt. I've decided to rebuild the numbers up from scratch--they had been bugging me for a while. I managed to not only make them look nicer but also got past 10. Now, the numbers from 1-10 are their own roots; past that things get a little different, so I'm gonna split this up into two sections.

1-10

These ten numbers are root adjectives:

1: maś-
2: śru-
3: zdek-
4: vat-
5: nas-
6: nov-
7: sṇt-
8: pṛ-
9: raj-
10: kṛś

These form root adjectives. They behave like any other adjective. Expressing "[NUMBER] X's" uses the indefinite; expressing "the [NUMBER] X's" uses the definite:

Wurfō maśō. Cṛsūvo śruyūvo. Wurfrā maśrā. Cṛsūrau śruyūrau
boy.INDEF.SG one-AR-INDEF.SG girl.INDEF.PL two-ER-INDEF.PL boy-DEF.SG one-AR-DEF.SG girl-DEF.PL two-ER-DEF.PL

When talking about quantities, or simply referring to numbers (i.e "Five is three plus two"), you use nouns from these roots. They are all formed with MonoL, -ra and take the pronomial endings mentioned in the pronouns post: mēśra śrūra zkīkra vētra nēsra nāvra sāntra pūrra rējra karśra. And while we're at it: "X plus Y" is "X Y-INSTR". "X minus Y" is "X Y-PRIV"

Nāvra vētra śrūram. Nēsra pūrra zdīkrasi.
six four two-INSTR five eight three-PRIV
Six is four plus two. Five is eight minus three.

"X divided by Y" is "X Y-ABLOC". "X times Y" may be expressed in two different ways. The first is simple "X Y-LOC". The other way is to add <-īm> to Y's root. This forms an adverb meaning "[Number] times": śruyīm "two times, twice", sṇtīm "seven times", etc.:

Nēsra karśa śrūrasa. Rējra zdīkra zdīkrav. Rējra zdīkra zdekīm.
five ten two-ABLOC nine three three-LOC nine three three.times
Five is ten divided by two. Nine is three times three. Nine is three times three.

When used with a definite genitive noun, these number nouns mean "[NUMBER] of the [NOUN]". In participial phrases they count as singular definite athematics:

korītṛ santra ōsivāmi tagīm bentīyyaśva
blade-DEF.PL-GEN seven.NOM make-PTCPL.PERF.PASS-ATHEM-DEF.SG-INSTR soon finish-FUT-1P.INCL
With seven of these blades finished we'll soon be finished

All of these numbers have ordinals. For one and two, these are suppletive; "first" is wāḥ (from a root woḥ- which only is attested as this adjective and the adverb woḥīm "only, just"), and "second" is ad- ,which literally means "next" or "the following"; due to this double meaning, "second" is often the regularly-formed śroyī- as well . For the other numbers, the ordinal is formed with the familiar L, -ī- adjective suffix: zdīkī- vētī- nēsī- nāvī- santī- purī- rējī- karśī-:

swēthanā navīyarā iśtōya gṛbōya allu źāthrāyīm otibauyyū!
caller-DEF.SG.NOM sixth-AR-DEF.SG.NOM car-INDEF.SG-ACC new-AR.INDEF.SG-ACC=INTENS reward-DEF.SG-DAT give-PASS-FUT-3S
The sixth caller will be given a brand-new car as a prize!

When using these ordinals as nouns, i.e "fifth (place)", "the fourth one", etc, then you simply use the -ar stem form of the adjective as a substantiative; and note that "first" and "second" for this are not suppletive: "You're in first!" is mēśīṣrāva! not *wāḥīṣrāva, and likewise "You're in second" is śroyīṣrāva not *adrāva. The Pazmat equivalent of "1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc." is "1īy, 2īy, 3īy, 4īy, etc.".

Being roots, these numbers may form verbs. Their causatives mean "make [number": mēśay- "make one, put together, consolidate", śrūyay- "make two, divide", vētay- "make four, quarter". They also have a smattering of nouns like śroyō "couple, pair", śrujim "twin" ("two-birth"), vatvustī "four-legged creature, quadraped" ("four-walk"), novṛdī "insect" (lit. "six-footer!")

That last one was inspired by Sanskrit ṣaḍpada- "honeybee", also literally "six-footer"

Now while this is all fine and good, what if we want to use a number higher than 10? Well, that involves a whole new system. Let's proceed:

10-Infinity

Once you go above ten, all numbers are now nouns. I'll start with multiples of ten for now.

The main factor for these numbers is the noun kṛśī (it's a 3rd-declension e-stem). It means "ten" as a noun. To form 20, 30, etc., directly prefix a numeral root to it, using a linking -i- if there's awkard consonant clusters. Here's the decads in all their glory:

20: śrukṛśī
30: zdekkṛśī
40: vatikṛśī
50: naskṛśī
60: novikṛśī
70: sṇtikṛśī
80: pṛkṛśī
90: rajikṛśī

To use a noun with these, place the noun in the genitive and inflect the number like whatever you need. These numbers are always indefinite, the definiteness of the original noun cluing you into the meaning:

narōtra vatikṛśīna. narrīṣṣtṛ vatikṛśīna.
guard-INDEF-GEN.PL forty-INSTR guard-DEF.PL-GEN forty-INSTR
With forty guards. With the forty guards.

You may have noticed that this is actually the exact same method shown above for 1-10, except that had a partitive meaning. Here it does not. A partitive meaning with these numbers is done by using the number alone and then putting the noun in the ablocative: "forty of the guards" in Pazmat is literally "forty from the guards": vatikṛśī narrīṣṣam

To express numerals within these decads (11, 24, 45, etc.), you use the decad first and then you add the number after it in the instrumental; "fifty three" for instance in Pazmat is "fifty with three".

Drēḥanā ḥīsantra novikṛśī nēsram mēdhavyaṣṣi na kṛnāv mataṣṣi
judge-DEF.SG.NOM citizen-INDEF.PL.NOM sixty.NOM five-INSTR ask.PERF-3P=SUB 2S.LOC speak.AOR-3S
Judge, sixty five citizens have asked to speak you with you

Ordinal forms of these numbers can be expressed by turning the decad into an adjective (śrukṛśī "twenty" > śrukṛśay- "twentieth"). Any numbers after it remain the same:

kṛtīrū sṇtikṛśayirū pūrram
bag-DEF.SG.NOM seventieth-ER-DEF.SG.NOM eight-INSTR
the seventy-eighth bag

Because the number after the decad is always going to be in the instrumental, it's very common to "clip" it; instead of sṇtikṛśayirū pūrram we find sṇtikṛśayirū'pū(r). Likewise for novikṛśī nēsram we often find novikṛśī'nē(s).

Once you know this, you can build higher and higher numbers. Yet more for you:

100: nūdhī (clearly a derivation from nidh- "big")

This is actually where the native system stops. The next three numbers are loanwords from a language called Ṣṇdmat by the Paz; its speakers are the Ṣṇdez mentioned a few posts up in the adjectives post. Nowadays most call them by their endonym, Shanari.

1,000: ūranī
10,000: asunī
100,000: mitrī
1,000,000: kitūrō (not actually a loanword but an archaic term that just meant "a lot" which was later given this meaning of one million when the Paz started to need numbers that big).

I haven't gone past this yet. In any case, you start with the largest number (for now that can be nine million, or rajikitūtō) and then just have everything else in the instrumental (it's common to just compound everything afterwards into one huge noun):

novūranī nasnūdhīna pṛkṛśīna mēśram
six-thousand five-hundred-INSTR eight-ten-INSTR one-INSTR
six thousand five hundred and eighty one
(Also found as novūranī nasnūdhī'pṛkṛ'mē

pṛkitūrō rajmitrīna sṇtasunīna śruyūranīna vatinūdhīna zdekkṛśīna nāvram
eight-million nine-hundred.thousand-INSTR seven-ten.thousand-INSTR two-thousand-INSTR four-hundred-INSTR three-ten-INSTR six-INSTR
eight million, nine hundred and seventy-two thousand, four hundred and thirty six

////////////////
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP:Numbers 2.0)

Post by Αυτοβοτα »

I really like what you've been doing with this language. I love the feel of it, very much like Sanskrit. I'm still reading through all the posts but I wanted to leave a +1.
-_-_Aftovota_-_-

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP:Numbers 2.0)

Post by Chagen »

Αυτοβοτα wrote:I really like what you've been doing with this language. I love the feel of it, very much like Sanskrit. I'm still reading through all the posts but I wanted to leave a +1.
Thank you so much for these kind words! Truthfully, I love Sanskrit, and it shows up a lot in this language, but it has slowly changed and taken more inspiration from Proto Indo-European itself.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP:Numbers 2.0)

Post by Chagen »

Pazmat Syllabification and Stress

Welcome to yet another thing I've been working on for a while and am now just giving a post. Truth to be told, Pazmat's phonotactics are not really something I consciously worked on. Instead, as I pronounced the language either for kicks or to get a feel for it, I found these rules slowly forming on their own. The stress accent as well ended up forming mostly on its own.

For all the complex clusters Pazmat can have, such as gdrēsana "I am wasting away", Pazmat syllabification, surprisingly, hates intra-word consonant clusters. The basic method behind it is that it tries to make as many syllables open as possible. Of course, it doesn't always succeed, but it tries quite hard. There is no phonemic component to this. In general, one can almost always follow these steps to split a word up correctly:

For the record:
C= Consonant
V= Vowel
N= Nasal
R= Non-nasal resonant (r, w, l, y)


1: Go from left to right through the word. After each vowel, insert a syllable break. Check each syllable to see if it is acceptable.

For many words this is all one needs: mētana "I am speaking", ḥrautitha "he/she/it is running", and cṛsirūsit "without the girl" syllabify to mē.ta.na ḥrau.ti.tha cṛ.si.rū.sit.

2: If a consonant cluster at the beginning of a syllable is unacceptable, move its first consonant to the end of the syllable before it.

We can see this twice with vardhantra "with some laws": by rule 1 we get *va.rdha.ntra, the last two syllables being unacceptable. By rule two we move their final consonants to the previous syllables to get var.dhan.tra which is acceptable.

2a: Geminates are handled a little differently; if before a vowel, they stay (thus VC:V > V.C:V); if before a consonant, they move to the previous syllable

Both situations occur in the definite plural paradigms of any -ar stem noun; e.g matrīṣṣit "without languages" and matrīṣṣmi "with languages". In the first, by rule 1 we get ma.trī.ṣṣit and leave it thus. For the second, rule 1 gives us ma.trī.ṣṣmi, which then becomes ma.trīṣṣ.mi

These handle many situations, but sometimes they are not enough. The following rules are more complex:

3: All inter-vocal CC and CCC clusters where with a final obstruent are broken up (even if they are acceptable initially). For CC clusters, split them up (VCCV > VC.CV); for CCC clusters, the first consonant goes to the previous syllable, the second two remain (VCCCV > VC.CCV). This also occurs in CN clusters.

For the sake of example: swātva "on a criminal"; rule 1 gives us swā.tva. Then by rule 3 we get swot.va. For the rare intra-word CCC cluster, we can turn to voystva "during a walk": voy.stva > voys.tva (in situations like these where /v/ is after a voiceless consonant it often takes on an approximant pronunciation)

Note that this applies as long as the final consonant is an obstruent; danśtanā "the countryside" is da.nśta.nā > dan.śta.nā.

The final part of this rule explains differences in syllabification between -ar stems and -an stems. To provide examples, from the same root even, the -ar stem matrāva "in the language" and the -an stem mētnāva "in a word. For the first word, we get ma.trā.va; since the middle syllable is a CCr, we're fine (this would also happen in CCw clusters, but those are rare). In the second however, we start with mē.tnā.va; the second syllable must have its cluster broken and we end up with mēt.nā.va.

3a: CCR clusters follow the normal rules as stated above in 3 (VCCRV > VC.CRC). But CCN clusters act differently; the first consonants of the cluster go to the previous syllable (VCCNV > VCC.NV)

The first part of this explains words like iśtrā "the car": i.śtrā > iś.trā.

The second is seen in a word such as tarsnāmi "with the feather"; ta.rsnā.mi > tars.nā.mi.

4: CCCC clusters where the first and last consonants are either nasals or resonants (basically the only kind of CCCC clusters to every appear split into CC.CC

This rather rare situation most commonly shows up in -ar or -an stems formed to CVCC roots with syllabics, such as danśtrā "the news, going-ons" (root dṇśt- "to spread around"): da.nśtrā > danś.trā or vurkṣnā "grower, planter, parent (poet.)" (root vṛkṣ- "grow, age (intrans.)": vu.rkṣnā > vurk.ṣnā

//////////

After those somewhat baroque rules, it may be a relief to know that Pazmat stress is simpler. The stress system seen in Proto-Pasuu where stress could be somewhat free depending on the word is long gone; Pazmat decided to simply bowl it over with a simple weight-based system, that takes into account the pentultimate and ultimate syllables (interestingly enough, it is somewhat akin to the length system seen in Proto-Pasuu). A syllable is light if it is open and has a short vowel. A syllable is heavy if it is closed and has a short vowel or if it is open but has a long vowel (diphthongs count as long vowels). If a syllable is closed and has a long vowel, or has a short vowel and is closed with a geminate (beginning with a geminate has no effect on weight), then it is superheavy. The amount of final consonants does not matter; <dṇśt> is the same weight as <ar> (both are heavy). With this in mind, stress in Pazmat works according to one rule: it always tries to land on the earliest syllable with the heaviest weight. Stress falls on the penultimate when it is heavier or equal to the ultimate. Stress falls on the ultimate only when it is heavier than the penultimate (if they are equal stress will always fall on the penultimate).

The imperfect provides a perfect example of stress changing throughout a paradigm:
mētána "I am speaking" (mē.ta(L).na(L))
mētáfe "you are speaking" (mē.ta(L).fe(L))
mētátha "he/she/it is speaking" (mē.ta(L).tha(L))

mētaqqū́ "we(inc.) are speaking" (mē.ta(L).qqū(H)
mētáẓẓa "we(excl) are speaking" (mē.ta(L).ẓẓa(L)
mētayúdh "you all are speaking" (mē.ta(L).yudh(H)
mētagúḥ "they are speaking" (mē.ta(L).guḥ(H)

To cap it off, I'll provide the full paradigm of the ar-stem word matō "speech, language", the -er stem word śṇtū "bag", and the two third declension nouns najir "adult" and vṛdhī "post, submission", all of them marked for stress. I'm not gonna provide translations or show how they split up and their syllable weights, it should be possible for you to figure out.

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Syllabification and Stress)

Post by Chagen »

Minor Tweaks: Phonology, Reduplication Changes, and More

Another post of minor tweaks I've been working on. Here we go:

Pazmat's phonology is mostly regular, but there are a few tricky aspects to it. First of all, geminate /j/ is pronounced as a palatal fricative; the voiceless [ç] is preferred in the standard Eastern dialect, but the Western dialect often uses the voiced [ʝ]. However, the frication is very weak; oftentimes it sounds more like a slightly-raised approximant. In addition, this pronunciation is common for any /j/ before /i/, even in consonant clusters; nēccavyī "I prepared, got ready" is pronounced roughly [neː.tɕːa.vʝi].

The trickiest part of Pazmat's phonology, however, is undoubtedly is its two rhotics, the normal consonant <r> and the syllabic consonant <ṛ>. To start with the syllabic: it is always pronounced as a syllabic alveolar trill. The normal consonant, <r>, however, always has a retroflex pronounciation; inter-vocally, it is an approximant [ɻ], but after a consonant, it's a true retroflex trill [ɽ]. This causes heavy retroflexion of the dental consonants /t d n θ ð/ (but NOT /s z/), turning them into [ʈ ɖ ɳ θ̠ ð̠] (note that the non-silibant fricatives are true retroflexes, not merely retracted; they sound like /ʂ ʐ/ but non-silibant, almost). Note that the <r> does NOT drop or assimilate into the consonant; doing such is one of the biggest signs of the Western dialect, to the point where fiction uses it to mark characters as uneducated Western bumpkins. In romanization, this is shown with a dot underneath the consonant; cf:

ātrā "the gift" [aː.ʈɽaː] (Western: āṭā [aː.ʈaː]
ṣōdrā "the Shodara*" [ʂoː.ɖɽaː] (Western ṣōḍā [ʂoːɖaː]
wṛthrītā "having been beautiful" [wr̩.θ̠ɽiː.taː] (Western wṛṭhītā [wr̩.θ̠iː.taː]
muddhro "the magic" [mu.ð̠ːɽo] (Western muḍḍho [mu.ð̠ːo])
ranrau "and therefore..." [ɹaɳ.ɽau̯] (Western raṇō [ɹa.ɳɔː]

*:Demon in traditional Paz mysticism which sucks the life force out of people who don't have enough sex/masturbate enough (yes, seriously)

Outside of this, Paz phonology should be rather easy to grasp.

Reduplication Alterations:

Reduplication works a little differently now. In reality, this change alters ONLY vowel-initial roots. We'll need to go back to Proto-Pasuu for this. As I have already stated, PP and Pazmat both ban vowel hiatus. Any such hiatus occurring was blocked by an epenthetic /j/. In Proto-Pasuu, this /j/ wasn't an actual phoneme; it was when PP *pj became Pazmat /j/ that it gained phonemic status. The only exception is when the two vowels were the same syllabic but different grades; then the syllabic expansion rules would take place (put simply: *ṝṛC > *arṛC > arraC, while *ṛṛC > *ṝC > arC)

However, now I have added one exception to this rule: if the vowels were both short, and the same vowel, they simply fell together as a long vowel, which then went through the various changes of Pazmat like normal. This did not occur in any other situation: a long vowel and short vowel, even if the same quality, remained separate. Reduplication only shows, at least right now, in three situations: the Potential formed from a reduplicated syllable with a long grade, a tiny number of adjectives formed from reduplication, usually with intensive or resultive force (kaxak- "broken" from xak- "to cripple, damage", mimidh- "inquisitive, curious" from midh- "to ask", etc.), and in the new optative-conditional mood which I haven't actually described yet.

The potential is irrelevant to this change since it uses a long grade in the reduplication syllable; thus, "I can go" is still īyeyī (e-) and "I can make for myself" is still annadī (ṇd-; remember the syllabic expansion rules?). The adjective formation is barely relevant, but the optative IS highly important. The specifics will come later, but for now, it's formed with basic-grade reduplication and -am-. Thus, mamatamī "I would speak", babadhamū "s/he would maim", etc. However, for vowel initial roots, the two basic grades "collide" and form one single long grade. Thus, "I would go" is NOT *eyeyamī but īyamī, and "I would make for myself" is andamī. Interestingly enough, this doesn't appear very often outside of this formation, mostly from analogy. For instance, the root thi- "see" should form the pluperfect thauruna "I had seen" (thi+iru+na) but does not; it's thiyiruna. The one exception to this is the optative of irregular verbs ending in -a, such as gna- "grieve", nga- "(of a celestial body) be out", and śra- "do": ngagnēmī "I would grive", ngangēmī "(the sun/moon) would be out", and śaśrēmī "I would do".

The second "change" isn't really a change, because it's always been there, really, and I've just never really mentioned it. Causative and Passive verbs reduplicate internally. The original root is kept the same, and the formant -ay- or -ib- reduplicates. For instance, to get the optative of nūcay- "to speed up (s.thing else)", you take the -ay- and reduplicate it. Since it is technically "vowel-initial", the reduplication ends up as -ēy- (not *-ayay-) and then you proceed like normal: nūcēyamī "I would speed (s.thing) up". Likewise for the passive: tor- "to hit" > torib- "to be hit" > toraubamī "I would be hit". Of course, the potential is different: the causative and passive potentials are -ēyay- and -awib-, respectively: nūcēyayī "I can speed (s.thing) up" and torawibī "I can be hit".

//////////////////////


Next post, I will go over the conditional, and how to form conditional sentences.

Also, I just realized the very large amount of morphophonology in this language. It's nowhere near some real-life polylangs, of course, but you have to keep a pretty large amount of (thankfully almost completely regular) rules to correctly produce Pazmat (such as breaking vowel hiatus, turning /j/ into /ş/ before consonants, the syllabic expansion rules--with vowel alterations depending on the preceding consonant--, the reduplication rules, ablaut...)
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Syllabification and Stress)

Post by Chagen »

The Diminutive

This is a small post on a feature which has existed for a while but I've just now fully fleshed out. The Diminutive in Pazmat is a productive method with can be applied to just about any noun. While it can be used as an ad hoc way of denoting a miniature/little version of a noun, many diminutives have taken on special meanings, sometimes distant from the original. It also is important for mass nouns. The diminutive is formed differently for each word class, though all but the -er and -ir stems use the same suffix. The diminutive is always either an athematic or a 3rd declension n-syllabic:

Athematics take monolong grade; the result is an n-syllabic:

yed "sword" > yīdan "dagger, short sword"
jad "ocean, sea" > jēdan "little sea, lake"
qiḥ "man" > qūḥan "wimp, bottom man in a gay relationship, gay guy in general (slang, VERY offensive--basically equal to "faggot")

Ablauting suffix nouns put the suffix in the weakest grade and then suffix -as. The new noun is an athematic, and does lengthen in the indefinite:

wurfarā "boy" > wufrasā "little boy, young boy (used to affectionately refer to a son or younger male relative)"
frētharā "river" > frēthrasā "brook, stream"
danśtanā "countryside" > danśtnasā "park (> little countryside), rural area"
nējharā "Sun, star of a solar system" > nējhrasā "lightbulb, lamp, torch"
zrēyanā "friend" > zrēṣnasā "causal acquaintance"
bādharā "war, intense fight" > bādhrasā "skirmish, minor battle in a war"
dumarā "fire (especially an uncontrolled one)" > dumrasā "ember, controlled fire"
rāyanā "ambition, desire" > rāṣnasā "desire (for one particular thing), lust"

-Er and -ir stems keep the length on the -er suffix. Then they turn the new noun into an n-syllabic--because of this, the -er suffix is always -īr-:

cṛsirū "girl" > cṛsīran "little girl, young girl"
vēgirū "book" > vēgīran "small book, novella, pamphlet"
jhṛmirū "army, military" > jhṛmīran "militia, guerrilla fighters"
tamīr "refrigerator" > tamīran "ice chest, cooler"
kodirū "hill, hilly terrain" > kodīran "little hill, knoll"

3rd declension nouns, be they syllabic or vocalic, place the suffix in overlong grade and suffix -as, becoming athematics like the ablauting suffix nouns:

murā "dumbass, idiot" > muroyasā "useless idiot, weak bastard"
eskar "gathering" > eskārasā "clump, haphazard collection"
vṛdhī "law" > vṛdhayasā "suggestion, (in traditional Paz law) a law which incurs only indentured servitude or a fine for breaking it (as opposed to incarceration)

////////////

The diminutive, as the above examples show, obviously denote a smaller sense of the main noun, or affection as well. However, for a few nouns, the diminutive has a special use.

Pazmat possesses a few mass nouns notable by being grammatically singular despite having a plural meaning. A good example is kodarā, which means "waves" (from kod- "to undulate"), referring generally to waves on the surface of water. It has no indefinite at all and no definite plural, and is grammatically singular:

zvitā kodrāya, jadāva, yēyayū
wind-DEF.SG.NOM waves-DEF.SG-ACC sea-DEF.SG-LOC be-CAUS-AOR-3S
Wind causes the waves on the sea

You cannot count kodarā. So how do you say "two waves" or "five waves"? You use the diminutive, kodrasā. Suddenly, you can count waves now:

kādayarāva, kodrēs līrevyū
dip.fingers.into.water-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC wave-DIMIN.INDEF.SG.NOM bob-PERF-3S
When I dipped my fingers (into the water) a wave bobbed up and down

Frustratingly enough, kodrasā also has the literal diminutive meaning of "little wave" or "ripple". kodrasīva nasīva could mean either "in the five waves" or "in the five ripples". Which meaning is intended depends on context.

Names may also be made diminutive, either to denote friendly/familial affection like a nickname or to insult someone in a patronizing way. It also can be added to adjectives when describing someone playfully/patronizingly, best translated as "mister/miss X":

Śṛdirū: Ḥoy, Kūrayasā! Vētṛtāmi sens, guqat mētvūya awivyaśva!
INTERJ NAME look.at-PTCPL.PST.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-INSTR happy for.a.long.time talk-INFIN-ACC NEG-PERF-1P.INC
Hey, Kurayasā! Glad to see you, we haven't talked for a long time! (lit. "with having seen you, I'm happy...")

Kūrasī: Ṣṛdirū! Jhāye "Kūrayasā"-mi ṣvathīs'!
NAME 1S.DAT NAME-INSTR call-IMP.NEG.SG
Śrdiru! Don't call me "Kurayasa"!

Śṛdirū: Cnā, Bājrīyasā...
INTERJ angry-DIMIN-DEF.SG
Jeez, Miss Bitchy...

*Kūrasī is speaking with with a very northern accent here: pronouncing "Śṛdirū" as "Ṣṛdirū" (northerners merge palato-alveolars into retroflexes), and "swathīsa" as "ṣvathīs'" (<v> is a very faint approximant and also retroflexed /s/) . Also, while this isn't shown, her /a e i o u aj ej oy au eu/ are [ɑ ɪ e o u yː eː eː oː øː].

Some names are Diminutives at their root, such as Zvūtasan, a male name meaning "Little Wind". These can still take an affectionate diminutive, effectively being a double diminutive: Zvūtasan > Zvūtānasā.

Finally, diminutives are normal nouns and may thus take derivation as usual:

dumarā "fire" > dumrasā "ember" > dumrēs- "smoldering"

rāyanā "ambition, desire" > rāṣnasā "desire (for one particular thing), lust" > rāṣnēs- "lustful, greedy"

cṛsirū "girl" > cṛsīran "little girl, young girl" > cṛsīrān- "adorable"
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Comparison, Reworked -ir/er stems)

Post by Chagen »

Comparison of Adjectives and Revised -er and -ir Nouns

Hello all. I have not posted for a very long time, and I am quite sorry about that. School, depression, suicidal ideation, and fucking all my classes scrambled my brain. But as the finals come and the Christmas vacation looms closer, I'm getting the conlanging bug again. The result has been the addition of new grammar rules and systems. But perhaps more importantly, the long conlanging has made me come into Pazmat with a fresh mind. I have tweaked and altered a ton of little bits of the system--replacing affixes, completely reworking the -er and -ir stems (the latter in particular are almost unrecognizeable from before), and more. Some changes are large, others are tiny (such as a miniscule reworking of the number system). Even such staples as the phonotactics are undergoing very slight changes (nothing major; indeed these changes mostly clarify unstated rules that already existed). Many of these changes will be detailed in a later post. As for now, comparison!

Comparison of Adjectives

For a long while, Pazmat has not had a way to compare adjectives. I could not find a system that suited me, so I pushed it off. As the language grew more and more fleshed out, however, this gaping hole became more and more painfully noticeable. Nevertheless, I avoided tackling it. However, two days I was looking at the post on participles to refresh my memory and look over the system, and I all of a sudden got an idea. Within an hour I had the comparative system down.

What gave me the idea were the passive participles for root adjectives. These have the special meaning of "becoming X" (jag- "strong" > jagrīt- "becoming strong"). It does not take a large leap to go from "becoming strong" to "becoming stronger". And in an instant, I decided to make -īt- the comparative suffix. The rest came quickly.

Unlike the traditional X-Xer-Xest system seen in many Indo-European languages, Pazmat has five degrees of comparison. Outside of the Positive, the Comparative and Superlative have the usual meanings: superiority compared to something else and absolute superiority. Then we have the Inferiorative, which means "less X than Y". The Sublative means "least X". Finally, the Equative means "As X as Y". The endings are:

Comparative: -īt-
Superlative: -allīt-
Inferiorative: -as-
Sublative: -allas-
Equative: -ith-

The -all- in the Superlative and Sublative comes from the adjectival root all- which means "absolute, utter", and is the source of the very common adverb allu. The -as- of the Inferiorative and Sublative comes from the diminuitive suffix. These suffixes are added onto the end of the adjective, but first the adjective must undergo some slight alterations:

-Athematic adjectives do not do anything, directly suffixing: kār- "sharp" > kārīt- "sharper"

--ī adjectives (including roots with -ī) exchange the -ī- for -aw- and suffix: juqrī- "painful" > juqrawīt- "more painful"

-Adjectives formed from 3rd-declension nouns do not change, like athematics: muroy- "foolish/stupid" > muroyīt- "more foolish/stupid"

-All other adjectives lengthen the adjectival suffix and then add the comparative suffixes: ayam- "impatient" > ayēmīt- "more impatient"

These behave like normal adjectives. When directly modifying a noun they agree with it: yedāva kārallītāva "with the sharpest sword"; kūvāv wurfarāsam vṛkawitharāsam "(there are) no boy as bold here"; anpusayat pēvallasasayat "for the least funny old man".

Of course, the main purpose is to compare. Comparisons are done with the dative, and the adjective appears in its bare form, unless it is directly agreeing with a noun: Nāśśerā Śṛdirūt wṛthawīt "Naśśera is prettier than Śṛdiru"; korāsam kārithāsam kūye ṣundōtṛ nūdhayam "there is no blade as sharp as this one in a hundred cities"; jhā Tanterāt jagasā "I am not as strong as Tantera", etc.

When used as adverbs, simply inflect them in the dative as indefinite singular athematics: kārīthīm śṛgū "she writes more strikingly (> "sharply")".

These comparative adjectives can form participles. In conjunction with the various roles participles can take, this can allow for some concise sentences...and some very long words. They do not lengthen:

Jhā ṇpasarāva, dhāvyī na dāvāv frethrāva źīvevyī.
1S.NOM old-INFER-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC rejoice.PERF-1S=SUB DEM-LOC river-DEF.SG-LOC swim-PERF-1S
When I was not so old, I loved to to swim in that very river.

Jagallasayyaśāmi, zokarīm kostrāyovyū
strong-SUBLAT-PTCPL.FUT.PASS-ATHEM-DEF-INSTR quit-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-DAT decide-PERF-3S
About to lose all of his strength, he decided to quit
(Lit. "With being about to become the least strong, he decided to quit")

Fun Fact: The Pazmat root for "decide", kostro-, literally means "think-grab"

Kṛnāye ātacithásamāva, kṛnāt idderāṣ, jhāye matarāva na wo źāthrā sīnsrāya āttūṣ yū, yājovyī.
2S.DAT wealthy-EQUA-PTCPL.FUT.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC 2S.GEN meaning-DEF.SG-LOC 1S.DAT speak-PTCPL.PRES.ACT-ATHEM-DEF.SG-LOC=SUB money-DEF.SG-NOM only happiness-DEF.SG-ACC give.INFIN-ACC NEG.AOR-3S understand-PERF-1S
After becoming as wealthy as you, I realized what you had meant when you told me that money alone does not bring happiness

Participles derived from verbs can also take comparative markers. In these cases, the markers often indicate comparison (no alteration of the participle marker): marjhṛtītā "(I) worked more"; śrayaras- "working less". However, they often refer to the intensity of an action, in which case they are in the instrumental for overall intensity, or the locative for duration: marjhṛtītāmi "(I) worked a lot" (I was working intensely); marjhṛtītāva "I worked a lot" (I was working for a long time; the intensity was irrelevant). The translation will depend on context; the comparative might mean "really hard", "a ton", "for a long time", etc, while the superlative might be "[verb] as hard as possible" or "the hardest/strongest/fastest/etc."

Note that in this usage, the participle must agree with the subject of its action, even if it is unstated. "I will fight as hard as I can" (which use the superlative) is sepaśamallītāmi, whereas "the veteran (anpusasī) will fight as hard as they can" is sepaśamallītasṛna.


This concludes the section on comparison.

//////////////

A Minor Note on Adverbs:

I have decided that using adjectives adverbially can now use the instrumental as opposed to the dative. The idea is thus: "I ran with quick(ness)" > "I ran quickly". This is the preferred method for the Eastern prestige dialect; and note that the ending used here is the pronominal -am. In the Western dialect, it's common to use the locative instead (e.g for "I drunkenly stumbled", easterners say kajīram dhananvyī; westerners say kajīrav dhananvyī), and it's one of the most salient traits of a "western bumpkin" in popular media, much like how in American media "ain't" and droppin' the -ng on ya' gerunds marks a country southerner.

The use of the privative/ablocative clarifies that you are not doing the action in the manner of the adverb. To better clarify than that horrid sentence: kajīram mēdhavyū is "He was driving drunk", whereas kajīrasi mēdhavyū is "He was driving, but not drunkenly. This can be used to rebuff someone's statement, and another adjective (uninflected) clarifies what really happened:

Tanterā: Ṣṛdirū mētavyū'n pravṛś kajīrav madhiruf'! Vanīm?! Dā'tha!
("Ṣṛdiru said you was drivin' drunk last night! Seriously?! Don't do that!")

Kararā: M-mu, kajīrasa...dhānēmallas? Van'. Dṛk kajerā yī.
("W-well, not drunk...a teeny bit tipsy? sure. But I'm not an alcoholic.")

Regardless of this change, the adverbial usage of the dative lives on in fossilized adverbs and other constructions. Also, this change applies to comparitive adjectives: vṛkawītam "very boldly", nucītasi "not very quickly", etc.

Redesigned -ir and -er Stem Nouns

The -ir and -er stem nouns have undergone major changes; in the former's case, the affix -ir now never actually appears in the words of the class, though they will retain their name as a historical relic. These two noun classes now use a new set of endings: they are called the 2nd Declension, but are directly derived from the 3rd declension endings; they are effectively the same except for the loss of final phonemes in a few endings. They can be viewed as a bizarre offshoot of the 3rd declension. The endings are:

ACC: -ṣ
DAT: -t
LOC: -m
GEN: -ba
INSTR: -na
ABLOC: -sa
PRIV: -si

Note: Do not confuse the -t and -m endings with the same endings in the pronomial inflection. Here, they indicate Dative and Locative respectively, and derive from the 3rd declensions endings for the same cases of -at and -am. In the pronomial endings, -t is for the Genitive and comes from the 1st Declension -tṛ; -m is for the Instrumental and comes from the same declension's -mi; the actual pronomial Dative and Locative endings are -ye and -v, from the 1st declension -yīm and -va.

I'll start with the -ir stems. They are relatively easy to learn. In the indefinite, they behave like -er stems, as before, having the affix -ū-, though now they have the second-declension endings; the indefinite plural is slightly trickier: it uses the historical -vo plural collective-turned-plural marker, but only in the cases past the genitive (and the nominative) does this show up as -vo. In the three cases before (ACC/DAT/LOC), the -v- has assimilated to the ending, geminating it. In the definite, these nouns act like ablauting suffix nouns, where the historical stress always falls on the definite article, which is -ā- like the ablauting suffix nouns. Because of this, they have the distinctive affix of -erā- in the definite singular. Yup: in an intense twist of irony, the -ir- stems not only don't have -ir- anywhere in their declension, but have, of all things, -er, which the -er stems themselves do not have! Moving on, the plural suffixes -ī to the -er suffix like an athematic.

To demonstrate, here is the noun madherā in all of its forms. madherā comes from madh- "to lead", and means "driver" (madh- can also mean "to drive").

INDEF.SG: madhū madhūṣ madhūt madhūm madhūba madhūna madhūsa madhūsi
INDEF.PL: madhūvo madhūṣṣo madhūtto madhūmmo madhūbavo madhūnavo madhūsavo madhūsivo

DEF.SG: madherā madherāṣ madherāt madherām madherāba madherāna madherāsa madherāsi
DEF.PL: madherī madherīṣ madherīt madherīm madherība madherīna madherīsa madherīsi

The standard method of deriving adjectives from these nouns is lengthening the affix to -īr- (one of the few times -īr- ever shows up in these nouns) and leaving it at that: madhīr- "of or relating to drivers or driving; automotive". Diminutives are similar to -er stems, with lengthening of the suffix to -īr-, but -as- is suffixed like the ablauting suffix nouns and athematics.

Some more examples of -īr- stem nouns; they often denotes either actors, or one who creates something related to the action:

kajerā "heavy drinker, alcoholic" (kaj- "to drink"; kajīr- "extremely drunk/inebriated"; kajīras "someone with a drinking problem, who isn't a full-blown alcoholic")
nucerā "stimulant" (nuc- "quick, fast"; nucīr- "stimulating, exciting"; nucīras- "'pick-me-up' (sl.)")
varterā "cow" (vṛt- "milk, extract"; vartīr- "bovine")

-īr- stems also have the merit of being a somewhat common way of deriving nouns from causative roots; in these cases, they almost always form agent nouns, compared to the athematics and -e stem nouns which form action nouns:

nuc- "quick" > nūcay- "accelerate" > nūcayerā "accelerator, gas pedal, throttle" (nūcēṣrasī "acceleration")
di- "be unneeded" > daway- "make obsolete/useless/unnecessary (irreg. formation) > dawayerā "the newest model/product in a line" (lit. "that which makes (the previous model) obsolete"); cf. dawēṣrasī "obsolescence; outdated-ness"
triṣ- "hot" > trūṣay- "make hot, heat up, raise the stakes" > trūṣayerā "heater, challenger"

The -īr- stems have gained their current forms after many centuries of change. Originally they were much different; they used the 3rd-declension endings directly, for instance, meaning that, e.g, "for the driver" was madherāyat; in addition, they truly acted like ablauting suffix nouns, giving them definite nominatives of madhīro (sg.) and madhīre (pl.) (this is why they gained the name "-īr- stems". However, they contracted their endings a few hundred years ago, causing the DAT and LOC endings to drop their vowels; the GEN and ACC endings lose of final phonemes is unexplained, however. The former could have come from making it better resemble the INSTR, ABLOC, and PRIV endings, but then one would expect the same thing in the 3rd-declension nouns. The latter may be analogy from the pronomial endings, but those endings have barely influenced anything, the same is not found in the 3rd declension nouns, and the more likely pronomial influence would have just been taking the whole set or taking the dative and locative endings to prevent any confusion between the two classes. Regardless soon afterwords the anomalous definite nominative endings were brought in line. These innovations then spread to the related -er stems.

-er stems are much like this and don't actually have many changes besides taking on the new endings and now using -urrū- for the definite plural: vagirūt "for the text", vagurrūt "for the texts".

I am utterly incapable of deciding if the plural morpheme should be -errū-, -arrū-, or -urrū-. The second nearly won but this language has enough <a>, and a preponderance of <a> is already the job of the -ar stems. In the end, I want to use the -er stems more, as they are pathetically under-represented despite being one of the first classes ever made for the language. I just never jived with their appearance and phonetics.

Adjectives are now formed from -er stems with ūr- (vagūr- "textual").

Still undecided on all of this. These nouns are going to be the death of me. But it's good enough for now.

I am seriously debating getting rid of ALL -er stem nouns outside of names and just making everything -ir stems. But that's a pretty drastic idea, don't you think? I like the -urrū- of the -er stems but otherwise they drive me insane.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Comparison, Reworked -ir/er stems)

Post by KathTheDragon »

Welcome back, Chagen! Nice to see you posting more about Pazmat again, it's a really cool conlang.

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Re: Pazmat mk.II (NP: Comparison, Reworked -ir/er stems)

Post by Chagen »

The Current State of Pazmat

This is not, mostly, a post on new things in Pazmat. Instead, it's a reminder by me that this language still exists, and that I am still working on it.

I stopped working on Pazmat extensively over half a year ago. There are various reasons for this, such as simply growing tired of the language (not bored--I still love Pazmat dearly, but I worked on pretty much nothing but it for nearly two years. I had grown as a conlanger and wished to explore other ideas, such as infixes and heavy morphophonology in Kirroŋa. I started working on writing more and tried to enjoy more things like video games, anime, etc.

However, one major reason, I think, is how much of a complete and utter mess this topic is. Half of the statements in this topic are invalidated by later posts. There are also many which were said once, promptly forgotten, and utterly ignored. For instance, in one post here I said that the Present Desiderative was changed to -ar (so matarī "I want to speak"). I forgot about this completely until I reread the thread several months after this was written--I was still using the old marker of -ara like nothing had changed. I had said that I would revive the -eqh and consonant stems--this never happened. Other elements have always bugged me, yet remain unchanged. This topic is a mess.

No more.

I am going through Pazmat right now and renovating things. I am not wholesale throwing stuff out, but more "touching up" things--a replaced suffix here, a slightly altered nominal paradigm there, and so on. I am going to detail these changes starting with the nouns and phonology ablaut in a series of posts, and afterwards I will continue working on things left abandoned, such as the Conditional (if I can find my notes on it...) and the overall syntax for conditional statements and the new Potential.

I would honestly prefer to make a new thread here for this, but I'm not sure if the mods would like this. Regardless, expect a new post...soon. I am working on a story right now, I want to eventually return to Kirroŋa, and I should also get a basic Haeku Rath grammar down. I have a lot of stuff to deal with, so please be a little patient.

However, there are a minority of new things that I want to talk about. Namely, the 2nd-conjugation 2S suffix is now , and not -ot. Thus, kṇsō "you die". This sounds nice, and fits with the other singular suffixes for this conjugation being long vowels: kṇsī "I die", kṇsū "he/she/it dies". This is not the only suffix that will change (though I am trying to remain conservative).

Also, <ṃ> does not exist as a phoneme anymore, I cannot get it to work right and it sounds ugly next to most sounds...well, perhaps I will not get rid of it, but I will limit its appearances to appearing word-finally or next to labial consonants.

I want to create some rules for when labial consonants force syllabics to expand to uC, or just make it root-dependent, but I can't come up with anything that satisfies me. I have an idea to make it umlaut-based; they expand to uC or aC depending on what vowel follows the ablauting root, but who knows. I should just make them invariably do it, but I like things like vṛdh- > vardh- too much. Besides that, I also am thinking of making a new Vr class alongside the ar-roots and er-roots. If I were crazy I'd do it for EVERY Vr-root but that's a little much. In all honesty this probably wont happen--I don't want to introduce any new vowels to Pazmat, and making any new Vr-roots use existed vowels clutters the system too much. We already have things like /i/ and /u/ both ablauting to /u:/ in the Overlong conjugation.

Pazmat will gain one or two new phonemes with these changes. They will all be consonants. Also, the orthography will change very slightly, as in the diphthongs are now written differently (and are now written consistently for that matter). The only exception is <eu> which is now <ō>, as that phoneme was kind of rare anyway (so "you begin to defend" is now wōsubbō).

I should stress that Pazmat after these changes is still going to be 90% the same language (and that's pushing it, it's really more like 95% the same). It will look the same. Its nouns will still have eight cases with two numbers and definiteness states. Its verbs are still based off of ablauting the root, suffixing special markers, and then adding personal endings, along with six participles and infinitives (though I am definitely going to change some of the infinitive and participle endings).

With that said, it's funny how different Pazmat is from its influences, yet how similar it also is. It was designed as my experiment with Proto-Indo-European style ablaut, with an aesthetic inspired by Sanskrit mostly with some very minor Arabic influence (namely /q/). In the end...Pazmat looks nothing like Sanskrit or Arabic. The orthography shares a great deal of commonality with Sanskrit, but the end result is entirely its own thing. In grammar, Pazmat adheres much more closely to its PIE influence, with its large case inventory, use of ablauting suffixes, and so on, but even then with suffixed articles, no dual, and a preference for agglutinative morphology, it carves its own niche. I am definitely glad that it has ended up like this--I love Sanskrit, but making a straight-up clone would have been quite boring. In addition, this already heavy-distance means I can introduce some more slight Sanskrit influence at my leisure, without coming off as a complete rip-off.

One such example of this is that I am thinking of having <w> become <v> when it comes from an <au> diphthong breaking before a vowel. Therefore, nāvubbī "I am beginning to guard", from nau-ubb-ī and thāvina "I am seeing". Original cases of /w/ do not experience this: śtēwatha "she seethes in anger", from śtēw-a-tha. This would be a sort of fortition. However, /w/ in all cases would also become /v/ before resonants (except for /w/ and /v/); before other consonants (and the two previous exceptions) it merges with the following consonant. This is why the word "seething anger, internal rage" is śtōtū: the word is underlyingly śtēw-t-ū > śtēwtū, and as said before, /ew/ > /o:/, thus stōtū.

See you all later. By the end of the week I should have a post on ablaut and nouns.
Nūdhrēmnāva naraśva, dṛk śraṣrāsit nūdhrēmanīṣṣ iźdatīyyīm woḥīm madhēyyaṣṣi.
satisfaction-DEF.SG-LOC live.PERFECTIVE-1P.INCL but work-DEF.SG-PRIV satisfaction-DEF.PL.NOM weakeness-DEF.PL-DAT only lead-FUT-3P

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