Seuna relative clauses

The relative clause marker is ta. This corresponds to "that" or "who" in English.

SVO ....... or VSO when the S is indefinite.

The relative clause marker for the singular : "ta" in its different forms

ta

The dog that bit the man. => dog ta bit blas

The dog that bit a woman. => dog ta bit gla

tas

The man whom the dog bit. => man tas dog bit.

The man whom a dog bit. => man tas bit dog.

ta'u

The endtag u corresponds to English "by".

The hand that I hit with => hand ta'u I hit

tayo

The endtag yo corresponds to English "to" or "upto". It is used exactly as in English to indicate the receiver of a gift.

The family that we gave the dog to => family tayo we gave the dog

tafi

The endtag fi corresponds to English "at".

The hurdle at which I fell => hurdle taf I fell.

tage

The endtag ge corresponds to English "'s" or "of".

The man whose dog I killed => man tage dog I killed

tale

The endtag le corresponds to English "from".

The place that we come from => place tale we come

tawa

The endtag wa corresponds to English "towards". Also to English "about" as in "I think about you".

The person who we are all thinking about => person tawa we are all thinking.

taho

The endtag ho corresponds to English "with".

The woman that you went to market with => woman taho you went to market

The relative clause marker for the plural : "tan" in its different forms

When the head noun is plural tan must be used instead of ta. For example;-

The dogs that bit the man. => dogn tan bit blas

The various forms of tan with the endtags are tan tansa tanu tanyo tanfi tange tanle tanwa and tanho. Notice that an a has been added to tansa to make it fall within the allowed morphology of Seuna. Inspite of this it is allowed to pronounce tansa as tans. It is also allowed to pronounce tanfi as tanf.

"ta" followed by adjectives (a subset of "ta" + RC)

As it is allowed to drop the copula when it is deemed not to have any usefull information

meu ta ro hau ... => the cat that is black

mean the same as meu ta hau, hence NOUN+ta+ADJECTIVE is the same construction as NOUN+ta+RC.

Now the question is : what is the differnce in meaning between meu ta hau and meu hau. The answer is not much. The former construction gives slightly more prominence to the adjective. For example if you were comparing a black cat to a white cat you would tend to use the ta construction. ta can be put after any NOUN and before any ADJECTIVE that qualifies that NOUN and it won't feel strange. A full RC would seem a bit strange (i.e. meu ta ro hau for meu hau) unless of course there was relevant tense information to convey.

I guess having meu ta hau meaning basically the same as meu hau gives a bit of leeway to songwriters and poets.

When we have 'ta instead of ta

Consider the three sentences below.

1) meu hau sleeps on the bed

2) meu ta hau sleeps on the bed

3) meu 'ta hau sleeps on the bed

In the third sentence the apostrophe represents a definite break in the flow of words. The Seuna writing system has symbols to represent breaks in the flow of words ... either for breathing or for emphasis. Usually when I write Seuna text with the Latin alphabet I do not bother to show these breaks. However I do in this case as it is important for the meaning of the text.

In the first sentence both the speaker and the hearer can identify the black cat.

In the third sentence, the hearer, beforehand, did not know that the cat was black, i.e. the fact that the cat was black is "new information".

The above that I have demonstrated with an adjective, is valid for RC's as well.

What about the second sentence ? Well it basically means the same as the first but with slightly more emphasis on the adjective. For example;- meu ta hau sleeps on the bed but meu ta ai sleeps on the chair

The usage NOUN 'ta RC is similar to the usage NOUN 'NOUN. For example ;- "George Bush - President of the united states said today ...", when two nouns are stood beside each other and thereby equated to each other.

when the RC stands by itself

So far we have been dealing with nouns that are modified by RC's. But in Seuna RC's can can be nouns in themselves. For example;-

ta comori = the one who came

tan comuri = the ones who came

tas seeari = the one that I saw

tans seeari = the ones that I saw

It is permissible to have na or wa in front of ta to indicate what we are talking about is human. And in the same manner it is permissible to have je in front of ta to indicate what we are talking about is non-human. But usually the animacy of what is under discussion is known so the insertion of these pronouns is unnecessary.

I want ta hau = I want the black one

Index

1. Introduction to Seuna
2. Seuna : Chapter 1
3. Seuna word shape
4. The script of Seuna
5. Seuna sentence structure
6. Seuna pronouns
7. Seuna nouns
8. Seuna verbs (1)
9. Seuna adjectives
10. Seuna demonstratives
11. Seuna verbs (2)
12. Asking a question in Seuna
13. Seuna relative clauses
14. Seuna verbs (3)
15. Methods for deriving words in Seuna
16. List of all Seuna derivational affixes
17. Numbers in Seuna
18. Naming people in Seuna
19. The Seuna calendar
20. Seuna units