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VAIs

We are now beginning to get into the meat of the verbal system, with real person marking. Because these verbs are intransitive, there's still no polypersonal or direct/inverse marking, but we will see some incorporation. The template is pretty much the same as that for VIIs:

[personal marking/order]-(TAM)-(preverbs)-verb root-(voice/number marking)-(medials)-(more TAM)-(finals)

but we'll actually see some medials in play.

Personal Marking/Order

Here, the order system of independent/conjunct I/conjunct II that we've already seen is now crossbred with a personal marking system: first person, second person, third person animate proximate, and third person animate obviative. Order affixes usually go after the personal markers, but occasionally there are syncretic forms, so we're treating them at the same time.

The personal markers are similar in the first and third person proximate to possessive prefixes on nouns, but the second and third person obviative are not the same. Motivations for this are unclear.

1st nɨ-
2nd čɨ-
3AN.Prox hā-
3AN.Obv ke[ʔ]-



The order markers are similar to those in VIIs:

Independent -Ø-
Conjunct I -se(h)-
Conjunct II -we(h)-


Order prefixes usually appear after personal markers. However, there are a couple of syncretic forms in the conjunct orders: the third person proximate will combine with Conjunct II to produce the prefix hō(h)-, and the third person obviative will combine with Conjunct II to produce kʷ'ē(h)-. The second person will combine with Conjunct I to produce šɨ:(h)-. Additionally, the first and second person prefixes nɨ- and čɨ- will back to no- and čo- when followed by Conjunct II.

So, to recap:

Independent Conjunct I Conjunct II
1st nɨ- nɨse(h)- nowe(h)-
2nd čɨ- šɨ:(h)- čowe(h)-
3rd Prox hā- hāse(h)- hō(h)-
3rd Obv ke[ʔ]- keʔse(h)- kʷ'ē(h)-



The TAM prefixes and preverbs are pretty much the same system as in VIIs, so there's no need to go over them again.

Voice/Number marking is pretty simple. VIAs may have, in addition to the passive -(h)iknɨ- that we've already seen in VIIs, an antipassive -(y)ekʷ(a)- suffix which can be added to transitive verbs  to eliminate their object. Neither of these are particularly common, however, and more interesting is the number marking suffix, which appears after any voice suffix. No suffix appears in the singular; in the plural, there are two possible affixes:

-ahw(ɨ)- indicates the presence of a first-person argument. This is always the pluralizing suffix used when the subject is first person plural; however, the prefix will make a clusivity distinction. If the subject is first person exclusive, use a first-person prefix; if the subject is first person inclusive, use a second-person prefix.

-(y)ēkm(a)- indicates the lack of a first-person argument. Thus it's used in the second person plural and with third-person subjects.

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OK, onto medials. Here's where we're going to see noun incorporation. (Arguably the more nouny preverbs also count as noun incorporation, but they're not quite as obvious.)

Generally speaking, the only nouns that get incorporated are objects and instruments. Pretty much any noun can be incorporated, but it has to be stripped of any affixes, including prenouns, number-marking, obviation and case. If an object is incorporated, you can stop there; if an instrument was incorporated, you'll additionally want the instrumental suffix -cē- appearing before the incorporated noun. Usually, object medials are attached to VTA or VTI stems, which turns them into VIA stems. An example (skipping ahead to flesh out a bit of VTA morphology, which I'll get to later...)

If an incorporated noun has a final vowel, this is deleted if a following, vowel-initial affix follows. If it reappears and was long in the independent noun, it'll always be short in the incorporated form.

nismā nɨ-Ø-p'i:nɨ-Ø-Ø
potato 1sg-ind-eat smth (VTI)-sg subj/sg obj-nonpast
'I am eating a potato.'

nɨ-Ø-p'i:nɨ-Ø-nisma-Ø
1st-ind-eat smth (VTI -> VIA)-sg subj-potato-nonpast
'I am eating a potato, I am potato-eating.'

Only one noun can be incorporated into a verb.

TAM suffixes and finals are the same as in VIIs, so I'm not going to go over them again.

Another glossed sentence:

łɨ-hoteʔ-āt-et hā-Ø-kōhθ-ēkma-cik, nɨ-hoteʔ-ohta-het ke-Ø-skēł-ēkma-cik.
2sg-sheep-pl.prox-sg.poss 3PROX-ind-be.black (VAI)-pl.-μέν, 1sg-sheep-pl.obv-sg.poss 3OBV-ind-be.white (VAI)-pl.-δέ
'Your sheep are black, on the one hand, but my sheep, on the other, are white.'