Balasian

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Verbs ​

Verbs are conjugated for tense, aspect, mood as well as the noun class of the subject of the clause.

There are three tenses: the past, present and future. There are five aspects: perfect, perfect continuous, perfective and imperfective, as well as the gnomic aspect. There are a few moods: indicative, subjunctive, conditional, imperative and interrogative.

Many of these tenses, aspects and moods can be combined. A few of these, however, cannot be combined and merely exist on their own (merely with noun class marking). These are the gnomic aspect as well as the imperative mood.

There are two voices: the active and the passive.

Conjugation Overview ​

First, we identify the appropriate tense marker.

  1. The present tense is unmarked
  2. The past tense is formed by reduplication of the initial syllable C₁(C₂)V as C₁V
    • If the initial syllable does not have a consonant, d is used as C₁
  3. The future tense is formed by the reduplication of the initial C₁(C₂)V as C₁VS₁ where S₁ is the softened variant of the consonant as appropriate
    • If the initial syllable does not have a consonant, d is used as C₁ and s is used as S₁

Next we identify the appropriate modal marker.

  1. The indicative mood is unmarked
  2. The subjunctive mood is formed by the infix '-sa-' inserted after the initial syllable's onset and nucleus
  3. The conditional mood is formed by the infix '-bu-' inserted after the initial syllable's onset and nucleus
  4. The imperative mood is formed by the reduplication of the verbal root's final vowel (shortened, if long) and coda
  5. The interrogative mood's formation is discussed in further detail below

Next, we identify the appropriate aspectual marker.

  1. The perfective aspect is unmarked
  2. The imperfective aspect uses a suffix of '-u'
  3. The perfect aspect has two forms. One form emphasizes the process of the action that was completed, whereas the other form emphasizes the final state after the action is completed.
    • The first form uses a suffix of '-d'
      • If the verbal stem ends in a consonant cluster, the suffix becomes '-ad'
    • The second form uses a suffix of '-š'
      • If the verbal stem ends in a consonant cluster, the suffix becomes '-aš'
    • This is inspired by Early Modern English's usage of the auxiliary verbs 'to have' and 'to be' in these two roles. For example, "I have come to visit you" vs. "I am come to visit you".
  4. The perfect continuous aspect uses a suffix of '-j'; if the verbal stem ends in a consonant cluster, the suffix becomes '-aj'.
    • In a sense, the perfect continuous aspect combines the perfect aspect with the imperfective aspect in meaning.
    • Compare "I have worked" with "I have been working"
  5. The gnomic aspect uses a suffix of '-u', placed after the noun class suffix

We then identify the appropriate noun class suffix.

  1. Noun Class I uses a suffix of '-ês' unless a suffix follows in which case it is '-êd'
  2. Noun Class II uses a suffix of '-ous' unless a suffix follows in which case it is '-oud'
  3. Noun Class III uses a suffix of '-aš'
  4. Noun Class IV uses a suffix of '-uw' unless a suffix follows in which case it is '-ul'

We finally select the appropriate the voice suffix.

  1. The active voice is unmarked.
  2. The passive voice uses a suffix of "-i"

Interrogative Mood Formation ​

The interrogative mood is formed by inverting the consonant and vowel of the noun class suffix.

For example: seinês "he went" > seindê "did he go?"; siseibunvês "if he were to have been going" (PST.COND.IMPF.CLS-I) > siseinudê "was he going?" (PST.IMPF.CLS-I.INT)

Participles ​

Balasian makes extensive use of participles - most adjectives are, in fact, merely verbal participles. As these forms are derived from verbal forms, they are inflected for tense, aspect, mood and voice.

Participles take the tense, aspect and modal markers of the verbal form that they are derived from. There are two participle suffixes, which derive the active and passive participles respectively. The active participle marker is '-nô' and the passive participle marker is '-ne'. The consonant 'n' of the suffix replaces the verb form's final consonant.

A few examples:

  • Present active perfective participle: sein 'to go' > seinênô, as in seinênô sêndu 'the man that goes'
  • Present active imperfective participle: sīn 'to go' > seinuvênô, as in seinuvênô sêndu 'the man that is going'
  • Past active perfective participle: sein 'to go' > siseinênô, as in siseinênô sêndu 'the man that went'
  • Past active imperfective participle: sein 'to go' > siseinuvênô, as in siseinuvênô sêndu 'the man that was going'
  • Present passive perfective participle: gus 'to see' > gusêne, as in gusêne sêndu 'the man that was seen'
  • Present passive imperfective participle: gus 'to see' > gusvêne, as in gusvêne sêndu 'the man that was being seen'

The active participle is used when the noun is the agent of the action in question. The passive participle is used when the noun is the patient of the action in question. We seen an example of this distinction between seinênô sêndu 'the man that goes', where the man is the agent of the action of going, and gusvêne sêndu 'the man that was being seen', where the man is the patient of the action.