Talk:Gamgweth Grammar (book)

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What Is This?

This is mean to be a discussion of a lexical analysis that complements the grammar book. This is also intended to find out what modifications to the language should be make to clarify certain constructions whenever issues are noticed.

Proposals for Change

Adverb Adversity!

When an adverb exists, there is no place to put it clearly in the sentence. You can see this from below examples (spec. Example With Adjective vs. Adverb).

Why is this important? Well, adverbs play special roles in more complex sentences, modifiying both adjectives, verbs, and clauses. If we can't decide what it's modifying, then it will definitely lead to confusion.

Without Inflection

ex.

Example Adverb/Adjective Incoherency
Esar ama gwer Gamgwethahle. "I do speak beautiful Gamgweth" (Do-pres I speak Gamgweth-beautiful)
Esar ama gwer Gamgweth ahle. "I do speak Gamgweth beautifully" (Do-pres I speak Gamgweth beautiful)

With Inflection

With inflections, the adverb could follow the verb or moved to the end of the clause.

  • e.g., let's assume the inflection is uf'- (one of the least-found pairs)
With Inflection uf'-
Esar ama gwer Gamgwethahle. "I do speak beautiful Gamgweth" (Do-pres I speak Gamgweth beautiful)
Esar ama gwer Gamgweth uf'ahle. "I do speak Gamgweth beautifully" (Do-pres I speak Gamgweth beautiful-ly)
Gwerke Juli ri li trekhalo sann. (trekhalosann) "Juli spoke to the good chieftan" (speak-past Juli to the chieftan good)
Gwerke Juli ri li trekhalo uf'sann. "Juli spoke well to the chieftan" (speak-past Juli to the chieftan goodly [well])
Gwerke Juli ri li trekhalosann uf'sann. "Juli spoke to the good chieftan well" (speak-past Juli to the chieftan-good well)
Gwerke uf'sann Juli ri li trekhalosann. "Juli spoke well to the good chieftan" (speak-past well Juli to the chieftan-good)
Uf'sann gwerke Juli ri li trekhalosann. "Juli spoke well to the good chieftan" (well speak-past Juli to the chieftan-good)

Issues with Inflections

Potential Issues With Inflection uf'-
Hentorke uf'bolg Juli ve li gelvmor'seord uf'mor. "Juli badly traveled in the very dark cave"?

"Juli very badly traveled in the dark cave"?

  • This suggests that the adverbs should be situationally near, and ordered, to the thing they are describing. Notice in the sentence below that the adverbs follow the thing they are describing, even adjectives. Never modifying from the end of a clause!
Complex Sentence With Inflection uf'-
Hentorke uf'bolg uf'mor vi Juli bolg uf'more ve li gelvmor'seord uf'mor. "A very bad Juli very badly traveled in the very dark cave" (travel-past badly greatly a Juli bad greatly in the cave dark greatly)

Basic Structure

Alphabet

There are 24 Common characters used in Gamgweth (by example)

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W Y Z
  • Notice there is no example of the Common letters Q or X used (though the vocals may exist in other combinations)

Punctuation

There are 4 (or 5) special characters used punctuation and are as follows:

Character Usage
. end of a declarative sentence.
? direct question at end of sentence
, separate ideas, elements, clauses (but not to separate adjectives)
' (apostrophe) indicate vocal stop (construed) between compounds where similar double consonants are paired; e.g., seord'telgi (dark green);

also used when inflecting verbs by adding -ing; e.g., gwelder (kill) -> a'gwelder (killing); may also be vocal stops

! (presumably) indicate emphasis in declarative or vocative sentence

Other Parts of Speech

Articles

Definite (the) Indefinite (a and an)
li vi

Prepositions

against as at by in of on out of to
gand ev ae ha ve ai / rae kus diluai (construed) ri

Conjunctions

and but nor or
ia kho uldin (construed) ul

Some Subordinating Conjuntions (others are already listed above)

"I was so scared that I ran away" (complement)

"I use that" (noun)

"I found it useful that I had the gold already" (sub conj) [arguable]

"It is on top of that table" (adjective)

  • This is meant to illustrate that these words may are not well-defined; it may be right in Common reuse the same word in different ways, but it may not be the intended usage in Gamgweth.
how than that when where
lof jen padia sudu suren

Compounds

General

Greater than

suffix -mor "great" to specify a greater amount/degree of a noun or adjective

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
chel "cool" chelmor "cold"
zindu "house" zindumor "manor"
sel "sea" selmor "ocean"
lermor "gorge"
gelv "cave" gelvmor "cavern"

Less than

suffix -ban "little" to specify a lesser amount/degree of the noun or adjective

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
sel "sea" selban "bay"
fal "river" falban "creek/brook"
lerban "fissure"

Area of type

remove end vowel and suffix -ren "land" to specify an area consiting of the type of noun or adjective

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
mod "tree" modren "woodland"
neflor "train" nefloren "training ground"
nama "salt" namadren "salt flats"

Full of, or filled with

suffix -ta "full"

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
crof "bush" croftan "brush"
selban "bay" selbanta "cay"
din "no/not/zero" dinta "empty"
av "eye" avtai "stars" (see seordav "eclipse" [dark + eye])

Person of type (occupation)

suffix -ger "person"

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
tyval "theft" tyvalger "thief"
lasa "noble" lasager "nobleman"

Young type of thing

suffix -wen "young"

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
ger "person" gerwen "child"
andu "day" anduwen "morning"
lasa "noble" lasawen "heir"
night "surmi" (inflected) sumiwen "evening"

Construables

Negative type of thing

suffix -isi (construed "unwelcome/unwanted/dangerous/negative")

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
lort "plant" lortisi "weed"
dyr "animal" (construed) dyrisi "beast" (see dyrgelv "den")

Time of thing

suffix -dor (construed "time")

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning
jeol "ice" Jeoldor "Winter"
anla "sun" Anlador "Summer"
sca "before" (construed) scador "prepare"

Questionables

  • batar, dotar, hentar "left, right (dir), crossroad", hen "road"
    • not sure how to interpret this...

Inflections

Adjectives

Compounding nouns with adjectives

Li denenshonarthe... "The warm king..." (the king warm)
Sa li denenshon arthe. "The king is warm" (be-pres the king warm)
Phopher li denenshona'phopher. "The dreaming king dreams" (dream the king dreaming)

Adjectives to Adverbs (Common -ly)

No inflection of the adjective, simply add to end of the sentence to modify

  • (assume Heyor == 'greet (v)' from Heyo "hello")
Heyor li denenshonchel Juli. "The cool king greets Juli"
Heyor li denenshon Juli chel. "The king greets Juli cooly"
  • There's no rule for inflecting the adjective-to-adverb with -ly, so this I guess is considered contextually appropriate in this structure (see adjective adverbs below).

Make appearance of, make into (Common -en), suffix -(a)fi

Adjective Meaning Modified Adjective New Meaning
rom "broad" romafi "broaden"
atila "gold (metal)" atilafi "golden (metal)"

Nouns

Verbification

If ending with a vowel, suffix -r

Noun Modified Noun New Meaning
phofe phofer "dream (v)"
ferse ferser "sleep (v)"

If ending with a vowel+consonant, replace consonant with -r

Noun Modified Noun New Meaning
achol achor "fear (v)"
abues abuer "love (v)"

If ending with a double-consonant, suffix -er

Noun Modified Noun New Meaning
gweld gwelder "kill (v)"

Adjectification

Noun Meaning Modified Noun New Meaning (Adjective)
elba "gloom" elban "gloomy"

Verbs

There do not seem to be infinitves with verbs (via examples), however there is ri (to) which may suggest it is usable to create them. However, it may also be intended to be preposition only and represents the Common use of the word, not necessarily proper Gamgweth usage.

Nominalization

TODO

Conjugations

Transitive Verbs

are modified by tense

Gweldke Juli li  denenshon.
TV      S    Det DO
"Juli killed the king"
(Kill-did Juli the king)

Intransitive Verbs

are modified only as a tense participle when using copulas (be)

Sa  Juli a'gwelder. "Juli is killing."
Cop S    IV

Axiliary Constructions

Progressive Examples

progressives using transitive verbs, you may want to use auxiliary verbs for tense e.g., sa "be-present", sake "be-past", and saal "be-future"

past progressive
Sake li denenshon a'gwelder. "The king was killing" (be-past the king killing)
Sake gaena a'gwelder. "They were killing" (be-past they killing)
past progressive + past participle
Sake li denenshon a'sa gwelder. "The king was being killed" (be-past the king being kill)
present progressive
Sa li denenshon a'gwelder. "The king is killing" (be-pres the king killing)
Sa gaena agwelder. "They are killing" (be-pres they killing)
present progressive + past participle
Sa li denenshon a'sa gwelder. "The king is being killed" (be-pres the king being kill)
future progressive
Saal li denenshon a'gwelder. "The king will be killing" (be-fut the king killing)
Saal gaena a'gwelder. "They will be killing" (be-fut they killing)
Saal gaena a'tyvar urfe naen. "They will be stealing all afternoon" (be-fut they stealing afternoon all)
present simple
Gwer tema Gamgweth? "You speak Gamgweth?"
Gwer tema Gamgweth "You speak Gamgweth" or imperative "(You) speak Gamgweth"

Sentences without copulas are not good, because there is not a distinction between the third person present tense and the second person imperative, "(You) kill Juli."

Gwelder Juli. "Juli kills" or "Kill Juli"?
Gwelder ama. "I kill" or "Kill me"?
Karke Juli gwelder. "Juli has killed" or "Have Juli killed"?

In this case, the default should imply the imperative is intended, and instead use modal conjugations when describing activities

Gwelderal Juli. "Juli will kill"
Gelderke Juli. "Juli has killed"

Use of modal esar (do):

Esar Juli gwelder. "Juli does kill"
Esar ama gwelder. "I do kill"
Esar tema gwer Gamgweth? "Do you speak Gamgweth?"
Esar ama gwer Gamgweth. "I do speak Gamgweth"

Example With Adjective vs. Adverb: This is where adverbs break down. See the following examples as to why adjective-to-adverb constructions don't necessarily work.

Esar ama gwer Gamgwethahle. "I do speak beautiful Gamgweth" Do-pres I speak Gamgweth-beautiful
Esar ama gwer Gamgweth ahle. "I do speak Gamgweth beautifully" Do-pres I speak Gamgweth beautiful
  • This can't necessarily go next to gwer (speak) as might an adjective for the same example way above without modals. i.e.,
Heyor li denenshon Juli chel. "The king greets Juli cooly" Greet the king Juli cool
  • In this example, heyor (greet; construed) would have to be modified, but then would become
Heyor chel li denenshon Juli. "Cool greets the king Juli" Greet cool the king Juli
  • The problem is that adverbs should be inflected to indicate they are indeed modifiers.
past simple
Esarke Juli gwelder. "Juli did kill" (do-past Juli kill)
Gwelderke Juli. "Juli did kill" (per grammar rule) (kill-past Juli)
future simple
Gwelderal Juli. "Juli will kill" (kill-fut Juli)
Sa Juli hevor ri gwelder. "Juli is going to kill" (be Juli going to kill)
  • In the last example, it might be possible to drop the ri (to) as implied infinitive or preposition; since the word exists, it should probably be considered proper to add it, while dropping it would be more like slang.

Perfect Progressive Examples

use of kar sa "have + be" with tense participle verbs (-ing)

present perfect progressive
kar li denenshon sa a'gwelder. "The king has been killing" (has-pres the king be killing)

|- | karfano li denenshon sa a'gwelder. | "The king could have been killing." | (has-pres-could the king be killing) |}

past perfect progressive
karke li denenshon sa a'gwelder. "The king had been killing" (has-past the king be killing)
karkefano li denenshon sa a'gwelder. "Thing king could have been killing" (has-past-could the king be killing)
future perfect progressive
karal li denenshon sa a'gwelder. "The king will have been killing" (has-fut the king be killing)

--DAEMETHEUS (talk) 22:32, 27 October 2016 (CDT)