Computer returns refurbished, along with a great keyboard with lots of special characters.
Nouns are pluralized with reduplication of the initial syllable. The accent must jump back one syllable:
qáwa 'man' ->
qáqawa 'men'
θúku 'loaf' ->
θúθuku 'loaves, bread (collective)'
mõŋó 'star' ->
mõmṍŋo 'stars'
Plural marking is obligatory in animate nouns, but optional in inanimates.
Nouns are either animate or inanimate gender. These are generally self-explanatory, except that some nouns (like c'ímü 'sun' and ŋuqú 'moon') are considered animate by convention. The lexicon will tell you the gender of a given noun.
Adjectives must agree with nouns in gender, number and case. Instead of reduplication, syncretic suffixes mark agreement. (Note that for animates the ergative is the unmarked form- possibly a remnant of a nominative/accusative system that persists in first and second person pronouns.)
| Singular Animate | Plural Inanimate | Inanimate |
---|
Absolutive | -ke/-kõ | -kʷe/-kʷõ | -Ø |
Ergative | -Ø | -wä/-wa | -jä/-ja |
Postpositional | -ŋi/-ŋũ | -mü/-mu | -ni/-nũ |
Note that although inanimate nouns are perfectly happy reduplicating to mark the plural (though as noted it's optional), adjectives agreeing with them do not mark number.
Adjectives precede the nouns they modify, and need no marking to be used adverbially:
qö́me-ke qáwa 'a happy man (abs.)'
qö́me qáwa-ja θúku hṍnõ 'the happy man eats bread'
qáwa-ja θúku qö́me hṍnõ 'the man eats bread happily'
Postpositions follow their objects, obviously, which must take the postpositional case, along with any modifiers:
ŋanṹ 'city'
ŋanṹ-nũ le 'to the city'
qö́me-ni ŋanṹ-nũ le 'to the happy city'
Possessive constructions are formed with the formula possessor-ERG possessum:
qáwa-ja θúku 'the man's bread'
The first and second person pronouns are nominative-accusative aligned:
| Nominative | Accusative | Genitive | Prepositional |
---|
1s | ŋä́qä | ŋéje | ŋä́jä | ŋä́ni |
1p | súwo | sújõ | súja | súnũ |
2s | céhi | céśe | céjä | céni |
2p | ráŋa | ráña | rája | ránũ |
Note the similarity of the genitive forms to the ergative case of nouns. The third-person pronouns are ergative-aligned, but, as in adjectives, the animates betray traces of a former accusative stance.
| Absolutive | Ergative | Postpositional |
---|
3an | wáka | wahá | wánũ |
3anf | kʷókõ | kʷówõ | kʷónũ |
3in | hínä | híjä | híni |
The special feminine forms refer only to female humans. Elsewhere the standard animate pronoun predominates.