Predicative (?)e (was RE: Nominal Ablaut, ...)

[Koontz John E]

Long, but quite synchronic and more or less syntactic.  JEK

On Wed, 5 Sep 2001, Rankin, Robert L wrote:
> >and the glottalization because I'm mainly aware of it where e(e) follows
> another demonstrative and take it for a boundary phenomenon as Bob mentioned
> earlier.
>
> Two things: (1) this is a glottal that is retained even word-internally in
> Kaw, so I tend to think it is organic, and (2) the one I mentioned earlier
> was not the demonstrative but rather *he 'be' (probably locative, certainly
> so in Dhegiha) that shows up in Dakotan (if my memory of these discussions
> is right) as ?e.

...

> >And e=tta 'to it' or 'to the aforesaid' is also not a problem.  I think
> s^aNge e would be 'it is the horse that', but I'd have to look for examples
> to be fully confident of exact parallels in current OP.
>
> To me it might possibly mean 'that one is a horse', but again here, both
> would be heads.  E would be a predicate. Intonation and accent in such cases
> tends to preclude enclisis.

I thought it might be interesting to track down cases of -e (or ?e) with a
sort of predicative sense.  I've stayed with OP, though I think Dakotan
and Winnebago have similar things.

In OP there is a final e that attaches to demonstratives and verbs.
There is never any glottal stop with this in OP that I can see, though
there is plainly a rearticulated vowel.  I've never heard this
construction in a live elicitation, but I've had very little live exposure
to OP, to be honest.  I have heard glottal stops live, of course, but
clear glottal stops in OP seem to be from *k? and *x? reduced to ?.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure these are the ?e that Bob speaks of, and that they
all match (all the clause final and post-demonstrative e's in Mississippi
Valley Siouan), rather than some (Dakotan cases?) coming (only) from
Dhegiha he.  Undeniably Dh verbal he should match a Dakotan verbal e, and
undeniably Dh verbal he has matches in Winnebago, so maybe some Dakotan
(?)e's come from *he.

Returnign now to OP, it's pretty clear what the (?)e is doing with
demonstratives, even when there's a noun preceding the demonstrative, or
anarticle following.  (Note that these e-forms seems to be almost always
followed by a declarative.)

90:126.14   dhe'e he 'this is he (w spkg)'
90:136.16   dhe'e ha 'this is he (m spkg)'
90:17.1     s^e'e ha 'that is it (m spkg)'
90:419.9    dhe'=dhaNkh=e'e ha 'they are the ones'
90:246.19   he'ga=am=e'e ha 'it is the Buzzard'
90:143.14   wiga'xdhaN ga'=akh=e 'my wife, that one lying, is she'
90:153.17   ga'=thaN e'e ha 'that one is she'
90:17.1     s^aN'de=dhaN s^e'e ha 'that is the (his) scrotum'

As soon as the e gets attached to a verb, it gets a lot less clear to me
what is going on.

90:17.6     a'=gu=di=the=di t?e'=dha=i=the  ttaN'be=t[t?]=egaN
            where-   the-at they killed him I will see it HAVING
            ua'ne  bdhe'e he
            I seek I go E DECL

            I go seeking in order to see the place where they killed him

            (Maybe, '(Here) *I* am the one who is ...' with the understood
            sense that the looker (Rabbit's Grandmother) might have been
            saved a good deal of trouble if *only* the lookee (Rabbit) had
            heeded the *excellent* advice that she gave him and *avoided*
            those consarned blackbears in the first place ... JEK)

In the next the e'e is merged with the front of the ede (e=de?) that
Dorsey translates "but."  I tend to wonder if this ede (or the de, anyway)
might be something like the Dakotan c^ha particle used with indefinite
relatives, but I haven't really looked at this.  Dorsey renders the form
"but" and cha is said to imply unexpectedness, but mainly =de seems to
occur at the end of clauses with obscure import (to me).  So, naturally I
think of =cha, which is also fairly obscure (to me).  And I haven't
actually noticed any indefinite relative clauses, either, otherwise.

Observationally, an ede can be pretty much substituted for e in many
grammatical particles, like egaN the general subordinator (conjunct?)
clause conjunction, which alternates with an infrequent edegaN.  Add an
e'e and you have the proverbial enigma wrapped in a riddle, etc.
(Conjunctions follow the clause, of course.)  I guess you could say that
ede can substitute for e, for that matter.

Have fun.  Except for clear 'DEM is' glosses the e doesn't seem to get
glossed by Dorsey and I've not tried to gloss it either except
parenthetically here and there.

90:23.5-6   e'=gaN=i    e'ede=gaN
            they are so E "but" HAVING
            Tta'xtigikkidabi=ama wi'aNnappa=i ha
            the Deertakers       we fear them DECL

            these things having "but" been so, we fear the
            Deertakers

90:133.19   dhiNge'e 'there is none'
            (Perhaps 'it is that it lacks' or 'it is a lack'?  JEK)

This next may perhaps not be the same thing?

90:154.5    sa'ttaN waaN=dha=ama  e'   we'sappe e=d=uathaN e'   ha
            five    they deserted that sixth    next to    that DECL

            he is the sixth by those who are the five who left

            (Uttered in specifying which of several calves is the son
            the speaker had just claimed to recognize.)

I'm not sure the first dhe in this next doesn't refer ahead to the last
one, rather than applying (directly) to tti.

90:194.17   dhe' tti'  witti'gaN udha'=      dhaN'=s^ti dhe'e  ha
            this house my gfa    he spoke of heretofore this E DECL

            this is the dwelling of which my grandfather always spoke

90:221.9-10 wi'gdhaN    dhaNz^a uaga's^aN    bdhe'e ha
            I marry you though  I travelling I go E DECL

            though I am marrying you, I go travelling

90:331.17   dhe'=dhu=thaN z^u=a'wagdhe=hnaN    agdhe'e he
            here     from I with them  usually I go E  DECL

            I went homeward thence usually with them

90:362.2    kki dhe' s^aaN' tti=ma'
            and this Sioux  the dwellers
            e=di=thaN wiN uga's^aN     dhe'=   the'e  ha
            thence    one he travelled he went EVID E DECL

            one (man, just mentioned as of a wandering disposition)
            went off travelling from this Dakota camp

            (Perhaps, "it was this one who went off from the Dakota camp"?
            That is, a focus, like English cleft.  JEK)

90:369.1    dhe'ghegakku uthiN'=bi=     am=         e'e    ha
            drum(s)      they struck it they CONTIN that E DECL

            it is they who are striking the drum(s)
            (Here I've just translated with a cleft.  This is a conclusion
            about some enemies previously seen by a war party.  JEK)

            Incidentally, one of Rory's bi's.

90:487.10-11
            AN'ska,   Frank wa?u' miN'=gdhaN     e'=de t?e'e ha,
            by the by F     woman he married her "but" she died E DECL
            nu'geadi
            last summer

            By the way, (the) woman whom Frank married died, last summer.

The preceding has an example of ablaut (actually, an intrusive a) before a
postposition =di.

The next is similar with t?e'e.

90:512.4    I'kkuhabi=s^ti t?e'e ha 'Ikkuhabi, too, is dead.'

90:567.4    A'wathe'e a?  'Where is it?'
            (perhaps "Ou est-ce que c'est?"  Just a'wa=the is 'where',
            or, apparently, an interrogative reading of 'some place or
            another', from a'wa 'indefinite alternative' + the 'the
            (upright)'. JEK)

90:591.1-2  Xdhabe' dhe'=the ma'ghe idha'bat?u=tte ehe'e    ha
            tree    this the sky    it will extend I said E DECL

            'Let that tree extend to the sky' I said
            (Perhaps "I am the one who said ..."  JEK)

This is definitely not all the examples of e'e in the texts, but it is
good starting sample, with many similar examples suppressed.

===

With the simplest as clearest examples like dhe'e "this is it" we can see
where this morpheme gets the predicative analysis.  But I think that with
a little examination of the context most of these simple cases can be read
as clefts ("it is this that is the one") or at least stress focusses
("*this* is the one").  And when the examples get more complex, that
approach seems to be the only one that works or makes any sense, as I hope
some of my parenthetical analyses will have helped suggest.  So, the e is
not really 'is' but just 'it/he/that' or 'the one that', with the
predicative 'be' being implied by the context.  And, if this e is really a
demonstrative, then why not regard it as an instance of the usual e
demonstrative?

While this approach does perhaps erode some of the foundations of Bob's
objections to my nominal ablaut analyis, I don't think it discommodes the
relevant ones to a point where agreeing with this would entail agreeing
with ablaut analysis.  I intend this only as an expose of one small factor
in my analysis of demonstratives and Siouan syntax that eventually led to
my being comfortable with my assessment of ablaut.  I suspect that in a
synchronic context this anlaysis is more interesting then the nominal
ablaut thing anyway.

JEK