Q on Molina entry

[Joost Kremers]

Hi John and others,

>        The root of this word is probably "aqui", "to enter", with a glottal
> stop reduplication, "ahaqui". This then goes to the combining form,
> which resembles the preterite, "ahac". Then the auxiliary verb "yauh"
> is added with the "-t(i)-" ligature, shortening from "-tiyauh" >
> "-ti(ya)uh" > "-tiuh". "ahactiuh", "he, she or it goes entering
> (trotting)". The preterite form would be "ahactiyah", with the full
> preterite form of the verb "to go", "-yah". The the antecessive "o-" is
> added.

Thanks for your explanation. As far as I can see, it makes a lot of
sense.

> It looks like a directional "-on-" is also added, but its short
> vowel is absorbed into the long vowel of the antecessive. Thus,
> "onahactiyah", "---went off trotting".

The n in the preterite form that Molina lists, onaactia, is not -on, but
ni-, I would say. Molina usually lists preterite forms in the 1st person
sg. (Except for impersonal verbs.)

> What's funny about this verb
> (unless I'm completely off on the preceding analysis) is that the
> entire form, including the auxiliary verb is transformed into the
> "-liztli" active action noun, "ahactiyaliztli", "the act of going
> entering (trotting)".

Well, since you find it funny I guess such a formation is rare, but I'm not
really surprised that the action noun contains the auxiliary. After all, in
the verbal forms, the verb plus its aux are conjugated as if they were a
single element. It's not surprising then to see that they are treated as a
single element in a regular derivation such as -liztli, as well.

>        By the way, does anybody have anything to say about the new edition
>        of Andrews's grammar? I thing I like the first edition better.

Mmm... I've read through the preface and lessons 1-10, and to be honest, I
do have some things to say. In my opinion, the desire to be linguistically
correct is being taken too far, and instead of clarifying things, which it
should do, it is obscuring things.

For example, I find the insistence on distinguishing between
morpheme/morph, phoneme/phone etc., quite confusing, even though it is
technically correct. I don't think it's really necessary to make this
distinction in a descriptive grammar. (BTW, I also think the book should
not have been called "An Introduction to Classical Nahuatl". "A Grammar of
Classical Nahuatl" would have been more appropriate.)

Similarly, the use of a variety of symbols to indicate morpheme boundaries,
depending on the type of boundary, is not very productive, in my
opinion. Again, it's technically correct, but it's also confusing in many
cases. When you want to see what a complete verb form looks like, they just
get in the way.

Don't get me wrong, I think is it good to make the distinction, and it
should be explained in a book such as this. I just think that it is not
necessary to do it for every single quoted form. The same goes for the
"diagrammatic format", I believe.

There are also one or two smaller points that I believe to be
incorrect. For example, I don't understand why Andrews introduces the terms
sigeme and sig. The element he refers to is just a silent morpheme. He
makes a comparison to the decimal number system, which has "nine digits and
only one zero", but this is technically incorrect. The decimal number
system has ten digits, one of which is zero. In the same way, the silent
morpheme should be taken as one of the morphemes, not as a separate class.

I also don't see the need to distinguish between a regular and an irregular
silent morph (the slashed zero and the box, respectively.) If you make that
distinction, you should similarly distinguish *any* irregular morph.

I also don't understand why in chapter 7 Andrews says that temo- is a
different stem shape than temo:-. As far as I know (but correct me if I'm
wrong) this distiction is determined phonologically: the stem shape is
temo:-, and under certain phonological conditions (i.e., when -h follows,
or when no suffix follows) the long vowel is shortened.

I hope I do not sound too critical of the work. I should say that the
criticism that I have is mainly about the presentation. The precise
grammatical analysis is something that I can only admire.

--
Joost Kremers
Life has its moments