Conlangers

jānnien

the East.

The second sentence of the Babel text:

il ñatta jarēþa rūānnie il ñatta jamāesa japōññe sū jekiēn xīnār il aþ ñatta āke jamāramma;

contains the word rūānnie which is rū- + ānnie, the stem for “east”. rūānnie therefore means “from the east” and rā- + ānnie or rānnie means “to the east”. There is also sū- + ānnie for “at/in the east” but the form is sūānnien with a final -n like the singular noun jānnien. All the compass direction words follow this pattern more or less. The final -n is akin to the -(e)n suffix used with clan names when they are turned into stative nouns.

The word occurs in the first clause of the second sentence. The clause is ñatta jarēþa rūānnie. ñatta is the relational ñi inflected for a 3rd person paucal (or collective in this usage) agent. jarēþa is a singular noun that means “journey”. So the first clause can be translated as “they made a journey from the east”.

meliki

• (adj.) beautiful
• (v.) to be beautiful, to have beauty
• (n.) beauty
• (n.) beautiful one, beautiful person

Ipe mata kivio meliki!
“What a beautiful sight!”

Notes: Or perhaps “vista” would be a better translation. This was the image I had in mind:

That’s a nice little rock garden, complete with plants and bushes. I wouldn’t mind having that as my front yard.

The iku for meliki is a bit curious. I can see some of me in there, but a box has replaced the image of the woman. In the middle is the circle determinative, which denotes positive things. I think I may have made a box there not only to fit the circle, but also to indicate a face (so it’s like it’s an image of a beautiful person). I guess that qualifies it as one of a number of iku types, but ikuleyaka seems the most appropriate classification.

Example: Xe’nilusu. Kansu mi’la’mekuv indite’het’ny!
(1S-be.innocent. Kansu 3S-PST-steal cherry-PL.)
I am innocent. Kansu stole the cherries.

Nilusu is an odd name, especially since his connotation is a bit different from the expected one. Someone who is nilusu does not necessarily be naïve it might very well be that he knows badness and temptation but remains free of it due to her/his strength of character. Naïvety is not a virtue to the rejistanis as much as it sometimes seems to be in our culture (‘child-like innocentce and purity’).

The denotation of it being the opposite of guilty of course exists as well.

tiva

• (n.) knife
• (v.) to cut, to slice
• (v.) to use a knife
• (adj.) sharp

Tiva ia i katata i’i.
“Cut me some jerky.”

Notes: Since I brought it up recently, I thought I’d introduce the word tiva, which means “to cut”, roughly (the base word was “knife”, or a short cutting implement). The iku is a fairly straightforward combination of ti and fa.

Back when I coined this word (while I was at Berkeley), I had a pair of sandals whose brand name was “Tiva”. The “logo” (if that’s what it was) on the box was a gigantic spider, which turned me off quite a bit. The sequence was a licit Kamakawi word, though, so I thought I’d use it somewhere. I didn’t want it to be “spider” (too obvious), but somehow I thought it worked well as “cut”, and it’s been “cut” ever since.

ān tēna

This phrase is a combination of the numeral one (ān) and a modifier meaning “all of a set” (tēna). Together they denote a complete set of one. In the first sentence of the Babel text:

iēlte la anmārwi pa antaxōni ān tēna;

ān tēna modifies yesterday’s word antaxōni “language” to make a phrase meaning a set of only one language. So the sentence can be translated as:

Once long ago, the world had only one language.

Example: Xe’kaska ikimdu’het’ny ,min’yjanu oejelu, het.
(1S-like soap-PL ,3PL-emit.smell beautiful, this)
I like soaps which smell beautiful.

Well, yes, I do. Good smells are one of the things which improve my mood when it needs improving. Mornings normally count as such a situation.

I am not sure why the word is as it is. The word reminds me of a well-smelling soap though, so it is fitting. ‘ikimdu means to lather and an ikimdu’he makes soap.

u’upi

• (v.) to drift, to be adrift
• (adj.) adrift
• (n.) drifting

Au u’upi Kalavene…
“The Bears are adrift…”

Notes: Up by three in the waning seconds of the fourth quarter, the Berkeley Bears stopped the Washington Huskies three straight times on the goal line.

Unfortunately, there was a fourth down…

And so Berkeley finished 5-7, and will miss out on a bowl game for the first time since my junior year of college. Add to that that we lost the Big Game, and, well… I’ll be glad when this year’s done with.

Week 11

• Tennessee 24 Washington 17
• New York Jets 27 Houston 25
• Baltimore 33 Carolina 0
• Philadelphia 38 New York Giants 28
• San Diego 44 Denver 17

That’s 4-1 again, which takes me to 39-15 on the year.

Oh, and remember when I said to take note of that Baltimore-Carolina prediction last week? The final score ended up being Baltimore 37 Carolina 13. So it wasn’t a shutout, but it was a pretty bad blowout.

Here are my Week 12 predictions:

Week 12

• Green Bay 33 Atlanta 29
• Cleveland 36 Carolina 12
• Oakland 20 Miami 12
• Indianapolis 31 San Diego 24
• San Francisco 33 Arizona 27

That Green Bay score is wishful thinking. I’m playing my best friend in fantasy football this week, and I’m going to need a couple of miracles to beat him—including a huge day by former Berkeley Bear Aaron Rodgers as his Packers take on the Atlanta Falcons.

Just five hours to kickoff! I should probably get some sleep…

antaxōni

antaxōni is generally translated as “language”, though it includes more than speech and grammar. It specifically includes pragmatics and kinesthetics and customs of a culture.

ñi antaxōni cī;
“Fiat lingua!”