New CBB

I've been thinking about causative verbs tonight, and struck upon a notion that makes full use of Zidhgebzhail's tripartite morphosyntactic-alignment:

Does anyone spot any gaping holes in the below? And is this an example of some form of split-ergativity?

When using the causative particle ('-[i]vo[s]-') with a verb, the language exihibits NOM-ACC traits. An absolutive noun is used for that which causes something to happen, an ergative noun for that which is caused to do something, and an accusative noun for that which is caused to have something done to it, regardless of the transitivity of the verb:

Non-Causative Clauses - For reference

oz Entan
man.ABS eat.PRS
Man eats - ABS because the verb is intransitive.

nent h[ar-]Entan
food.ABS PASSIVE-eat.PRS
Food is eaten - ABS because the verb is intransitive.

ozil nentef Entan
man.ERG food.ACC eat.PRS
Man eats food - ERG and ACC because the verb is transitive.

Causative Clauses

aza ozil Entan-ivos
woman.ABS man.ERG eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Woman causes man to eat - Intransitive verb that has a 'nominative' argument as well as an ABS.

aza nentef Entan-ivos
woman.ABS food.ACC eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Woman causes food to be eaten - Intransitive verb with an ACC argument (which causes it to become active) as well as an ABS.

aza ozil nentef Entan-ivos
woman.ABS man.ERG food.ACC eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Woman causes man to eat food - Transitive verb with ABS, ERG, and ACC in the same clause.

Any thoughts would be welcomed.

Thanks.

Dan

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Valar morghulis.

Zidhgebzhail Orthography

So you are analysing the causer as a separate clause?

The woman [caused] (intransitive) the man eats the food (transitive).

I have little knowledge of the tripartite alignment but it seems plausible.

What about the sentence, "The woman causes the man to walk"

Firstly, it turns out that I wasted my time and yours by posting this. Half an hour after I gave up for the night, I realised that the language already has a built-in way around this issue. I specificially included a godsdamned causative case (-ung) for a related reason, but didn't make the connection.

azunga oz Entan-ivos
woman.CAUSATIVE man.ABS eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Because of woman, man is caused to eat.

azunga nent h[ar-]Entan-ivos
woman.CAUSATIVE food.ABS PASSIVE-eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Because of woman, food is caused to be eaten.

azunga ozil nentef Entan-ivos
woman.CAUSATIVE man.ERG food.ACC eat.PRS-CAUSATIVE
Because of woman, man is caused to eat food.

All of these examples imply that the causing to eat or be eaten was done deliberately by the woman, that she instigated the action. Dropping the 'ivos' from the verb would convey a sense that the woman was the cause without being the instigator.

Nevertheless, to respond:



I was hoping that the whole lot could be considered a single clause, but with the causal particle allowing for a case of special pleading; effectively saying that the language becomes NOM-ACC in the causative, with the ABS case used to indicate the causer.

This is now moot, however.



It would be identical to the "Woman causes man to eat," example in the first post. Using the more sensible system (with the causative noun case), this would be identical to the same example in this post.

I don't have a verb for 'walk' yet.

Why this particular example? Is it because 'walk' can't be transitive?

Dan

_________________
Valar morghulis.

Zidhgebzhail Orthography

It's confusing to use the same label for both a case for nouns and a voice for verbs in the same grammar of the same conlang. I recommend calling that case you described the "instigator" case instead of the "causative" case.

In natlangs, if my experience is a good guide, it's more common to have a special case for the causee or agent-of-effect or final performer, and just make the instigator or agent-of-cause or causer be in the normal "agents" case.

But I don't see why you couldn't have instead a special case for the instigator, as you propose.

Do you use a different case for beneficiaries than for instigators?

Do you do different things to the verb to indicate the salience of a beneficiary as opposed to the salience of an instigator?

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I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.

Yeah, I realised this after doing the glosses. I've decided to go with 'instigative' for the verbal suffix, and leave the noun case as 'causative'.



If I understand your use of 'beneficiaries' correctly (to mean 'something that is the recipient of an action', regardless of causation), then the answer is yes:

The causer/instigator would be marked with the causative case (-ung), and the beneficiary with the allative (-jaum, 'towards'), lative (-jaem, 'to'), or superlative (-jam, 'onto') cases.



Sorry, you've rather lost me there, I don't quite understand the use of 'salience' in this context.

If you mean something like 'are verbs explicitly marked when one of their noun phrases is a beneficiary of an action', then the answer is no:

ozil nentef Ien
man.ERG food.ACC give.PRS.SIMPLE
Man gives food.

ozil zhiefjaem nentef Ien
man.ERG boy.LAT food.ACC give.PRS.SIMPLE
Man gives food to boy.

The verbs are the same regardless of whether there is a beneficiary of the action of giving.

Dan

_________________
Valar morghulis.

Zidhgebzhail Orthography