Vadi

Introduction

Vadi is an extinct language once spoken in Minhay. A small parchment fragment was discovered in April 1963 in a cave outside of Peħħat, a small township in Sakkeb Prefecture. More fragments were discovered in subsequent years in the vicinity of the cave, named Aħħur, where the first texts were discovered. Finally, in the late 90's, the wonderfully preserved Kalapái Scriptum were discovered in an isolated hut approximately ten kilometres north of Peħħat. These texts were dated to the mid to late 1800's CE. The Kalapái Scriptum is a collection of letters between two farmers, Éro and Sorvin, who were embroiled in an ongoing feud regarding the property lines between their lands. The letters were written in Vadi intermixed with words from the unrelated Peshpeg and Minhast languages. A few letters were written entirely in the the extinct Minhast Knife Speaker dialect. Also found among the letters are legal papers drawn from the Prefect of Dog Speaker Country. The farmers' letters contained several texts clearly indicating code-switching between Vadi and the Knife Speaker dialect. The portions containing the intermixed Knife Speaker and Peshpeg words were used to decipher the Vadi texts. The Dog Speaker papers did not contribute directly to the decipherment of the language, but as an external source it provided a great deal of context of the nature of the feud between the litigants. This external contextual source clarified the translation of otherwise ambiguous passages. The Kalapái Scriptum is thus popularly referred to as the "Minhast Rosetta Stone".

Today, two linguists, Dr. J.F. Schumann of Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, and Dr. Iyyaħmi min Ruššur of the University of Aškuan, are the two major contributors to our current knowledge of the Vadi language, although others, such as Dr. Napayshni Tashunka of the University of the Lakota Nation at Three Pipes, have also made significant contributions.

This article incorporates the findings of Schumann's and Iyyaħmi's work, and to a lesser extent, Tashunka; where the Vadists significantly diverge, it will be noted and the opposing viewpoints will be presented.

Phonology

The entire corpus of the Scriptum is written in the indigenous Minhast Širkattarnaft script. While the Širkattarnaft, an abugida, works quite well for the Minhast language, it has presented a major challenge to Vadists in determining the phonology and phonotactics of Vadi. There are several spelling variants or inconsistencies, and numerous occurrences of digraphs appear in both litigants' texts. Many of the digraphs combine one of the few surviving ideographs in the Širkattarnaft with an ordinary character. These and other unusual usage of the Širkattarnaft characters in the texts, while not completely regular, do follow recurrent patterns, an indication of phonological differences between Vadi and Minhast, and as demonstrated by Iyyaħmi, evidence of sandhi processes occurring between syllable and word boundaries. Schumann has argued the texts indicate dialectal differences between the litigants; Iyyaħmi does agree that some of the spelling anomalies in the texts do indicate dialectal differences, but that this argument alone is too simplistic: there are other anomalies that are highly indicative that the writers were trying to indicate sandhi processes not reflected by the standard Širkattarnaft characters. He statistically backs up this argument by presenting frequency distributions of certain types of spelling anomalies found in both litigants' texts, differences which can only be explained by morphophonotactics.¹

Today, most linguists have come to a general consensus of the Vadi phonemic inventory. The language does appear to be largely CV, although CVC, initial and final CC syllables can arise due to the application of sandhi processes, as demonstrated by statistical evidence Iyyaħmi has presented.

Gemination² occurs among a restricted set of consonants, particularly /k/, /n/, /l/ and /t/. Consonantal mutations occur, with evidence of both lenition and fortition. Metathesis also occurs with certain consonantal combinations, traceable to Minhast influence.

Consonants

Vadi Consonantal Inventory

	Bilabial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
Nasal	m	n
Plosive	p b	t d ð*		k g		ʔ
Fricative	v	s s̺*	ʒ*			h
Affricates			d͡ʒ*
Approximants			j
Flap		ɾ
Lateral		l ɬ*

* Not reflected in Schumann's phonemic inventory.

Vowels

	Front	Near- front	Central	Near- back	Back
Close	i u o ɛ a
Near-close
Close-mid
Mid
Open-mid
Near-open
Open

Prosody

Stress

Stress is highly variable in Vadi, but it tends to fall on the penultimate syllable. Schumann's Romanized orthography marks stress with an acute accent, which in turn implies that the vowel is lengthened, although exceptions regarding vowel lengthening abound. When a penultimate syllable is marked with an acute accent, one can generally assume that vowel lengthening has also occurred, although at times it may be an orthographic relic from a time when the vowel was lengthened in the past, but by late Vadi times had been shortened.

In contrast, Iyyaħmi uses a macron to indicate simple vowel lengthening, and an acute accent for accented short vowels. Words containing a single macron and no additional diacritics indicate that the syllable containing the long vowel bears the stress. Words containing a vowel with an acute accent bear the stress, regardless of the presence of other long vowels.

Phonotactics

Before the Kalapái Scriptum was discovered, little was known of Vadi phonotactics. The spelling in the Aħħur texts was consistently CV, with CVn allowed in final syllables. The spelling yielded no discernible evidence of sandhi processes, if anything it suggested that Vadi phonotactics were quite uncomplicated.

The excellent condition of the texts from the Scriptum were a veritable gold mine for understanding Vadi phonology and phonotactics and quickly dispelled earlier views that Vadi phonotactics were simple. Rather, Vadi phonotactics were far more complex than earlier thought. Moreover, the phonemic inventory was underestimated.

Tashunka, who was working on Minhast dialectology at the time of the discovery of the Scriptum, was among the first scholars to examine the texts. He immediately realized the spelling anomalies and other unorthodox usage of the Širkattarnaft characters conveyed a more complex picture than that of previous work. He posited that either the phoneme /β/ or /v/ was part of the phonemic inventory of Vadi, based on the digraph <bi><f> found in the Scriptum's texts, which coincided with the alternation of <ba> and <wa> in the Aħħur texts. So while the Aħħur texts' spelling for "Vadi" alternated erratically between <ba><di> or <wa><di>, the texts from the Scriptum consistently spelled "Vadi" as <bi><f><'a><di>. Similar correlations of the anomalies the Scriptum with the Aħħur materials led him to conclude there was also a /ð/, and another albeit indeterminate sibilant, perhaps /ɕ/. Several years after Tashunka returned to his work on Minhast dialectology, Iyyaħmi took up where Tashunka left off and determined that the sibilant was the apico-alveolar fricative /s̺/.

Additional work by Iyyaħmi led to the discovery of consonantal mutations reminiscent of the Celtic languages, which created much controversy in the Vadist community. In time, after presenting statistical frequency distributions of the occurrence of certain spelling patterns throughout the Scriptum's corpora, his views gained credence. Today, the consensus of Vadists is that mutations and other complex sandhi processes were an important feature of the language.

Mutations

Vadi mutations fall into four major classes, and a fifth minor class:

1. Fortition
2. Palatization
3. Spirantization
4. Debuccalization
5. Labialization

Fortition is realized when fricatives turn into stops, stops become geminated and/or voiced if unvoiced. For example, the combination of the past tense marker plus the genitive triggers voiced fortition and syncope with kilay "heart, interior" in the phrase Junnyêna glai haglev man ukanyen "I will enter your house and ruin you", i.e. junnyêna glái << jula-nai-na kilay. If the future marker -nai- did not appear, fortition would not be triggered. Instead, the result will be Julana kilai haglev man ukanyen "I am entering your house to ruin you."

Orthography

As mentioned earlier, the Scriptum was entirely written in the Širkattarnaft, an Indic-derived script containing graphemes of an even older ideographic system:

The Širkattarnaft

• 

The Širkattarnaft was insufficient in representing Vadi phonology and phonotactics, as evidenced by the numerous digraphs, spelling anomalies and irregularities found throughout the texts. Schumann and Iyyaħmi use two different Romanized systems for glossing purposes. Schumann's is based on slightly modified version of Spanish, as it is his native language and moreover, he feels the Spanish orthography represents the phonology of Vadi accurately.

Schumann's Romanization
a, á, e, é, i, í, o, ó, u, ú, b, p, f, v, d, t, g, k, j, n, m, l, r, z, s, h, w, y

Iyyaħmi's publications inside Minhay utilize the Širkattarnaft to maintain Vadi's historical link with the actual system in the Scriptum, as well as to make it accessible to native Minhast speakers. However, for international publications, Iyyaħmi prefers a modified version of the Ammerkast system for transcribing Vadi alongside the original Širkattarnaft text:

Iyyaħmi's Romanization
a, á, ā, â, e, é, ē, ê, i, í, ī, í, o, ó, ō, ô, u, ú, ū, û, b, p, f, bf [v], d, dfš/dft [ð], t, g, k, n, m, l, fsl [ɬ], r, z, s, sš [s̺], š, h, w, y

A few notes regarding Iyyaħmi's Romanization: there are five digraphs, namely <bf>, <fsl>, <sš>, and <dfš> with its alternate <dft>. Iyyaħmi's system diverges from the Ammerkast system, which was designed to be phonemic. In fact, "Ammerkast" derives from "Americanist", a phonetic orthographic alternative to IPA widely used in linguistic literature for Native American, Semitic, Sumerian and other ancient Near Eastern languages. Although Iyyaħmi acknowledges that his modified system breaks the Ammerkast's original purpose to employ a one character-to-sound representation, the modifications map directly to the way the native Širkattarnaft was used by the Vadi litigants. The litigants' use of the Širkattarnaft was quite unorthodox, and part of the reason for this is that they used plenty of digraphs to represent sounds not found in the Širkattarnaft, as well as to indicate consonantal mutations and other sandhi processes that occurred in their language. Because this orthography maps more closely to how the litigants used the Širkattarnaft, Iyyaħmi believes it is more suitable in reconstructing Vadi phonology phonotactics.

Both Iyyaħmi and Schumann do employ IPA to represent the actual phonology of the textual material, but even here both Vadists diverge, as the IPA of Iyyaħmi reflects his more recent work on how the Širkattarnaft was used to represent Vadi phonology and phonotactics, whereas Schumann maintains Iyyaħmi's analyses are problematic. Today, however, the consensus among Vadists is that Iyyaħmi's analyses are more accurate.

Nevertheless, Schumann's system is more widespread as his work on Vadi started in late 1970, whereas Iyyaħmi, although quite prolific, began his work much more recently after finishing his post-doc in 2012. In this article, Schumann's Romanization will be used for glossing where there is little divergence between his and Iyyaħmi's samples. However, if there are significant discrepancies, both Romanizations will be represented together with Schumann's appearing first, separated by a slash before Iyyaħmi's.

Morphology

Vadi is a mildly fusional language with some agglutinative characteristics. Cliticization is a prominent feature of the language, such that considerable debate has arisen as to whether some affixes should be reclassified as clitics. Further adding to this debate is the ambiguities arising from the orthography in the texts: a given morpheme may appear as part of a word, and other times may be written as separate and distinct from its target word. Where the morpheme is written separately from its host, the initial or internal phoneme of the separated morpheme is often represented by a different character from the one usually used when it is attached directly to its host. This most likely indicates some sort of sandhi process occurred, suggestive of an affixal status, despite being written separately. Recognizing the clitic-vs-affix debate remains a contested area, this article generally follows Schumann's classification system, although some conventions based on Iyyaħmi's more recent work will be used, as many of his analyses have been have become the prevailing view among Vadists. Iyyaħmi's conventions, wherever they appear in this article, will be noted.

Nouns

Gender

Vadi nouns for the most part do not mark for gender, but there appear to be remnants of gender marking on special singulative forms, interestingly confined to body parts which also demonstrate an interesting split on the number system:

Gender-Number Marking on Body Part Nouns

Body Part	Singulative	Unmarked	Plural
Head	--	jidár	jidárha
Eye	kulúri	kulun	--
Ear	támika	taka	--
Nose	--	uvaz	uváza
Heart	--	rilai	rilaia
Hair	varláka	varlat	--
Lips	túnturi	tuntu	--
Tongue	--	nipáz	nipáza
Finger	patáka	pata	--
Hand	uzáka	uzap	--
Testicle	vúlari/vúluka	vula	--
Penis	niátari/niátak(a)	niat	niata

The singulative forms seem to roughly correspond with animacy. The -(r)i forms seem associated with animate nouns, whereas the -ka forms correspond largely with inananimates. However, exceptions do appear, as in uzáka instead of expected uzap(r)i "hand". The plural forms, consisting of the sole affix -a, shows no animacy distinction.

Unfortunately, these body parts are the only ones attested from the Scriptum. The last two body parts listed were extracted from letters that became especially laced with various vulgar ad hominems between the two litigants. Note also that the two last terms have both the presumptive animate and inanimate forms. The inanimate forms appear to be used as proxy pronouns for the addressee (implying impotence), while the animate forms appear to be proxy pronouns for the addresser, especially in passages threatening physical violence.

Number

Number exhibits a two-way distinction in nouns: singular and non-singular. Singular number, or more accurately the Singulative, is explicitly marked with the determiner han/ha (the latter considered by Iyyaħmi as either a prefixe or clitic), while plural and collectives are unmarked. Nouns beginning with a vowel are preceded by the allomorph han, while ha appears before nouns beginning with a consonant.

Sometimes the singulative is represented by inflection, particularly body parts. Number distinction in body part nouns displays an unusual split, one being the typical singulative-unmarked distinction, and the other being a plural-unmarked distinction. Body parts that usually come in pairs (e.g. hands), mass/collective (e.g. hair), or multiple instances (e.g. fingers) follow the singulative/non-singulative distinction. Those that occur (usually) as a single instance on the human body, such as the head, tongue, and nose follow a singular/plural distinction, with the singular being the unmarked condition. The last body part in the table follows a singulative-plural-unmarked distinction, a highly divergent pattern combined with possessing both an animate/inanimate distinction in the singulative form. How these forms arose remains speculative, but if the texts between the litigants is any guide, the form chosen was employed to intensify some of their more vitriolic correspondence, the animate singulative or plural form serving as the proxy noun of the speech transmitter, and the inanimate singulative or simple unmarked form serving as the proxy noun of the speech recipient. Regardless, the usual singulative determiner han/ha does not co-occur with singular body part nouns in any of the texts of the Scriptum, suggesting that double-marking with the determiner is ungrammatical.

Case

Six postpositional morphemes have been identified. They were originally classified by Schumann as clitics, whereas Iyyaħmi has convincingly argued for their status as affixes, based on statistical frequencies of certain anomalies in the litigants' use of the Minhast orthography. This article follows Iyyaħmi's classification, as this has now become the prevailing position of Vadists today:

Postpositional Affixes

Case	Postposition
Genitive	-na
Dative-Benefactive	-li
Ablative	-ta
Locative	-éva
Instrumental	-eta
Comitative	-kalí

Body part nouns may precede a head noun already marked with one of the case clitics to add more locational, directional, or positional precision. The singulative determiner does not surface before a singular body part noun, as would be expected. The following example illustrates this type of structure. Here, the noun kilái "heart", often combines with a noun marked with the locative clitic -eva to convey an inessive sense.

Julanáina gu kilái ha kileva mana, ukan hen!/Dyulnheyne gu~kilay ha~gu~klebfe man ukan~hen!
/d͡zula'naɪna gu kɪ'laɪ ha kɪlɛva mana 'ukan hɛn/ -- /d͡zunɲeɪnɛ glaɪ 'haglɛv man u'kãɲɛn/
ji-úla-nai-na gu kilái ha kil-eva mana ukan hen / ji-ula-nai-na kilái ha=kil-ev man ukan-hen
1S.NOM-2S.ACC-FUT-GEN [PART] heart SGV house-LOC still go wreak.havok EMPH/1S.NOM-2S.ACC-FUT-GEN heart SGV=house-LOC go-EMPH
I will enter your [?] house and still ruin you!/I will enter your house and still ruin you!

With the exception of the portmanteau pronouns, core arguments take no marking in transitive clauses. When an explicit noun appears in transitive clauses, strict SOV order is followed:

1) Jinái gu kusare a yaviti./Dyiney gu~kisare~a yabfiti~sš.³
/d͡zɪ'naɪ: gu kusare a 'javɪti/ -- /d͡zɪ'neɪ: gzarʌ jafts̺/
ji-nai gu kusare a yaviti / ji-nai guksarea yabfitisš
1S-FUT [PART] meat [PART] buy / 1S-FUT meat buy
I shall [?] buy [?] meat. / I shall buy meat.

Tense markers, when they cliticize, do so only with pronominal patient arguments. As this explicitly marks the direct object, word order can vary without ambiguity. In sentences 2b and 2c, the past tense marker hai has cliticized to the first person singular ji. As the patient is now explicitly marked, it can now appear after the subject (its default position), or it may precede it. Compare these to 2a where no cliticization has taken place:

2a) Ávaron ji vasáli hai./Ávaron dyi bifslei.
/'avaɾon d͡ʒi va'sali haɪ/--/'avaɾon d͡ʒɪɬɛɪ/
ávaron ji vasáli hai / ávaron ji-bfasáli=hai
PN 1S visit PST / PN 1S-visit=PST
Ávaron has visited me.

2b) Ávaron jai vasáli./Ávaron dyai bfasáli.
'avaron d͡ʒaɪ va'sali / 'avaron d͡ʒaɪ va'saɬ
ávaron ji-hai vasáli
PN 1S.DO-PST visit
Ávaron has visited me.

2c) Jai Ávaron vasáli.
d͡ʒaɪ 'avaron va'sali
ji-hai ávaron vasáli
1S.DO-PST PN visit
Ávaron has visited me.

An object may also come before the subject if the object is topicalized by the particle ipan, which is also followed by an audible pause:

Kusara ipan, ji yaviti nai.
kusara ipan ji yaviti nai.
meat TOP 1S buy
Meat, I shall buy (some).

Case Chaining

A specific form of agglugination seen in Vadi nouns is case chaining, whereby two or more markers become conjoined to each other. This process is used to convey more granular theta-role information of the host noun. This is seen most often in possessive phrases, whereby the possessor noun undergoes clitic/affix chaining to specify the semantic role of its head, and oftentimes to indicate tense, as in the third sentence:

Jinali valin pela udahadi hai, jutavarana iskuvan.
ji-na-li valin pela udahadi hai jutavara=na iskuvan
1S-GEN-DAT family cloth buy PST winter.clothing=GEN purpose
For my family I bought cloth to make winter clothing.

Jinevata kilái han odorim hesa hai, kuniri-ahalin ajul./Jinevda glai handorim essai, kundiri-ahalin ajul.
ji-na-eva-ta kilái han odorim hesa hai kuniri-ahalin ajul iskuvan
1S-GEN-ABL-LOC heart SGV house coin.PL bring PST disk-payment iron purpose
From inside my house I brought out money to pay for the iron ingot.

Pronouns

Vadi pronouns do not mark for gender. Case marking on core arguments for transitive clauses do exhibit a nominative-accusative distinction, but only when both arguments are singular in number.

Plurality in the independent pronouns are indicated by the suffix -ta. This contrasts with number marking on nouns, where plurals are unmarked but singulars are preceded by the determiner han/ha.

	Singular	Plural
First	ji	jita
Second	úla	ulta
Third	ka	kata

The nominative-accusative distinction occurs in the portmanteau forms, which are etymologically transparent. The first segment of the portmanteau affix marks the nominative argument, while the second marks the accusative argument:

Agent			Patient
	Singular
		Person	Singular			Plural
			First	Second	Third	First	Second	Third
		First	--	júla	jíka	--	julta	jikata
		Second	uláji	--	uláka	ulajta	--	ulkata
		Third	kaji	kúla	káka	katáji	kulta	katá
	Plural
		First	--	jitúla	jitakta	--	jitulta	jitkata
		Second	ultaji	--	ultakta	ultajta	--	ultakta
		Third	kataji	katúla	katáta	katajta	katulta	kakta

Affix/clitic chaining can occur with all pronominal forms, as in one of the sample sentences in the previous section, demonstrated again here:

Julanáina gu kilái ha kileva mana, ukan hen!/Dyulnheyne gu~kilay ha~gu~klebfe man ukan~hen!
/d͡zula'naɪna gu kɪ'laɪ ha kɪlɛva mana 'ukan hɛn/ -- /d͡zunɲeɪnɛ glaɪ 'haglɛv man u'kãɲɛn/
ji-úla-nai-na gu kilái ha kil-eva mana ukan hen / ji-ula-nai-na guklái ha=gukl-ebfe man ukan-hen
1S.NOM-2S.ACC-FUT-GEN [PART] heart SGV house-LOC still go wreak.havok EMPH/1S.NOM-2S.ACC-FUT-GEN house SGV=house-LOC go-EMPH
I will enter your [?] house and still ruin you!/I will enter your house and still ruin you!

Adjectives

Adjectives in Vadi precede their heads. In terms of morphology, there are no special affixes that distinguish them from either nouns or verbs. Iyyaħmi believes they may trigger mutation, but admits that further analysis is needed. Interestingly, and unfortunately, the Scriptum contain far fewer adjectives than one would expect in such a significant corpora, and the ones that do occur are mostly in the forms of insults found in the Waškixrapmakirimērumbustikmaban. Unfortunately, even the texts in the Waškixrapmakirimērumbustikmaban contain relatively few adjectives, not enough for Iyyaħmi to definitively say that a mutation has occurred or not. Moreover, the adjectives that are found occur in phonemic environments that are unlikely to trigger sound changes. One such example from the corpora, cited by Iyyaħmi, follows:

Ûla erva vûluka ran
/'u:la erva 'vu:luka ran/
úla erva vûlu-ka ran
2S small testicle-INAN.SGV man
You have no ba**s! (lit. "You are a small one-testicled man")

The adjective erva "small" both begins and ends with a vowel, as seen from the Ammerkast and the original Širkattarnaft text. No mutation, vowel syncope, or other sandhi of úla "you" is indicated. While vowels usually lenite a stop to a fricative, they usually have no effect on a pre-existing fricative in the following word, unless the word has the determiner ha= cliticized to it; such a case would trigger either palatalization and possibly syncope as in *erva yulka⁴ << erva ha=vûluka.

Vadi has no copula. To express the copula, the adjective is placed at the end of the clause, preceding any tense markers that may be present. The next example, also from Iyyaħmi, demonstrates this:

Danar kúda hai imu Sorvin ga~kamatkamat.
/'danar 'ku:da haɪ 'imu 'sorvin 'gamatkamat/
danar kúda hai, imu sorvin gamat-kamat
place.name beautiful PST until PN burn-burn
Danar was a beautiful place until Sorvin utterly torched it.

Again, neither the Širkattarnaft or the Ammerkast transcriptions indicate that the adjective kuda "beautiful" has undergone or triggered any phonological changes. The phonemes /ɾ/ + /k/ do not undergo any changes when adjacent to each other, and kuda does not lenite to /'kud͡ʒɛɪ/ even though the past tense clitic hai appears after it, since a final /a/ prevents lenition if it was etymologically derived from /aʔ/ or /aɦ/, as it appears to be the case with kúda << */'ku:dðaʔ/

Verbs

Vadi verbs are for the most part contain no grammatical inflection. They do not mark for person, number, tense, or aspect. Few, if any clitics attach to them. Any affixes that appear on the verb are predominately derivational, most of which are deverbals to derive instrumental, locational, and occupational nouns.

The language has a variety of converbs which appear before their head. These converbs encode modality, aspect, manner, and various adverbial meanings. The converbs may be separated from their head by other elements, such as illocutionary particles, discourse markers, etc. Common converbs include:

• sutu, sútu: "and; additionally; to add"; a direct loan from Minhast suttu "and"
• ura: "again; to repeat"
• koni: "to start, begin"
• kila: "to stop, cease"
• helas: "to attempt, to try to do something"
• ila: "immediately; to do quickly"
• ókapi: "suspiciously; to do with malfeasence; to be deceptive"
• kitál: assertive particle, usually translated as "You did do it!"
• yoawíka/yawikâ /jo'ka:ʔ/ (per Iyyaħmi): presentational particle, usually translated as "Look here (at the evidence I present you)"; possibly a loan from Minhast wahēk "behold; thus; and then"
• oan: evidential, lit. "It is said", but what the speaker really means is "He (the other litigant) falsely claims"
• peliár: "to be wrong"; used for repudiation, disputation, e.g. "What he (the other litigant) says is a lie/falsehood"
• oni: "to be empty", in the context of the lawsuit, "There is no evidence that..."
• neko: "to continue; still", in the context of the lawsuit, re-establishes a statement the litigant said that has been agreed by the Prefect to be true, setting up support for the next statement the litigant is going to say next, e.g. Neko Ápan jibái Yéso jibáitane!, i.e. "Just as was established (by the Prefect earlier) that Ápan is mine, so is Yéso!"
• penór: privative, "to undo; to wash away", e.g. Penór ójokan "to dismiss, disregard" (lit. "to un-hear"); in the context of the lawsuit, "to dismiss the charges (against me)", e.g. Neko hino jikátahai sonda, Ikúni mek Sorvinna penór mek piláhi!, i.e. "Just as this lowly one has presented thee evidence and thou dost agree, I beseech thee, Lord, that thou dismissest Sorvin's accusations (against me)!" Piláhi means "to accuse", so in this sentence, the litigant Éro is literally saying, "...un-accuse me!"

In most instances, converbs can stand alone as bona-fide verbs, e.g. Úla ókapi hai hen! "You did lie!"

As the language's canonical word order is SOV, the verb phrase occupies the final position of the clause, with the tense markers nai and hai appear at the very end of the clause.

Particles

• nai: past tense particle
• hai: future tense particle
• hen: emphatic particle
• ipan: topic particle
• ani: "yes"
• yal: "no"
• ka: "if"
• ki: "well then, so"
• mi: hortative particle
• bia: "behold"
• kunet: interrogative particle
• vali: conjecture particle, "perhaps"
• puni: resultative particle
• imu: until
• mek : "please" (borrowed from Minhast mek, a particle that softens not just commands, but statements, or simply to convey deference)

Derivation

Derivational affixes occur in greater frequency, but the texts from the Scriptum suggest the overwhelming number of these affixes are no longer productive. For this reason, the general consensus among Vadists is that these affixes have been fossilized. A prefix pesa- occurs among some verbs that tends to give them causative meaning. For this reason some have speculated this is a borrowing from the Minhast causative prefix -šp-. This view is problematic however, because this prefix sometimes appears to intensify the meaning of the root. Moreover, it is also found attached to some nouns, but its addition does not appear to affect the semantics of the noun.

Causative pesa-:

Anu úla pesadíka nai, hen. /Annu úla pesátkanen.
Anu úla pesa-díka nai hen
PN 2P CAUS-run.off FUT EMPH
(Prefect) Annu will drive you out!

Intensive pesa-:

Ji pesakúna, kaman uláta, ji nokan pesakúdi. / Ji pesakúna, kamallúta, jonkan peskúd.
ji pesa-kúna nai, kaman uláta ji nokan pesa-akúdi.
1P CAUS-go FUT head úla=ABL 2S rock CAUS-throw.
I will climb (that mountain) above you (so that) I can rain down rocks (upon you).

Nominal pesa-:

Pesarona hokun.
pesa-rona hokun
CAUS-snake eat.
Snakes will eat (you).

Contrast this with the use of the actual Minhast causative -šp-, by Prefect Annu (Minhast, Dog Speaker Dialect):

Tašpintaknataheknessuš, tašpintaknaknessuš. Marentaħmankilmakš, yattax! Ikšitamaškidustitaħmāš!
ta-šp-nt-ikna-tahek-ness-u=š ta-šp-nt-ikna-k-ness-u=š maren-tahem-an-kilmakš yattax kš-tamašk-dust-tahem-an=š
NEG-CAUS-INT-go-2S.ACC+1S.NOM-FUT-TRNS=IRR NEG-CAUS-go-FUT-TRNS=IRR pest-2P.NOM-MIR.NEG DEPR CESS-stalk.while.hunting-REC.ADVS-2P.NOM-INTR=IRR
I don't plan on throwing you off your land, and I'm not planning on throwing him off his land. You two pests should leave each other alone!

Other derivational affixes, both prefixes and suffixes, are more common, some appear to be highly productive and suggest they can be spontaneously generated:

• -kai: a deverbal for creating place nouns, e.g. iavati-kai "a place for buying", i.e. marketplace.
• -pallái: another deverbal for creating place nouns, e.g. tukin-pallái "a place for sitting", i.e. hearth, dining room.
• -kattá: a deverbal affix deriving agent nouns, e.g. iavati-kattá "one who buys, a buyer"

Some affixes may be chained, as in tukimpallaikattá < tukin-pallai-kattá "a place for sitting ones", i.e. "dinner guests, diners". However, affix chaining is rather uncommon.

Syntax

Vadi's canonical SOV word order is used to indicate the case roles of the core arguments of a clause, to delineate the constituents of a noun phrase, and to indicate the pivot in multiclausal sentences. Although the language is primarily SOV, the verb phrase may occur in different locations in the clause for pragmatic purposes. However, if both the subject and object arguments are expressed as overt nouns, the S-argument invariably precedes the O-argument in transitive clauses. Tense particles typically occur in clause-final position, but as discussed previously, in transitive clauses they can and often move from clause-final position to cliticize to an object pronoun.

Noun phrase

Possessums follow their heads, which serve as host to the genitive affix, and any other affixes that indicate the head noun's theta role and/or tense-marking clitics.

Adjectives typically follow their head nouns. However, in possessive constructions, whenever an adjective modifies the possessor, it must come immediately before the possessor, otherwise its default position means it is modifying the possessum. As for adverbs, they appear after the adjectival phrase they have scope over. These features of adjectives following their head nouns and adverbs following the adjectival phrase are more typical of VSO languages. It is thus hypothesized by some linguists that Vadi went through a stage in its evolution as a VSO language, but this remains speculative among most Vadists.

Example texts

Ad-Hominems and Other Insults

The majority of the materials found in the Scriptum are known as the Waškixrapmakirimērumbustikmaban lit. "All they do is insult each other incessantly", a Minhast term that describes the nature of these letters accurately, i.e. correspondence containing mostly ad-hominems, threats, taunts, and other insults. Many descend to the level of childishness, but this characteristic is probably the most valuable part of the collection, as the style appears to be in vernacular Vadi, with fewer intrusions from the dominant Minhast language found in the legal correspondence.

Ulájinai tábila nikku osar, petta ulátane
/u:'lad͡ʒnaɪ 'ta:bɪla nɪk:u osaɾ pet:a u'la:tane/
úla-ji-na-hai tábila nikku osar petta úla-tane
2S.NOM-1S.ACC-GEN-PST land.PL seize try, thief 2S-EMP
You tried to seize my lands, you are a thief indeed!

Ka mai naha úlajnaina tábila é, júlanai puni mérkeva!
/ka maɪ 'naha 'u:lad͡ʒnaɪna 'ta:bɪla e 'd͡ʒu:lanaɪ 'pu:ni 'mɛɾkɛva/
ka mai naha úla-ji=nai-na tábila nikku é ji-úla-nai puni mérkeva
if come here 2S.NOM-1S.ACC=FUT-GEN land.PL seize SJV, 1S.NOM-2S.ACC-FUT RSLT kill
If you come here to seize my land, I will kill you! (lit. If come here you-me-my-land to seize it, I-you will kill)

Júla nánani.
/d͡ʒ'u:la 'na:nani/
ji-ula na~nani
1S.NOM-2S.ACC RV~disgust
You truly disgust me.

Valí ulaki úla píhala nai.
/va'li u'laki 'u:la 'pihala naɪ/
valí ulaki úla píhala nai
perhaps authorities 2S seize FUT
Perhaps the authorities shall arrest you.

Dávan biri ulájai kunet? Dumúla rani ikkúni siráha ji?
/'da:van biɾi ul'a:d͡ʒaɪ kunet du'mu:la ɾani ik:'u:ni siɾ'a:ha d͡ʒi/
dávan biri ulá-ji-hai kunet dum-úla rani ikkúni siráha ji
why thus 2S.NOM-1S.ACC-PST commit.wrong Q-2S know prefect stand.behind 1S
Why have you wronged me thus? Do you not know the Prefect has given me his support?

Súnagun jibáitane! Ji súharak kanéneka, báti úla kimúdi, bia!
/'su:nagun d͡ʒi'baɪtane d͡ʒi 'su:haɾak ka'ne:neka 'ba:ti 'u:la: ki'm:udi bija/
súnagun ji-bai-tane ji súharak kanéneka báti ulá kimúdi bia
place.name 1S-ownership-EMP 1S papers hold.in.hand PART 2S read behold
Súnagun is mine! I have the (legal) papers, [?] here, take them and read!

Éro, úla peho te. Júlanai kanarídi. Ikkúni jili Súnagun parati nai.
/'e:ɾo 'u:la pɛho te 'd͡ʒu:lanaɪ kana'ɾidi ɪ'k:u:ni 'd͡ʒili 'sunagun pa'rati naɪ/
éro úla peho te júlanai kanarídi ikkúni ji-li Súnagun parati nai
PN 2S fool truth 1S.NOM-2S.ACC win FUT prefect 1S=DAT place.name reward FUT
Éro, you indeed are a fool. I will prevail over you. The Prefect shall award me Súnagun.

Óşi jínai kanárato bihók şilmá.
/'o:s̺i 'd͡ʒɪnaɪ kana:ɾato bɪhok 's̺ɪl'ma/
Ósi jí-nai kanárato bihók şilmá
yes 1S.NOM-2S.ACC succeed indeed today
Of course I shall prevail (over you) today

Manetór ki pida dáşelek mi, mánjate nihálave yal.
/manɛ'toɾ ki 'pida 'das̺ɛlɛk mi 'mand͡ʒate ni'halavɛ yal/
manetór ki pida dáşelek mi mánjate nihálave yal
fire well.then fall.down heaven HORT anyone care NEG
Well then, let fire fall down (upon you), no one will care.

Isáro ka munek ki bára jikalí, júla emtol. Ulánai paho yal.
/ɪs'aɾo ka 'munɛk ki 'baɾa d͡ʒɪka'li 'd͡ʒu:la 'ɛmtol u'la:naɪ 'paho yal/
isáro ka munek ki bára ji-kalí ji-úla emtol úla-nai paho yal
choose COND call.upon well.then fist 1S-INST 1S.NOM-2S.ACC thwart 2S-FUT win NEG
If you choose to call up (the townspeople) against me as I expect you will, I will stop you. You will fail.

Legal Claims

In contrast, the Legal Claims parchments (Upper Minhast: Yukan Mukan, c.f. Gull Speaker Yuk sut Muk, lit. "Complaint and Judgment") use more formal language and lack the colourful language of the Waškixrapmakirimērumbustikmaban. Minhast words, particularly legal terminology, units of measurement, and other terms requiring precision especially found in lawsuits involving land disputes, are found here. Especially prevalent is the formulaic Minhast phrase: Mek wa [proper noun]-behet širkattartahannamā, "Please write to (my lord X) these words".

It is believed that each litigant wrote these letters carefully in order to have them translated to the Prefect, the surveyors, or to ingratiate themselves to other Dog Speakers who could serve as witnesses in the lawsuit. In at least one case one of the litigants even tried to petition the powerful Salmon Speaker Prefect, Nattaxxawan.

• From Éro to Wasiškila for translating to Ruxparan min Ayyurmi, the headman of Niyyurpi Township:

Mek wa Ruxparan-behet širkattartahannamā: Úla hano temáka jilaikandá. Anuna beiólika pisap hai. Hano talta han Karbaratana kalaví Íkavalina menehim sentum ohira julór, hiya han sitturum Sarpaheyeva oroani duxtim sentum julór. Kon, ha bihata jóri, ha Pikuévana kippi kaħtam min sentum avóro alok nad. Bari, han Ikúni han jina pétetaiti hai ha tábila lavák hai, han jina tirosi umukál hai.
{Mek wa Ruxparan-behet širkattartahannamā} úla han-o temáka jilái-kanda Anu-na beiólika pisap hai han-o talta ha Karbara-ta-na kalaví han Íkava-li-na menehim sentum ohira julór, hi-ya han síturum Sarpahei-eva oroani duxtim sentum julór kon ha bihata jóri ha Piku-éva-na kippi kaħtam min sentum alo-k nad bari han Ikkúni han ji-na pétetaiti hai ha tábila lavák hai han jina tirosi umukál hai
{Embedded Minhast text: [deferential.particle CONN=PN=title.of.respect write to him thus]} 2S SGV-PROX map look-IMP PN-GEN surveyor.PL draw PST SGV-PROX line SGV place.name-ABL-GEN rock-GEN river.name-ALL-GEN shore 4 sentum stretch then-EPEN SGV beaver.dam place.name-LOC 3 sentum cross.over stretch from.that.place.there SGV ridge climb 5 sentum again SGV PN-ABL-GEN farmhouse burn-DVB NMZ thus SGV prefect SGV 1S-GEN viewpoint SGV agree PS SGV land recognize SGV 1S-GEN control give PST
Please write to Wise Elder Ruxparan thus: Look at this map. This is what Prefect Annu's surveyors have drawn. This line from Karbaram Rock stretches to the shoreline of River Íkava for 4 sentum (~6 miles), then extends across the old beaver dam at Sarpahey Spring for another 3 sentum (~5 miles). Thence it curves upwards for another 5 sentum (~9 miles) along the ridge where old Piku's farmhouse was before it burnt down. Thus the Prefect has recognized my territorial claim as the sole legitimate one.

The next letter, from Sorvin to Prefect Nattaxxawan, is a rare find, as it contained many archaisms not found in any of the Waškixrapmakirimērumbustikmaban or the majority of the Yukan Mukan for that matter.

• From Sorvin to Ittahampar for translating to Prefect Nattaxxawan, of Salmon Speaker Country:

Mek wa Ikkūne Nattaxxawan-behet širkattartahannamā: Tódimtana galua jinda pattuk.
{Mek wa Ikkūne Nattaxxawan-behet širkattartahannamā}

Please write to Wise Lord Nattaxxawan: This lowly one places himself before the Great Hero's feet and kisses the ground upon which he steps. This lowly one is not worthy, for thou art the most high and esteemed Lord of all of Salmon Speaker Country. Yet this lowly one beseeches thee and ask thee but only give a light word to the most respected Prefect of all of Dog Speaker Country, the great Prefect Ruxparan under which this lowly one places himself under the Great Lord's feet.

OVS -> matrix clause SC -> dependent clause

SVO -> matrix clause, COND SOV -> dependent clause, RSLT

OSV

Footnotes

1) A major criticism directed towards Schumann, notably by Dr. Tashunka, is that although Schumann is "competent" in the Širkattarnaft, he lacks a full understanding of its development and evolution, and how it was historically used by other non-Minhast minority speakers, namely the Peshpeg and Ín Duári, to transcribe their respective languages.

2) Schumann argues that gemination outside of Minhast loanwords does not occur in Vadi, as the authors' Širkattarnaft does not show any gemination. This argument, as Tashunka notes, is problematic in that most Minhast writings, both past and present, rarely indicate gemination. Evidence of gemination in Vadi surfaces in the orthography between morpheme boundaries where the vowel of the syllable preceding the geminate consonant is lengthened, and the following syllable or an inserted "dummy syllable" starts with a voiced consonant to indicate fortition. Schumann argues this is partial reduplication used for derivation, but Iyyaħmi concurs with Tashunka's analysis.

3) This particular gloss is an excellent example of how Schumann and Iyyaħmi's analyses diverge due to the ambiguities introduced by the litigants' unorthodox spelling. Unlike Schumann, Iyyaħmi's Ammerkast-derived transcription follows the Širkattarnaft more closely.

In the original Širkattarnaft, sometimes a single or couple of characters are written preceding a word. These characters indicate that the next word is undergoing some sort of sandhi process triggered by the preceding word. Iyyaħmi joins the stranded characters to the word with a tilde. In this case, the preceding word Dyiney triggers kusarʌ to undergo voicing of the initial consonant coupled with syncope, yielding /gzarʌ/. The character for gu appears separately preceding kusarʌ, which may lead to some readers to conclude the character as a separate word without the tilde.

In fact, Schumann has glossed this separate character as a word, which he glosses in morphemic gloss as a word or particle with unknown meaning. Iyyaħmi's representation conveys the sandhi process kusarʌ undergoes. As a result, Iyyaħmi's transcription yields two fewer words than Schumann's, the very two that Schumann has glossed as independent words. Iyyaħmi's gloss ultimately shows there are no unknown, independent words in the ligigant's text.

4) Iyyaħmi's reconstruction of erva yulka is based on a sentence from one of Éro's texts:

Ikúni behet mek, yawikâ ha yi~bfita mek hen
/i'ku:ni bɛhɛt mɛk jo'ka: ha'jita mɛkjɛn/
Ikúni behet mek, yawkâ ha=yita mek hen
lord VOC.DEFR please here SGV paper please EMPH
My lord, I beseech thee, behold the (legal) documents (in my hand).

Here, the singulative clitic ha= triggers palatalization of the noun vita to yita "paper" (from yi bfita). It is this example that Iyyaħmi posits the mutation of the adjective phrase (AP).