(At this stage you might wonder what was the point in inventing such an insane, unlearnable, language.
If your patience is reaching breaking point, skip the next two lessons, and get directly to the juicy
bit, there. Otherwise, read on. Qoteedy.)
More on Beddy-Byes
(Nova Scotia, Deneb V)
A few examples will help the reader grasp the fundamentals of Nova Scotian
Beddy-Byes syntax better than long explanations.
VOCABULARY
Gebo = to swim.
Sade = swift.
Babi = meaning-reversing modifier (very much like Esperanto mal-)
Moga = I
Toto = you/he/she/it (Beddy-Byes distinguishes only two persons: first
and the rest)
SOME SIMPLE SENTENCES
Gesadebo = to swim swiftly. "Swiftly" (sade), modifying "to swim"
(gebo), is embedded immediately after its first phoneme/syllable.
Gesababidebo = to swim slowly. Literally: to swim un-swiftly.
Geqamogaqabo = I swim. "To swim" (gebo) is determined by the subject
marker (qaqa), itself determined by the first-person pronoun (moga).
This is really not an alien construction after all, as we find
constructions that can be similarly analyzed in some Terran languages,
Japanese, for instance. In Japanese, the determinant precedes the
determined, and "I swim" is: watakushi (I) wa (subject marker) oyogu
(swim). We could hold that the verb (oyogu) is determined by the
subject marker (wa), which is itself determined by the personal pronoun
(watakushi). That is exactly what Beddy-Byes does, except that in
Beddy-Byes the determinant is *embedded* in the determined.
Geqaqabo = someone swims. Here the subject marker is left undetermined,
hence the general meaning: "(some)one swims" (viz French: "on nage",
German "man schwimmt"). Imagine that you could say wa oyogu in
Japanese. The Beddy-Byes construction is exactly the same.
IMPORTANT
Note the difference between these two sentences:
- Gesaqaqadebo = someone swims swiftly.
- Geqasadeqabo = someone swift swims.
In (1) sade (swift) is embedded in, and therefore modifies, gebo
(swim). In (2), however, sade is embedded in the subject marker
qaqa, and therefore modifies the subject, not the verb.
HOMEWORK
Translate into Beddy-Byes:
You swim swiftly
Someone swift swims slowly.
I who am swift swim slowly.
She who is slow swims slowly.
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