Tatari Faran Grammar

Verbs

Basic verbal constructions have already been described in the previous sections. Here we describe further details about verbs.

Adverbial Position

The position right after the verb in a clause is called the adverbial position. Many markers and adverbs are placed in this position to modify the meaning of the verb.

Negation

Verbs are negated by placing the postposition be in adverbial position, and dropping the finalizer:

The same process is used for negating adjectival statements or statements of equivalence. For example:

Strong denial can be expressed by retaining the finalizer and prefixing it with bei:

The negated finalizer strengthens the denial.

This device is also used in adjectival statements to express strong negation:

In statements of equivalence, the negative finalizer bai is used to express negation:

In the imperative mood, placing the postposition be in adverbial position expresses prohibition. E. g.:

Note that the finalizer is omitted when the verb is negated with be, unless one wishes to express strong prohibition:

When there is no argument NP between the verb and its finalizer in a strong prohibition, be is dropped in favor of bei-:

Reduplication

A number of verbs exhibit intensification via reduplication:

tapa	To walk.
tapatapa	To walk a lot, to go to many places.
uke	To bend.
uke'uke	To twist out of shape.
dutan	To hear.
dutarutan	To hear a lot about, to be well-acquianted with.

Reduplication may modify the meaning of the verb in various ways:

jataa	To teach.
jatajataa	To boss around, to micromanage.
tintan	To exchange, to swap.
tintatintan	To do business.
hamra	To appear, to be seen.
hamrahamra	To show off, to make a display of oneself.

The finalizer of a reduplicated verb often changes, in correspondence with the change in meaning. In some cases the finalizer acquires the pluralizing prefix hei-; e.g., tapa bata → tapatapa heibata. In other cases, a completely different finalizer is substituted; e.g., tintan huinui → tintatintan ku'un.

Verb Conjugations

The Gerund

The gerund form of a verb is formed by suffixing -i for consonant-final verbs, and -'i for vowel-final verbs. For example:

hamra → hamra'i

duum → duumi

Gerunds are marked for case in the main clause using a neuter case clitic.

The Conjunctive

When conjoining a clause in which the topic NP is elided, if temporal succession is not indicated, a conjunctive verb is employed instead of using hena followed by the case particle of the elided NP.

The conjunctive verb is simply a verb with a conjunctive prefix, which indicates the function of the elided NP. The following table lists these prefixes.

Conjunctive prefixes	Originative	Conveyant	Receptive
Masculine	ka-	sa-	na-
Feminine	ki-	si-	ni-
Neuter	ko-	so-	no-

Historically, these prefixes developed from the same pronouns that the case clitics developed from; hence, they closely resemble each other.

If the verb stem is vowel-initial, vowel changes occur. If the initial vowel on the verb is long vowel or a glide, the prefix loses its vowel. For example:

ki- + aipam → kaipam

Otherwise, the following changes occur:

Prefix vowel	Initial verb vowel
	a	e	i	ue	o	u
a	aa	e	ai	ue	au	au
i	ia	e	ii	ue	o	u
o	ua	e	ui	ue	o	u

Notice that e and ue absorb the prefix vowel unchanged, and likewise with o and u except when the prefix vowel is a.

Summary of Conjugations

The following table summarizes the verb conjugations and their functions:

Verb Conjugations		Vowel-initial		Consonant-initial
		Vowel-final	Consonant-final	Vowel-final	Consonant-final
Gerund		-'i	-i	-'i	-i
Conjunctive	originative	k- (with mutations)		ka-, ki-, ko-
	conveyant	s- (with mutations)		sa-, si-, so-
	receptive	n- (with mutations)		na-, ni-, no-