Ois! Could this be a causative?

[suomichris]

I was thinking about the phrase said by Norm in the lab when he meets Grace, which I have seen transcribed as:

'awve ultxari ohengeyä, nawma sa'nok lrrtok siveiyi
"May the All Mother smile upon our first meeting."

So, this is all fine and good, except that I note the "tok" in there, which looks a bit like our "be.at" verb.  And, we have the "si" verb here which we've previous thought might show up as a causative.  Now, we should probably expect to see case marking here, but the phonological environment would, potentially, make it hard to hear/pronounce.  So, might this be:

'awve ultxari ohengeyä, nawma sa'nok(ìl) lrr(ti) tok siveiyi
Literally, "May the All Mother make a smile be at our first meeting."

Now, I'm not saying it is, so don't accuse me of taking liberties (you know who you are :p), but I think it's worth considering.  Do we have any other confirmation of "lrrtok" meaning "smile"??

[Keylstxatsmen]

I was thinking about the phrase said by Norm in the lab when he meets Grace, which I have seen transcribed as:

'awve ultxari ohengeyä, nawma sa'nok lrrtok siveiyi
"May the All Mother smile upon our first meeting."

So, this is all fine and good, except that I note the "tok" in there, which looks a bit like our "be.at" verb.  And, we have the "si" verb here which we've previous thought might show up as a causative.  Now, we should probably expect to see case marking here, but the phonological environment would, potentially, make it hard to hear/pronounce.  So, might this be:

'awve ultxari ohengeyä, nawma sa'nok(ìl) lrr(ti) tok siveiyi
Literally, "May the All Mother make a smile be at our first meeting."

Now, I'm not saying it is, so don't accuse me of taking liberties (you know who you are :p), but I think it's worth considering.  Do we have any other confirmation of "lrrtok" meaning "smile"??

I think like krrnetx, lrrtok has the direct object "baked in" and is treated intransitively.  This is an example of verb + si though, but because it seems like a idiomatic expression like "nice to meet you" or "はじめまして(ha.ji.me.ma.shi.te)", it may be hard to extend to other situations.

I would think that if sa'nok was in the ergative, we would at least hear a bit of the "ì".

-Keyl

[suomichris]

I think like krrnetx, lrrtok has the direct object "baked in" and is treated intransitively.  This is an example of verb + si though, but because it seems like a idiomatic expression like "nice to meet you" or "はじめまして(ha.ji.me.ma.shi.te)", it may be hard to extend to other situations.

I would think that if sa'nok was in the ergative, we would at least hear a bit of the "ì".

Ah, that would well make sense.  One would still wonder if "lrr-tok" might not be the historical source of it, just as krrnekx is clearly made of two bits...

Yeah, I wish I could hear an ergative in there :p  On the other hand, if "lrrtok" is a noun, "smile," as it seems to be, then like any other N+si construction, we'd expect an intransitive.  So, yeah, maybe "lrrtok" is an older form...