Behind the scenes - Na'vi dialog for Jake

[Tsahaylu]

Avatar The Movie James Cameron Avatar The Movie Behind The Scenes Making The Movie 2

In this video at 3:01 there is a sample from Jake's Na'vi script.
3 sentences with <iv>, very interesting material.

[Txen Seri Unil]

Kaltxi!

Irayo so much for posting this! Not only for the language but I hadn't seen this clip before. Great find! Irayo!

Eywa ngahu,
Txen Seri Unil

[Will Txankamuse]

yup I hadn't seen that one before either so thanks for posting it!  Here's a capture of the screen (if the video gets removed, which a few of them have been by Fox)



Will

[omängum fra'uti]

Apparently that youtube clip is an edited version of a making of special on FX.  Some of the stuff in that screen capture is a little deceptive in the low quality.  For example "ätxäle" looks almost more like "ätxllle", however on the recording I had on my TiVo it is most certainly the first.  I'll see if I can get something a little higher quality captured.

[Payoang]

Na'vi Dialog for Jake - 3-13-2007


Sc. 108, P. 67

   I See you Brother, and thank you. Your spirit goes with Eywa, your body stays behind to become part of the People.

   Oel ngati kameie, ma Tsmukan, ulte ngaru seiyi ireiyo.

   Ngari hu Eywa saleu tirea, tokx 'ì'awn slu Na'viyä hapxì.


Sc. 132, P. 80

   I have passed the tests. I respectfully request the Dream Hunt.

   Sìfmetokit emzola'u ohel. Ätxäle si tsnì livu oheru Uniltaron.

Sc. 182, P. 103 - 104


   Eytukan, I have something to say, to everyone. The words are like stones in my heart.

   Ma Eytukan, lu oeru aylì'u frapor. Aylì'u na ayskxe mì te'lan.


   A great evil is upon us. The Sky People are coming to destroy Hometree. They will be here soon.

   Eo ayoeng lu txana tìkawng. Sawtute zera'u fte fol Kelutralti skiva'a.

   Pìyähem fìtseng ye'rìn.


   You have to leave, or you will die.

   Ayngari zene hivum, txo....


Sc. 223, P. 116

   Tsu'tey of the Rongloa, son of ...
   
   Ma Tsu'tey te Rongloa...
   
   Na'viru ...

[Eight]

Wow. Good work.

You get a half-second glimpse of a script and you were able to grab it and pull out the dialog for us. Nice one.

[wm.annis]

A great evil is upon us. The Sky People are coming to destroy Hometree. They will be here soon.

Eo ayoeng lu txana tìkawng. Sawtute zera'u fte fol Kelutralti skiva'a.

A-HA!  We know how to form purpose clauses now.  Fte + verb‹iv›.  We have a negative version in the NYT sound files, fteke nìhawng livok ... to not get to close.

I think it's safe to consider these canon for the corpus.

[Taronyu]

   I See you Brother, and thank you. Your spirit goes with Eywa, your body stays behind to become part of the People.

   Oel ngati kameie, ma Tsmukan, ulte ngaru seiyi ireiyo.

   Ngari hu Eywa saleu tirea, tokx 'ì'awn slu Na'viyä hapxì.

Here we have ireiyo. Does this mean that it ought to be spelled differently? Not that slu doesn't have an infix! Where is saleu from?

   I have passed the tests. I respectfully request the Dream Hunt.

   Sìfmetokit emzola'u ohel. Ätxäle si tsnì livu oheru Uniltaron.

What is sì doing as an adposition? We have dative subject construction, in the second phrase, as noted elsewhere by William. <iv> is used here in a subordinate clause: do you guys know what type? Reason?

   Eytukan, I have something to say, to everyone. The words are like stones in my heart.

   Ma Eytukan, lu oeru aylì'u frapor. Aylì'u na ayskxe mì te'lan.

As noted, what's happening with the double dative and -r. Looks like Jake mastered lenition, anyway.

   A great evil is upon us. The Sky People are coming to destroy Hometree. They will be here soon.

   Eo ayoeng lu txana tìkawng. Sawtute zera'u fte fol Kelutralti skiva'a.

   Pìyähem fìtseng ye'rìn.

A-HA!  We know how to form purpose clauses now.  Fte + verb‹iv›.  We have a negative version in the NYT sound files, fteke nìhawng livok ... to not get to close.

I think it's safe to consider these canon for the corpus.

This is awesome! Man I've been wondering about that. Good spot william.

   You have to leave, or you will die.

   Ayngari zene hiyum, txo....

Shouldn't that be <ìy>?

   Tsu'tey of the Rongloa, son of ...
   
   Ma Tsu'tey te Rongloa...
   
   Na'viru ...

Another clan name, already noted. I assume that the next sentence is "to the Na'vi". Use of Cameronian te.

[txura utral]

   Sìfmetokit emzola'u ohel. Ätxäle si tsnì livu oheru Uniltaron.

In these sentences, why is it "oheru" and not "oeru"?

[wm.annis]

   I have passed the tests. I respectfully request the Dream Hunt.

   Sìfmetokit emzola'u ohel. Ätxäle si tsnì livu oheru Uniltaron.

What is sì doing as an adposition?

Plural of tìfmetok, I think.

   You have to leave, or you will die.

   Ayngari zene hiyum, txo....

Shouldn't that be <ìy>?

How about ‹iv›, with the underlining causing confusion?  Matches other uses of modal verbs.

[Mirri]

   I have passed the tests. I respectfully request the Dream Hunt.

   Sìfmetokit emzola'u ohel. Ätxäle si tsnì livu oheru Uniltaron.

What is sì doing as an adposition? We have dative subject construction, in the second phrase, as noted elsewhere by William. <iv> is used here in a subordinate clause: do you guys know what type? Reason?

It's 'si', isn't it?
Ätxäle si, to make request.

Edited: Oh, misunderstood. Yeah, Sìfmetok is the plural with the ay dropped.

In these sentences, why is it "oheru" and not "oeru"?

Ohe is the differential/ceremonial form of oe. I'm assuming this is how the 'respectfully' bit sneaks into the sentence.

[Mirri]

Tried to get a crisper frame from the video and sharpened it up. Looks like hivum to me.

The places where there's an underlined y in Eywa, Eytukan and Piyähem all show slight imperfections to the underlining. The underlined livu and hivum don't seem to.

[Will Txankamuse]

Here we have ireiyo. Does this mean that it ought to be spelled differently?

I would imagine that Ireiyo is the result of Irayu taking the laudative <ei> marker, so it's a deferential form of thank you.

Will

[Carborundum]

Here we have ireiyo. Does this mean that it ought to be spelled differently?

I would imagine that Ireiyo is the result of Irayu taking the laudative <ei> marker, so it's a deferential form of thank you.

Will

That would only work if 'irayo' was a verb, which I don't think it is. Even if it was, the laudatory form should be 'iray<ei>o'.

[Eight]

Sawtute zera'u fte...

Bit curious about this...

Makes me wonder if there's any real difference between using the basic present in Na'vi

Sawtute za'u...
The skypeople come to destroy hometree etc.

vs zera'u
The skypeople are coming to destroy...

In English, the simple present tends to be used for permanent and frequent happenings. Whereas the continuous is more for describing things that are happening now, but don't necessarily always happen.

Oe nì-ìnglìsì plltxe, slä oe nì-Na'vi perlltxe set.

[Taronyu]

It looks to me like a pretty solid rule, given this, that any inflected pronoun receives stress on the root. interesting.

Added all of the stress information to my dictionary, and a few new lexical entries based on this document.

[Will Txankamuse]

   I See you Brother, and thank you.

   Oel ngati kameie, ma Tsmukan, ulte ngaru seiyi ireiyo.

ulte ngaru seiyi ireiyo

ulte nga<ru>  s<eiy>i ireiyo

and you<DAT> make/do<?> thank

and to you I do thank

is it possible that <eiy> is one of the missing second verbal infixes?

Will

[wm.annis]

is it possible that <eiy> is one of the missing second verbal infixes?

It seems likely that seiyi to prevent *seii.  Long vowels were named as something Cameron did not like in a sound system for Na'vi (along with tone, which makes me sad).

[Will Txankamuse]

Note that slu doesn't have an infix! Where is saleu from?

perhaps the script is intentionally made easier to pronounce for the actors, and saleu is actually s<ay>l<ei>u so that would be 'will become<LAUD>'

Nga<ri> hu Eywa s<ay>l<ei>u tirea

you<TOP> with Eywa will become<LAUD> spirit

as an aside, does anyone notice the similarity between the future tense conjugation of 'to become' (s<ay>lu) and the word for 'the bond' - 'tsaheylu'?  Quite interesting, or perhaps just a conincidence.

Will

[wm.annis]

Note that slu doesn't have an infix! Where is saleu from?

perhaps the script is intentionally made easier to pronounce for the actors, and saleu is actually s<ay>l<ei>u so that would be 'will become<LAUD>'

There are more difficult words in these examples that don't get this treatment.  For now I'm content to consider this new vocab (or old vocab with new affixing).