lälen (noun): kingdom; country.
elrer un er-lälen palröncheÃ
once and this-kingdom more.glorious
“this kingdom [was much] more glorious once [than it is now]”
lälen originally meant ‘land owned in common’ (for example, in a village, or among a number of cultivators), but its meaning was extended to meaning ‘the lands belonging to a kingdom’ (i.e., owned ‘in common’ under the king’s authority) and, by further extension, ‘country’. The noun lälneon ‘king’ is derived from lälen.
eranono (perfective verb): to leave, set out from.
rönicher Chertesöà erà eranon
tomorrow Chertesö.ACC we.INCL leave.PAUS
“we are [all] leaving Chertesö tomorrow”
Listen to the example sentence here: W_TR_002_eranono_example
larneÃÂ (adjective): deadly, dangerous.
ner Aenith woni feyetha larneÃ
REL Aenith man.ACC see.3.MASC.SING.NONPAUS dangerous
“the man that Aenith saw [was] dangerous”
Listen to the example sentence here: W_TR_001_larnei_example
The adjective larneà contrasts with larnaà ‘dead’, providing a good example of a preserved contrast between the adjectival endings –eà (agental / ‘active’) and –aà (patientive / ‘passive’).
First a happy new year to anyone who might be (at least occasionally) tracking this blog – the recent silence on my part was mostly due to the holiday season, but also because I’ve grown slightly bored with High Eolic ‘words of the day’. Posts like that will continue, but in another language – Trurian – which was the first language I ever created (around 10 years ago), and has recently undergone a major overhaul.
I’m planning to release the grammar for Trurian 2.0 some time in February. Until then, I might publish a few more grammatical ‘teasers’ (a couple can already be found under the ‘trurian’ tag – see here) – but there will also be Words of the Day (three per week, as with High Eolic in this past year), beginning on 16 January! This is actually quite an exciting exercise for me – the lexicon for Trurian is already quite well developed, with around 3000 entries, but it will be great to both fill the existing gaps, as well as try to explain the nuances of usage of some words in a bit more detail. And hopefully it’s an interesting language in terms of structure as well!
lurcá- (transitive verb), imperfective lurcávam: to talk, converse, sit with (someone).
lurcá-m mál surát cúrcur-cándaremec
speak.with-TRANS he/she.ACC earlier year.GEN-three.INESS
“I last spoke with him/her three years ago”
cúris- (transitive verb), imperfective cúrisaram (occasionally cúrsaram): to look at, examine, inspect; to study, read up on.
ngúrnam hangaral ivá lapá tacettárut issá ca cúris-am
see.PERF.TRANS smoke.ACC and go.PERF place.ILL.DEF so.that I examine.PERF-TRANS
“I saw smoke and went over to have a look”
attám (noun): wet, soaked; moist, moistened.
civa tenámbes issá tás civa y-attámb-es
become.COMPL rain.ESS so.that soil become.COMPL 0-wet-ESS
“it rained so the soil became wet”
tattá- (intransitive verb), imperfective tattár: to chat, chatter, babble.
cavá ngillándá tattá-ndá lecá len tandingucám
finally uncle.PL chatter-COMPL and.so we continue.POT.1.TRANS
“finally, [my] uncles ended their chatter and we could continue”
The verb tattár is generally used to mean senseless or useless talk, and can also be used to refer to e.g. the babbling or babies. In Eolic culture, the talk of old men on family matters (such as weddings and deaths) or religion (such as horoscopes and calculation of religious duty calendars) is considered to be the quintessential example of tattár.
rassim (noun): edge, border, corner; periphery, edge (of something).
civa mullates se-tersa-rassimba-mecut
become.COMPL bread.ESS your-mouth-edge-INESS.DEF
“[you have] bread[crumbs] at the corners of your mouth”
varná- (transitive verb), imperfective varnávam: to wake up (someone).
ca layúcav yat már varná-m cal
I sleep.IMPERF then he/she wake.up.PERF-TRANS I.ACC
“I was sleeping when he/she woke me up”
The verb varnávam is underlyingly transitive, but may also be used in the middle voice in an intransitive sense (as in “I woke up”).
