Syntax

.

Being written - please be patient

1. Introduction

Dr Outis did not give a dedicated syntax section. What I attempt to do here is to summarize what I understand to be the syntax of the language from what tells us and the examples he gives.

2. What we have seen in the previous pages

2.1 Normal Word Order

We have seen that the normal word order is Subject Verb Object, if that Object is direct. Indirect Object is expressed with the preposition po to, e.g.

• Ut edos sout po kun He gave a bone to the dog/ He gave the dog a bone.
• Em eleg po paideu I said to the boy/ I told the boy..

2.2 Position of Adpositions

We have seen that adpositions in Outidic, as in most European languages (exceptions being Basque, Estonian, Finnish, Hungarian and Saami) are placed before their noun complement (noun, pronoun, or noun phrase), i.e. they are prepositions. The preposition and its complement forms a single structure, a prepositional phrase, which, in Outidic, functions grammatically as an adverb (but see particle o below).

2.3 Position of Adjectives

We saw also that adjectives are placed before the noun they qualify. e.g. meg dom a large house, but that the adjective may follow the noun if it is linked by the relative particle o, e.g. dom o meg.

Above we said that prepositional phrases in Outidic are adverbial in function; if we wish to use such as a phrase adjectivally, we must link it to the noun with the relative particle, e.g. kun o ne kep the dog (which is) in the garden.
Cf.:

• Kun akoiman ne kep The dog is sleeping in the garden ("in the garden" is adverbial),
• Kun o ne kep ou ain po em The dog in the garden is not mine ("in the garden" is adverbial)

2.4 Relative Clauses

The particle o (on before vowels) is used to introduce relative clauses. Examples of these are given in Section 4 of 'Other Pronouns'.

2.5 Questions

There are three types of questions:

1. Wh-questions (also known as open questions, variable questions, non-polar questions or special questions) e.g. "Where is the dog?", "Whose dog is it?"
2. Yes-no questions (also known as a polar questions, or general questions) e.g. "Is the dog in the house?"
3. Alternative questions e.g. "Is the dog in the house or has it gone in the garden?"

We have seens examples of all three types in previous pages.

The interrogative adjectives, nouns and adverbs (Outidic's wh-words) are given in the Table of Correlatives in Section 3.5 of 'Other Pronouns'. Only one example, however, is given: Tindrop kun-ut toutot ain? Whose dog is this? which shows that there is no inversion of subject and verb and we may assume that is a general rule in Outidic. Thus Where is the dog? will be Tintop kun ain?

In Section 3.3. of 'Prepositions, Conjunctions, Adverbs, Particles & Interjections' we read that:

• ra "introduces a question if there is no specific interrogative pronoun, adjective or adverb" e.g. Ra kun ain ne dom? Is the dog in the house?
• rale ... rale marks an alternative question, e.g. Rale kun ain en dom rale ut eban se kep? Is the dog in the house or did it go into the garden?

2.6 Exclamations

Dr Outis gave no specific forms for these. As in very many languages they are either statements, often preceded by an interjection (see Section 3.4 of 'Prepositions, Conjunctions, Adverbs, Particles & Interjections') or a question form uttered in an exclamatory form. Examples from previous pages include:

• A, dom ain pru-meg! Oh, the house is too big!
• tin-paidik! how childish!

2.7 Commands

These are traditionally imperatives (2nd person), jussives ('3rd person imperatives') and hortatives (1st person plural). We have seen that Outidic uses its subjunctive mood for all these. Examples we found in previous pages are:

• imperative: Trek! Run! [perfective]; Trekan! Get running! [imperfective]
• jussive: Ut koiman! Let him sleep (on)! [imperfective]
• hortative: Emas ban! Let's go! [perfective].