Dal'qörian preposition word order

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back to dalq'örian prepositions

In dal'qörian, a prepositional object, be it a pronoun, real noun or a non tangible noun (like a thought, feeling or expression), 'always immediately follows' a nominative pronoun or noun in the subject position (except when the pronoun or noun is followed by a modal or auxiliary verb, then it follows the modal or auxiliary. Dalcurian ears are very sensitive to this syntactic rule; forgetting this makes you easily stand out as a non-Dalcurian):

• ména, máriÞ érenöra, görøria. We're going out with them. (lit: We, with them, are going out).

• diö nöacr, qiöcra séÞa, icaÞr ela. You can take everything except for these. (lit: You can, except for these, take all).

However, when a sentence or clause has more than one prepositional word/phrase (pph for short), there is a set word order according to whether the phrase contains:

ː Adverbs of time-these always go first.
ːPronouns, people names-these go second. (accusative)
ːNon-tangible nouns, thoughts, ideas-these go third
ːplaces, areas, direction-these go last.

Example 1:

• lintöni sol, binä nébaræ, máriÞ Garé ön Séan, eÞöaquálö. I’ll be out until 6 with Gary and Sean. (lit: Until 6 pm, I will be, with Gary and Sean, somewhere).

Although the pph until 6 is not technically an adverb of time, it goes first in word order because it 'denotes' time; the pph with Gary and Sean goes second in word order because it contains real names. (please note that binä nébaræ is not a pph)

Example 2:

• lintöni 6, binä nébaræ, máriÞ Garé ön Séan, andri animatáj. I’ll be at the cinema with Gary and Sean until 6pm.

This sentence contains three pph’s: until 6 (time) again, this goes first, with Gary and Sean (real names) goes second, and the pph at the cinema (place) goes last.

In the sentence:

• binä nébaræ, máriÞ Garé ön Séan, andri animatáj. I’ll be at the cinema with Gary and Sean. (lit: I’ll be, with Gary and Sean, at the cinema).

there is no pph regarding time, so word order follows in an ordinal fashion.

In sentences consisting of more than one clause, be it a subordinate or coordinate clause, word order resumes for each separate clause:

• diö nöacr, näø 6, raƒör binöra, yil?,, qösra binä nébaræ, lintöni nes, máriÞ Gary ön Sean, eÞöaquálö. Can you call me after 6 because I’ll be out with Gary and Sean until then. (lit: You can, after 6, call me, yes? because I’ll be, until then, with Gary and Sean, somewhere).

NOTE: Due to prepositional word order, it's not possible in Dalcurian to end a sentence with a preposition, unlike in English. For example:

• That's the house I live in.

In Dalcurian, this would be:

• TaÞ di abödä,, vömä binä habitr. That's the house where I live.
• Binä, am taÞ abödä, habitr. I live in that house.