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=== Gender === | === Gender === | ||
Teonaht once exhibited a morphology of gender, but that has been effaced by time. Nouns and articles do not reflect gender by themselves, whereas pronouns do. Animals, however, have a whole range of gendered categories expressed in an adjective that follows the noun; these vary according to the type of animal but are far from being consistent. | Teonaht once exhibited a morphology of gender, but that has been effaced by time. Nouns and articles do not reflect gender by themselves, whereas pronouns do. Animals, however, have a whole range of gendered categories expressed in an adjective that follows the noun; these vary according to the type of animal but are far from being consistent. | ||
=== Nenddeylyt Noun Classes === | |||
The following classes of noun are presumed to come from Nenddeyly, a language for which we have little textual evidence and much folklore. They take different endings: | |||
==== -ar/-arn nouns ==== | |||
These are primarily used for animals and plants and some gods: things of the earth; -ar was originally the masculine ending; -arn is the feminine. Plurals are formed variously, usually with a prefix. | |||
:'''pavar''', "clam." | |||
:'''ivvarn''', "deep glen." | |||
:'''õllern''', "pigeon." | |||
==== -im/-em nouns. ==== | |||
:'''velim''', "female." | |||
:'''fyllim''', "female virgin." | |||
:'''zelim''', "male." | |||
==== -õl, -ol, -or nouns ==== | |||
This group includes nouns made from verbs, adjectives, or other nouns and represent both states of being and generality. By analogy, these endings have been applied to non-Nenddeylyt words: | |||
:'''firkol''', "generosity" (from '''firik''', "giving"). | |||
:'''nisimol''', "pushing" (from '''nisim''', "aggressive"). | |||
:'''toykor''', "sarcasm" (from '''toyk''', "cutting"). | |||
:'''coyol''', "sentimentality" (from '''coy''', "sweet"). | |||
==== -õn, õ , -õ, -is/-il, -l, -ik, -k nouns ==== | |||
This very large group includes objects. Not all Teonaht words ending with these letters are Nenddeylyt: | |||
:'''flanis''', "wool" | |||
:'''fõn''', "dust" | |||
:'''findris''', "glass" | |||
==== -yr nouns ==== | |||
This special class of nouns takes traits from Teonaht nouns, so it is unclear whether they are corrupted forms of Nenddeylyt nouns or vice versa. An unerring characteristic is the stress on the second syllable in disyllabic words. They have a special form of the object case, described below, and take Teeonaht endings in the plural: | |||
'''byr''', '''byrn''', "guilty one(s), beer(s)." | |||
'''dyr''', '''dyrn''', "scream(s)." | |||
'''cyr''', '''cyrn''', "tumult(s)." | |||
=== Articles === | === Articles === | ||