Obrenje

by Christian Thalmann

Source

The story of word of sign the monastery

This was story about thief and priest.  In time of far past, there_was thief that he had ??? near the monastery.  Wanted some things rich from the guardian monastery.  In a_certain day, there_was priest in standing outside, and she said "He perhaps wanted this" because not there_was at any place else.  He replied, "No, I to_want word of sign."  The priest gave_out anger to him.  He ran and hid far from her.

The Text

Dobie vin Dirdemaj ur Arimaja

Mo ti u dobi vin cerin a arimajel.  Dzha dranje, jur cere i dasarimaja.  Sonjaw i alme pri valaje arimajae.  Ce miza, tcuq jos arimaje, a je zynu, "Cambra kwure i ti", toj tafiru jece kawre. Kcimu ceree, "Tash; kwonza i dirdejo."  Je dirdoj arimaje u pwaj a makra.  Lom cossu ceree, a us pri je ne cunu.

English version

The Story of the Monastery Oracle

This is a story about a thief and a priestess.  Long time ago, there was a thief who had traveled near a monastery.  He coveted some valuable things from the monastery's guardian.  One day, the priestess was standing outside, and she said [to him] "Perhaps you wanted this", because there was nobody/nothing else around.  He replied, "No, I want a prophecy."  The priestess predicted anger [and pain] to him.  [Scared], he ran away and hid far from her.

Notes

I took quite a few liberties in the translation, due to the fact that the vocab list was not complete, some verb forms in the source appeared wrongly chosen, and some crucial words seemed to be missing from the text (e.g. the thing that "wasn't there anywhere else").  Also, "prophecy" is a wild guess at the meaning of "word of sign".  =P

Unfortunately, it still doesn't make much sense as a story.  =((

Vocab

|a| conj. "and"
|alme| n. "worth, valuable, worthy"
|arimaja| n. "monastery"
|cambra| adv. "maybe, perhaps"
|ce| pron. "one, a"
|cere| n. "thief"
|cosse-| v. "flee from +, run away, escape"
|cyn-| v. "hide + in *"
|das| prep. "near, around"
|dirdej-| v. "prophecise, predict, foretell * to +"
|dirdejo| n. "prophecy, forecast"
|dirdemaj| n. "prophet, oracle, seer"
|dobi| n. "story, tale"
|dranje| n. "long (time)"
|dzha| prep. "before"
|-el| suff. (female ending)
|firo-| v. "there be, exist, be around"
|i| prep. (objective case)
|-in| suff. (male ending)
|je| pron. (3rd person animate, objective case)
|jece| pron. "any"
|jor-| v. "to wander, migrate, travel [to +, in/by *]"
|jos| adv. "outdoors, outside a house, in the wild"
|kawre| n. "other"
|kcima-| v. "to reply, respond, answer * to +"
|kwo-| v. "to want +"
|lom| adv. "then, after that, consequently"
|makra| n. "anger, ire"
|miza| n. "day; daytime"
|mo-| v.irr. "to be * (to +)"
|ne| pron. (reflexive, objective case)
|pri| prep. "from"
|pwaj| n. "pain"
|sonja-| v. "to desire, crave +"
|ta-| pref. (negation)
|tash| interj. "no"
|tco-| v. "to stand" (CAUTION: uses consonantic conjugation endings!)
|ti| pron. "this"
|toj| conj. "because, for, since"
|u| prep. (predicative case)
|ur| prep. "of" (descriptive or associative rather than possessive)
|us| adv. "far, far away"
|valaj| n. "guardian, protector, overseer, keeper"
|vin| prep. "about, compared with, concerning, with respect to"
|zin-| v. "to speak to +, talk to + [about *], say * [to +]"

Note:  In verb glosses "+" represents an object in the objective
case, while "*" stands for a predicative case object.

Grammar

This is a really skeletal compactification of Obrenje grammar...  if you have the time and leisure, check out the grammar webpage at  http://www.cinga.ch/langmaking/obrenje_index.htm

- The most basic word order is VSO(O).  The verb usually comes first, then the subject, then the object(s).

- The subject is unmarked, while the objects are tagged with prepositions.  Even the grammatical object cases of Obrenje (predicative, objective) are marked with prepositions: |i| for
objective and |u| for predicative.  Only personal pronouns can carry case without these prepositions.

- Sometimes an object is placed *before* the verb in the sentence: OVS(O).  In this situation, an unmarked object (no preposition) is taken to be in the predicative case.  In other words, if you place the predicative object before the verb, you can drop the preposition |u|.  Even though unmarked, it cannot be confounded with the subject, since that must always come after the verb.

- For the roles of the two unconventional cases "predicative" and "objective", please consult
http://www.cinga.ch/langmaking/obrenje_nouns.htm#2 .  It's explained in few words and some pictures.  =P

- For verb conjugations, check out the following page (especially the tables): http://www.cinga.ch/langmaking/obrenje_verbs.htm .
Don't despair, you'll only need a few of all those verb forms.  ;-)

- In case you wonder why there are always two 3rd person forms for verbs... 3e stands for "3rd person, explicit subject" and 3i for "3rd person, implicit subject".  You use the 3i form when the subject is not explicitly mentioned in this sentence, but appeared in an earlier sentence.  It replaces the 3rd person subject pronouns of English. Compare: |Jor cere| "a thief travels" versus |Jore| "He travels".

- Note that there are two conjugation tables, one for vocalic verbs (whose stems end in a vowel, e.g. |kcima-|) and one for consonantic verbs (e.g. |jor-|).  Also, a verb's last vowel will shift in the past and future tenses!  |Jor| means "travels", but |jur| is "traveled" and |jer| "will travel".

- For our purposes, the "solid" and "liquid" verb aspects correspond quite well to the English "simple" and "continuous" aspects.

- Nouns do not inflect for number (singular/plural), but they do inflect for definiteness...  for example, |cere| means "thief, thieves" while |ceree| means "the thief, the thieves".  The inflection rules are quite simple, but you don't even need to bother with all of them... all nouns used in this text build their definite forms by appending |-e|.