MORPHOLOGY

Nouns
Articles
Verbs
Adjectives
Prepositions
Conjunctions



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NOUNS

Nouns, as in English, are the names of persons, places, or things. In Old Esmic, the nouns have some inherent qualities that we, in English, don't have, don't do much with, or do things with differently. These things include case, gender, and number. Also, there are a few different types of nouns. In addition, there are methods of compounding nouns and of making nouns from other word classes. These basic qualities, features, and distinctions will be discussed herein.
"Herein" is a great word and people should use it more often.

Functions and features:

• Gender
• Number
• Case

Types of nouns:

• Common nouns
  • Abstract nouns
• Pronouns
• Proper nouns

Noun construction:

• Compound nouns
• Derivations
• From verbs
• From adjectives and adverbs

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Gender
Old Esmic has eight genders, broken up into three different classes:

• sentient
• animal
• inanimate

• The sentient class is where all humans, gods, sentient aliens, spirits, etc. fall into. So are, due to a religious peculiarity, cows and bulls. In addition, body parts and corpses are considered grammatically sentient (but only the body parts/corpses of people/gods/etc. - not animals [well, actually, cow parts or bodies are grammatically sentient]). This also includes meats and other by-products of bulls and cows (such as milk) but not other animals. (There is uncertainty among Esmic grmmarians about what category to put hermaphroditical people in: the sentient-mixed, sentient-neuter, or inanimate, but since there aren't that many hermaphrodites born, and the ones that are are usually surgically "corrected" to be boys or girls, so it's basically a moot point.)

• The animal class is where animals fall. Any word for an animal or animal corpse or body part or whatever is in this category. This includes words for meats and animal by-products, by the way. Note that if an animal is not explicitly male or female, it and corresponding parts, bodies, etc. go into the inanimate category.

• The inanimate class contains basically everything else. Water, plants, asexual/hermaphroditic animals, bacteria, air, thoughts, feelings, they all go in here. Also, non-sex-specific animals go in here. "Sow" and "hog" would go in the animal category, since they are, respectively, male and female, but there's no way of knowing whether "pig" is male or female, and so it is placed into the inanimate category.

In the sentient classes are four of the genders: masculine, feminine, neuter, and mixed. Male sentient things are in the masculine category, and female sentient things are in the feminine category. This includes the body parts, bodies, etc. (a woman's nose would be in the sentient feminine category). The neuter gender can be either sentient things that have no physical gender or something whose sex is unknown, as in hypothetical situations. It is also used for gender-neutral nouns ("waiter" would be masculine, for example, and "actress" would be feminine," but "teacher" would be neuter, unless you were talking about a specific teacher). The "mixed" gender is only used for plurals and trials (more on this later) when you have two or more things that aren't all of the same gender subcategory. Generally, this is used mostly for pronouns, but there are certain times when you use it for common or proper nouns as well.

The animal class has three of the genders. The masculine, feminine, and mixed are basically as described above. Notice the lack of neuter. Generic, sexless terms for animals, such as "pig" instead of "sow" or "hog," are given inanimate gender. Any animal that is not definitely male or female is treated, grammatically, like an inanimate object.

The inanimate class is basically the doggie bag of Old Esmic gender: whatever's left over goes into it. Only one gender is in the inanimate class, thankfully.

I know that may have been confusing and tangled, so I'll just give you here the eight genders of Old Esmic nouns:

• Sentient masculine
• Sentient feminine
• Sentient neuter
• Sentient mixed
• Animal masculine
• Animal feminine
• Animal mixed
• Inanimate

Gender is not indicated by any suffix or prefix or by articles. It must simply be memorized. Fortunately, the system for gender is regular. Knowing the gender of nouns is important, as you will need it once you get to the verbs.

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Number
Every common noun has a suffix denoting its number: singular, plural, or trial. This suffix is attached immediately to the end of the noun. A noun of which there is only one gets a singular suffix. A noun of which there are two or more gets a plural suffix, unless there are exactly three of said item, in which case a special trial suffix is used. This is the chart of what goes on.

	SUFFIX
SING.	tet
PLUR.	riz
TRIAL	thshag

Note that every single common noun has a number suffix. For liquids, one "unit" is one drop. For example, one tholzhuthtet (water, plus case suffix and singular suffix) is one drop of water, where as many tholzhuthris can mean what we in English mean when we say "water": a large, conglomerated collection of water drops. It can also mean many individual drops of water, like on, say, a car window during the rain. Informally, the singular is sometimes used to mean "a glass of (x)" if it's a beverage, but this isn't done as much as it is in English, and it's advised that you don't do it, as there are a lot of sarcastic waiters out there. Things that are substances, such as jelly and cheese, are done in pieces. That is, one piece of cheese will come through as, roughly, "one cheese." It doesn't matter how big or small this piece is. Likewise, three pieces of cheese will come out as "three cheeses." Gases' numbers are based on molecules in the same vein as liquids' numbers being based off the drops. The numbers of abstract nouns expressing qualities are based, curiously, on the number of items which possess the qualities. If you're talking about a man's integrity, for example, you would put "integrity" in singular form. If you're talking about six people's integrity, you'd put "integrity" in its plural form. And so on.

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Case
Old Esmic uses the ergative-absolutive case system, which basically works so that nouns (or pronouns or whatever) that are the subjects of intransitive sentences or the objects of transitive sentences are in the absolutive case, while the subjects of transitive sentences are in the ergative case. In addition, Old Esmic has a case for the objects of prepositions (the prepositional case), as well as the vocative case, which is used to refer to who- or whatever you're talking to (such as "Eric" in "Eric, come over here!"). OE also uses inside titles of books, plays, etc. when the titles aren't complete sentences (so, for example, the word "trouble" in the title "Big Trouble" would be in the vocative, but in the title "Trouble Follows Eric Wherever He Goes" it would be in the ergative, since "Trouble Follows Eric Wherever He Goes" is a complete sentence). It also has the genitive (possessive) case, but four different versions of it. I'll go into detail on the genitive cases in a minute, after I bring you this table of the case suffixes.

CASE	Voiced1	Unvoiced2
Ergative	zhuth	sud
Absolutive	but	put
Prepositional	bodh	pod
Genitive-ergative	zhadh	sadh
Genitive-absolutive	budh	kudh
Genitive-prepositional	gud	khuth
Genitive-vocative	dith	thith

¹This is the suffix used if a voiced consonant precedes the case suffix.
²This is the suffix used if an unvoiced consonant precedes the case suffix.

These suffixes go directly after the number suffix (or noun, if the noun carries no number suffix). Nothing may come between a number suffix and a case suffix. The vocative case is indicated, however, by its lack of case suffix. It is the case that all the nouns in dictionaries are in.

There are four genitive cases in Old Esmic: one for the ergative, one for absolutive, one for prepositional, and one for vocative. The thing "possessing" the other object is in the corresponding case (in "Eric's duck," for example, whatever case "duck" is in, "Eric" will be in the corresponding genitive case). For example, if you were to translate "Eric's duck bit me" into Old Esmic, "duck" would be in the ergative case and "Eric" would be in the genitive-ergative. If you translated "I bit Eric's duck" or "Eric's duck flew," "duck" would be in the absolutive case, and "Eric" would be in the genitive-asbolutive. If you trasnlated the phrase "with Eric's duck," "duck" would be in the prepositional case, and "Eric" would be in the genitive-prepositional. Fianlly, if you translated "Eric's duck, come here," "duck" would be in the vocative and "Eric" would be in the genitive-vocative. Nouns with any genitive case need no article.

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Common nouns
All nouns that aren't proper nouns or pronouns are considered to be "common." The basic difference between common nouns and the others is that common nouns (unless in the vocative case) require number suffixes and articles.

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Abstract nouns
Abstract nouns are a certain subset of common nouns that deal with ideas and concepts and not physical, concrete things. Like all common nouns, they must have an article in front of them, they must have number suffixes, and they must have case suffixes. However, they also share the same required number feature as common nouns. In order to do this, an abstract noun counts as "one" noun if it's the [whatever] of one person/animal/thing/etc. Example: "Bob's integrity never faltered." In that sentence, if translated, "integrity" would be singular. In the sentence "The three sisters' integrity never faltered," "integrity" would be a trial. In the sentence "The seventeen partners of the firm had unfaltering integrity," "integrity" would be plural.
If the abstract noun is used in a general, sweeping sense, such as "Honesty is the most important thing in the world," it is used as a plural (with appropriate suffixes, of course).

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Pronouns
Pronouns, as in English, are words that "stand for" nouns. This section will deal with personal pronouns and leave relative pronouns for the syntax section. Pronouns are differentiated by gender, number, and person. Here is the basic, general chart:

	First person	Second person	Third person
Sentient singular masculine	baek	teb	yig
Sentient singular feminine	yat	soet	yiz
Sentient singular neuter	yid	tub	gog
Sentient plural masculine	dos	wat	yikh
Sentient plural feminine	yap	let	dikh
Sentient plural neuter	doek	tib	thies
Sentient plural mixed	bies	biswup	bid
Sentient trial masculine	bik	khad	bakh
Sentient trial feminine	dakh	kid	yal
Sentient trial neuter	dheg	dhek	did
Sentient trial mixed	das	sut	khab
Animal singular masculine	wak	yieg	gil
Animal singular feminine	gib	ted	kakh
Animal plural masculine	bikh	khol	yeb
Animal plural feminine	wab	dhus	khub
Animal plural mixed	zhók	yit	lak
Animal trial masculine	shash	dhas	rak
Animal trial feminine	tash	dhab	dhakh
Animal trial mixed	toesh	yek	shek
Inanimate singular	yis	tith	khib
Inanimate plural	shug	shad	zed
Inanimate trial	khid	reg	bied

Remember: pronouns do not carry number suffixes and do not take articles.

Possessive pronouns, such as "mine," "yours," and "hers," are formed by adding the possessive suffix -pak before the case suffix. Thus, "mine" as in "Mine is empty" would be baekpakput (or yatpakput if you're a woman). This practice is also followed with proper nouns, as well as common nouns. Note that the possessive suffix goes directly before the case suffix. Also, keep in mind that it is not to be used as a genitive — that is, don't use it to try to make phrases like "my duck," because it won't make any sense at all.

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Proper nouns
All proper nouns are "shielded" by special affixes. Depending on the type of title or name it is, a certain syllable will be put at the front of and back of it. The syllables are as such:

NAME TYPE	PREFIX	SUFFIX
Human	pet	pet
Animal	dad	tes
Place	wes	kal
Work	rik	brith
Company	tot	did

For simplicity's sake I will call the prefix and suffix the "name prefix" and "name suffix," respectively.

When you have a name or title, regardless of whether it's short or long, it has the name prefix attached to the beginning of it and the name suffix attached to the end. It is then treated as a noun and has the case suffix stuck to the end. Here are some examples:

Bzeshbris bled. ("Bzeshbris" is a girl's name.)
koetyettikrad petbzeshbrispetput
   koet - yettik-rad pet-bzeshbris-pet-put
sent.fem.-bleed-past pet-bzeshbris-pet-abs.


Dhzadgótras is reading "He Loves a Woman". ("Dhzadgótras" is a boy's name.)
shaebbzhagsossos petdhzadgótraspetsud rikshaebpsakhsos yigsud gat bzeshputbrithput
   shaeb - bzhag - sos - sos    pet-dhzadgótras-pet-sud  rik - shaeb - psakh - sos  yig-sud gat bzesh-put- brith-put
sent.masc.-read-present-present pet-pshulgótras-pet-erg rik-sent.masc.-love-present he-erg. a  woman-abs.-brith-abs.


"Children's Songs" is a company.
gukhdhyaksos totpshulristhith thulshabkabrisbrithsud gat totdidput
gukh - dhyak-sos   tot-pshul- ris  -  thith  thulshabkab-ris  -  brith-sud gat totdid-put
inanim.-be-present tot-child-plural-gen.voc.     song - plural - brith-erg. a company-abs.


Don't worry about the odd word order or the verbs at this point. We'll get to that later.

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Compounding nouns
Compounding nouns in Old Esmic is rather simple, although it's pretty much backwards from English. The main noun comes first and the modifying nouns come after that. In English, for example, you can tell that a "doghouse" is a type of house and not a type of dog, even if you've never heard the word, because the "house" segment comes last. In OE, however, a word assembled like "doghouse" would indicate that it was some type of dog, probably one that lived in a house. Thus, the name "bzeshbris," literally meaning "girlcheese" (bzesh is "girl" or "woman" and bris is "cheese"), is accurately translated as "cheese-girl" or "girl of cheese" or some such.

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Deriving nouns from verbs
Deriving nouns from verbs, in Old Esmic, can be done in one of two ways. Nouns can be made that mean, essentially, "one who verbs," and nouns can be made that basically mean "one who is verbed." The suffixes that make the verbs into nouns can be translated into English, for the most part, as -er and -ee, respectively. There are different suffixes for the three gender classes:

	"-er"	"-ee"
SENTIENT.	dud	yith
ANIMAL	brak	thik
INANIMATE	bal	dhig

After the suffix is attached to the verb, it is treated as a normal noun and given the appropriate number/case/etc. suffixes. The verb that is turned into the noun is removed of any conjugational or inflectional affixes. However, in certain cases, one past, present, or future suffix may be left on the verb in the position it normally would be (see Verbs), which would emphasize:

• (if the past suffix is used) that the new noun is only a former [verb]er or [verb]ee and no longer holds the title
• (if the present suffix is used) that the new noun is only temporarily, in the present, a [verb]er or [verb]ee and this will be changing soon, or
• (if the future suffix is used) that the new noun is not yet a [verb]er or [verb]ee.

Again, these are not required, and should only be used for emphasis, generally to keep people "in line" (at least, that's how they sound to me).

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Deriving nouns from adjectives
Adjectives can be made into nouns by adding on the suffix -khit. This becomes an abstract noun and is used accordingly. In English, adjectives can often be used directly as nouns, as in "Give me your tired, your poor," but this is not possible in Old Esmic. The best way to do this would be to translate it as if it said "Give me your tired people and your poor people."

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ARTICLES

Every common noun has to have an article, as mentioned above. However, articles in Old Esmic extend beyond the traditional English range of "a" and "the" to numbers, possessives, and other quantity-marking words, all considered, in English, to be adjectives (even though they look and act EXACTLY like articles, but don't get me started on that rant). The different types of articles in Old Esmic are as such:

• Definite
• Indefinite
• Genitive
• Numbers
• Nonspecific quantity

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Definite articles
There are three definite articles in Old Esmic: kat is singular, kók is plural, and kug is trial. They basically amount to "the" in English.

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Indefinite articles
There are three indefinite articles in Old Esmic: gat for singular, gók for plural, and gug for trial. Gat is the same as a or an in English, and the other two are taken to the plural and trial level, usually translated "some" in English.

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Genitives
Genitives, whether they're common nouns, proper nouns, or pronouns, are used as articles in Old Esmic. Any noun of any type, when put into the genitive case, automatically becomes an article. If the noun that is in the genitive is a common noun, a special suffix may be given to it after the case suffix to make it definite or indefinite. The definite form of this suffix is -shak and the indefinite form is -zhag. These suffixes, of course, may not be given to proper nouns or pronouns.

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Numbers
Numbers count as articles in Old Esmic. There's really not much more to say about that other than the suffix -shak may be used to make them definite if necessary (although -zhag may not be used on numbers, as indefinitude is already implied by the use of the numbers).

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Quantities
Sometimes specific numbers are not appropriate and more general quantity words are needed, such as "a few," "several," and "a lot." There are six Old Esmic words used for such times as these. Lek is none and kel is all. The other four are more relative to each other and don't always have direct English translations. Luk is a couple, a few, a handful. Bat is several; more than luk, but less than many. Many is zyut, which can also be translated as a lot or similar phrases. Much more than zyut, however, is bazh, which can be translated as a bunch, quite a lot, or an ample quantity.
All but lek and kel may take on the -zhag suffix.

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VERBS

Old Esmic has verbs, like every other language in the world. All its verbs' "infinitive forms" end with either a g or a k. Every sentence in Old Esmic has to have a verb, and every verb has to be properly conjugated. The two main features of conjugation in Old Esmic are gender and time. Also, there are a couple of verbs that are strikingly different from English that I'll go into detail about.

• Gender
• Time
• Differences from English

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Gender
Every verb is conjugated based on the gender of the noun in the absolutive. A prefix is attached to the verb based on the gender. Remember that the "subject" as we know in English is not always the absolutive in Old Esmic!

GENDER	PREFIX
sentient masculine	shaeb
sentient feminine	koet
sentient neuter	khób
sentient mixed	tud
animal masculine	gob
animal feminine	yak
animal mixed	kush
inanimate	gukh

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Time
Conjugating for time is not as easy. Granted, there are only three suffixes, but they account for many tenses and aspects. There is one past suffix, rad, one present suffix, sos, and one future suffix, shub. These three are combined in certain patterns to get certain meanings. Here is a chart with all the possible legal combinations and their rough English approximations.

past						ate
present						eat
future						will eat
past	past					had eaten
past	present					had been eating
past	future					was going to eat
present	past					have eaten
present	present					am eating
present	future					am eating and will eat
future	past					will have eaten
future	present					will be eating
future	future					will be going to eat
past	past	present				had eaten and am eating
past	present	future				have been eating and will eat
past	future	past				ate and will have eaten
past	future	present				ate and will be eating
past	future	future				ate and will be going to eat
present	past	future				have been going to eat
present	present	past				have been eating
present	future	past				am eating and will have eaten
present	future	future				am eating and will be going to eat
future	past	past				ate and will have eaten
future	present	past				will have eaten
future	present	present				am and will be eating
future	future	past				will be going to have eaten
future	future	present				will be going to be eating
past	future	present	past			was going to have eaten
past	past	present	present	future	future	ate, am eating, and will eat

Keep in mind that these are all the approximate English values and do not match up with English all the time. One of the more notable things to watch out for is the difference between "eat" and "am eating." In English, when you would say "I am hungry" or "I want water" you would say in Old Esmic "I am being hungry" or "I am wanting water," because the "am -ing" tense indicates that the action is temporary and only happening in this moment, as opposed to "I eat cereal" or "She watches movies." Another thing to be careful uf is the future tense. In English, "We fly tomorrow" is perfectly acceptable, but you would not say that in Old Esmic. You would say "We will fly tomorrow."

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Differences from English
There are some more miscellaneous things about Old Esmic verbs that are important to know. The first is that there is no passive. In English, you can say "I was hit" or "I have been hit" or "He is being beaten up." In Old Esmic, however, you can't. You would have to say "Someone hit me" or "People are beating him up" or something to that effect.
The next is the imperative. When you tell someone to do something, it is called the imperative sense. The way to mark this in Old Esmic is to put the imperative suffix, -kad, in the place of the time suffix(es), which aren't necessary because in a command the present is already implied.
Every verb has some sort of transitivity. There are some verbs that are done to someone or something and there are other verbs that are just done. Most verbs in Old Esmic are transitive, although there is a fair share of intransitive verbs. In addition, most transitive verbs have alternate intransitive forms. The ones that don't can be used as intransitive verbs with an implied object of "stuff" or "people." The one exception to this is the verb dhyak, "be." This verb is always transitive. The intransitive "be" is shut.
The verb kheth, "give," is used differently enough from English for me to feel it is important to mention it here. The sentence "I give a clock to Joe" or "I give Joe a clock" would end up being translated as "I give Joe with a clock." The receiver of the item is the object, and the item itself is in a prepositional phrase that uses the Esmic word for "with."

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ADJECTIVES

Adjectives in Old Esmic operate differently than in English. For one thing, both what we call "adverbs" and what we call "adjectives" fall into the adjective category in OE. Adjectives are listed as their own words in dictionaries, but when actually used they are always attached to the word they describe.