Ngaliv Ëra
Do forgive the oncoming ramble.
Both "cat" and "dog" are loanwords, since the language's speakers wouldn't need to refer often to either.
Nmër kät ua hulo, ke nmër, a ko a.
[ŋ͡mer kʰæθ wɑ ʔɯlo kʰɜ ŋ͡mer ɑ kʰo ɑ]
nmër kät o a h-ulo ke nmër a ke o a
sleep cat arg2 IND IND-please c5 sleep IND c5 arg2 IND
The sleeping cat likes to sleep.
NPs have three "slots" between the noun and its article. The first of these is used for verbs modifying the noun in question; there are no specific non-finite verb forms, as these operate in the same way as any other verb except for their argument structure. Verbs themselves have three argument slots (very roughly corresponding to patient, instrument, and agent, in order); the noun goes in whichever is appropriate. Then comes the verb's modal particle, and then the noun's article (both dogs and cats are class 5). "Cat" in this case is the instigator of its own sleeping action, assuming this isn't a chloroformed cat we're discussing here; the
o (arg2) particle is thus added so that "cat" can fill the third argument slot as well. Phrasal morphophonological rules cause
o a >
ua.
So "the sleeping cat" -> sleep cat arg2 IND c5 (
nmër kät ua ke)
This contrasts with "the cat is sleeping" in the direction of looming (the interweaving of constituents, and the reason Ngaliv Ëra syntax is a hot mess); in regular verbs, the first argument looms left if present, but if that verb is modifying a noun, it must
always loom right. Phrasal rules cause
ke o >
ko. "The cat is sleeping" would be "cat sleep c5 arg2 IND" (
kät nmër ko a).
The entire "the sleeping cat" NP is now the first argument of the verb
ulo (Z/Y pleases X; X likes Y/Z), so it goes in slot one and the whole thing gets loomed leftwards as normal, with everything except the article moving in front of the verb (sleep cat arg2 IND IND-please c5 ... IND). "Please" gets an indicative prefix that "sleep" doesn't for phonological reasons.
The thing that pleases the cat is sleeping; again, there's no special non-finite verb form, just the verb "sleep" in the argument two position of
ulo. The cat is the one whose sleeping is being liked, and it's already in the common ground, so its article is all that's needed in the first argument slot here, followed again by
o so that it fills the third. The VP is thus
nmër ke ua; now we loom right, since it's the last argument of the head VP. This splits it up, putting the head VP's indicative
a immediately after the V of "sleep", giving us
nmër a ko a.
Dok hulo, ke them a kät ko ka.
[tox ʔɯlo kʰɜ tˣɜm ɑ kʰæθ kʰo kʰɑ]
dok h-ulo ke them a kät ke o ke a.
dog IND-please c5 smell IND cat c5 arg2 c5 IND
The dog likes to smell the cat.
Here's "please" again, with the first argument being "the dog" (being the one pleased) loomed left (dog IND-please c5 ... IND ->
dok hulo ke ... a).
"Smell" is the source of the dog's pleasure, so it's in argument two just as "sleep" was, and is loomed right just the same way; the IND after "smell" in the gloss belongs to the main VP "please". After that, we get the arguments of
them, "smell". First is the smelled thing, the cat. You could loom this left - you'd get
dok hulo, ke kät them a ko ka - but it's not mandatory when the "cat" NP is so short and the VP it's inside is already loomed, so best not to overcomplicate things.
It may be slightly too late for that.
The arguments of "smell" don't quite fit the patient-instrument-agent mold; the third argument doesn't have to have volition, unlike in "sleep", while the second indicates the scent and the first as the thing emanating that scent. You could put "the cat" in both the first and second slots (
dok hulo, ke them a kät ki ka), since the dog presumably likes cat-scent, not just the smelling action itself, but there's no real need. "Dog" needs to be the third argument, and it's in the common ground already, so all that's needed is a repeat of the article
ke (showing up in the surface form only as
k- because articles tend to merge with certain following particles). It shares a class with "cat", but that doesn't result in any "the cat smells itself" ambiguity because there's a separate reflexive construction (that would be
them (a) kät kiö a).
...Viola?
Géarthnuns