The Pages of The Gray Wizard

Predicates

bethfennar vecarmbeth
7.0 predicate morphology

The Predicate is the heart of the sentence in ámman îar. It is, therefore, more meaningful to consider the morphology of the Predicate than of the verb alone. This becomes clear with the understanding that predicate inflections distribute more widely across the entire expression than is commonly the case with verbal inflections. The ámman îar predicate system reflects a great deal of the predicate's underlying semantic content in surface structure inflections. Predicates are inflected for argument structure, semantic category, voice, polarity, aspect, mood, and tense.

NOTE: The analysis of ámman îar predicates as presented here has been influenced by work done in this area by Rick Morneau. This is especially true of the concepts of valency and class. Although the implementation in ámman îar is significantly different from Rick's conceptions, the intellectual debt remains. See his Lexical Semantics monograph for an extended discussion of many of the concepts presented here.

7.1 the verb chain

ámman îar predicates are invariably formed using a multiple verb and particle construction that distributes across the predicate expression according to well-defined syntactic rules. These constructions are composed of three components,

1. a lexical verb which specifies the semantics of the predicate;
2. an auxiliary verb which specifies the grammatical usage of the lexical verb; and
3. predicate inflections which define the argument structure of the predicate.

Consider the predicate en inarunarth ûelcorrieth in the following example:

7.1.1 the lexical verb

The first form (inarunarth in the above example) containing the verb stem is called the Lexical Verb. This form specifies the semantics of the verb, expressing the main lexical content of the predication. The components of the Lexical Verb are as follows:

The valency inflection, while illustrated above and appearing to be a lexical verb inflection, is considered an integral part of the Predicate Inflection (discussed below) rather than specific to the lexical verb.

7.1.2 the auxiliary verb

The second form (ûelcorrieth in the above example) is called the Auxiliary Verb. This form is semantically empty specifying rather the verb's grammatical usage. The components of the Auxiliary Verb are as follows:

NOTE: There is no root or stem form for the auxiliary verb. It is wholly formed by inflectional elements that modify the concept expressed by the main lexical verb.

7.1.3 predicate inflections

Predicate inflections distribute across the entire predicate and specify its argument structure.

The morphologically possible permutations that these tables suggest ( 7 Voices, 5 Valency Markers, 4 Class Indicators, 2 Polarities, 12 Modalities, 3 Aspectuals, 4 Aspects, and 3 Tenses) would generate a very large number of potential predicate forms (7*5*4*2*12*3*4*3 = 1,209,960). However, analysis of available corpora reveals that very few of these potential forms are semantically realizable. They are not all free variables. The semantics of the lexical verb usually determines the Valency and Classes that are realizable. In addition, each of the four Verb Classes has a default Tense, Aspect, and Modality (TAM) which is realized in the vast majority of utterances. This generally leaves only Voice, Polarity, and Aspectual to vary somewhat freely and with the possible exception of Polarity, even these are subject to semantic restrictions.

7.2 the verb stem

Strictly speaking, there is no verb infinitive in ámman îar. The citation form (the verb stem plus the suffix -o) is an atavistic throwback to a now obsolete usage. Although generally referred to as the 'infinitive', this form does not occur naturally in the modern language.

Traditional infinitive usages are performed by serial verb forms in ámman îar, such as 'to come" in sentences like:

Here, the infinitive usage of the verb is formulated using a serial verb construction:

erthulel loimiarth < tulo / loimo = 'to come- to want',

where the valency of the main verb

loimiarth < loimo -ia -rth

indicates cross-reference with the S-function argument alan as Patient of 'want' with an oblique argument in the form of the "gerund-like" verb form erthulel as Theme. Meanwhile the valency of the "gerund'

erthulel < tulo -e -l

indicates cross-reference with the same S-function argument alan as agent of 'come'. This example translates literally as "he is in the state of wanting the act of his coming" or "he wants coming".

7.3 predicate inflection

The Predicate Inflections in ámman îar determine the number and types of core arguments that the verb may take. Unlike tradition inflections, these are only notionally inflecting as they are manifested as particles, clitics and pure inflections distributed across the predicate rather than bound to the verb alone. These inflections provide a semantic role marking and pronominal cross-referencing paradigm that is active in nature, i.e. unlike the case system, which is purely syntactic, the Predicate Inflection is based on the semantics of the arguments.

The valency inflection consists of up to three components

1. a Patient/Theme Particle that precedes the Patientive or Theme argument;
2. an Agentive Clitic that attaches to the lexical verb in the presence of an Agentive argument; and
3. an obligatory Valency Inflection that specifies the argument structure of the predication.

In the chart below, the Patient/Theme Particle must immediately precede the patientive argument of the predicate when present or the Theme argument when present. In the presence of both (Patient/Theme Valency), the Patientive argument takes precedence.

7.3.1 core valency

7.3.1.1 patient valency

The patient argument of a verb is the noun or noun phrase that experiences the state or change of state described by the verb. Patients in ámman îar include such semantic arguments as experiencer and benefactor.

When the argument in S-function relative to an intransitive predicate is semantically patientive, the predicate must be inflected according to the patient valence paradigm. Note that this definition restricts Patient valency to State and Process verbs.

7.3.1.2 agent valency

The agent argument of a verb is the noun or noun phrase that is responsible for the event described by the verb.

When the argument in S-function relative to an intransitive predicate is semantically agentive, the predicate must be inflected according to the Agent valence paradigm. Note that this definition restricts the Agent valence to Action verbs.

7.3.1.3 agent/patient valency

When a transitive predicate takes a semantically agentive argument in A-function and a semantically patientive argument in P-function, the predicate must be inflected according to the agent/patient valence paradigm. Note that this definition restricts the Agent/Patient valence to Action/Process verbs.

7.3.2 theme valency

Each of the above Valency forms can take an additional Theme argument. The Theme serves as a reference point for the event described by the verb, but is unaffected by that event, i.e. it is not patientive.

7.3.2.1 patient/theme valency

When a transitive predicate takes a patientive argument in A-function that experiences the state or change of state described by the lexical verb, as well as a Theme argument in P-function that is the point of reference for the event described by the verb, the predicate must be inflected according to the Patient/Theme valence paradigm. Like the Patient valence, this valency is restricted to State and Process verbs.

7.3.2.2 agent/theme valency

When a transitive predicate takes an agentive argument in A-function that is responsible for the event described by the lexical verb, as well as a Theme argument in P-function that is the point of reference for the event described by the verb, the predicate must be inflected according to the Agent/Theme valence paradigm.

The semantic distinction between the last two examples is captured in the predicate inflections. In the former example, both the Patient/Theme Particle, en preceding the A-function argument i dais and the valency (-ia-) inflection on the verb henîarth indicate that the tiger as Patient was in the state (-rth) of seeing an eagle as Theme, thus "The tiger SAW an eagle". In the latter example, the Patient/Theme Particle in precedes the Theme argument indicating the absence of a patientive argument while the agentive (er-) and valency inflections (-ie-) of the lexical verb erhenîel indicates that the tiger as Agent was responsible for the action (-l) of seeing an eagle as Theme, thus "The tiger LOOKED AT an eagle."

7.3.3 ditransitive predicates

Predicate inflections specify the core argument valency of the predicate only, irrespective of the existence of any oblique arguments. For this reason, so-called ditransitive verbs that take an agentive argument in A-function, a patientive argument in P-function and an oblique Theme that serves as the point of reference for the event take the Agent/Patient predicate inflection.

Note that this is the canonical form for all such "ditransitive" verbs, (i.e A=AGT / P=PAT / Obl=REF). Unlike English, the verb must undergo a voice transformation for the following:

Although we will revisit this construction in the discussion of voice, it is instructive to note the salient differences between these two examples.

1. It is notable that the semantic roles of the three arguments remain invariant in the two examples (alan, he=Agent, nerin/neren, me=Patient and narnen/narn, story=Theme);
2. In order to facilitate the promotion of the underlying oblique argument (narnen) to P-function, the verb must be put in the Applicative Voice;
3. The lexical verb must be inflected for Agent/Theme valency (-ie-) in the second instance instead of Agent/Patient valency (-o-) to reflect the new core argument structure.
4. The Patientive Particle an remains associated with the semantically patientive argument in both instances.