Muipidan Semantics and Pragmatics

Common Phrases

  • Kaga ü-k’esas, literally “may you feel safe”, is used to welcome a newcomer to a place. Formally, the verb kas should conjugate to match the number of people being welcomed — kakmoda for two people, kak’ota for a small group, etc. Informally, the verb ending is usually lost entirely and the expression contracts to kak’esas.

  • Hmeta muytïdo, literally “fortuitous day”, is a standard formal greeting; in informal situations people will just say muyte (“fortuitous one”).

  • Emükende imis ü-tiga, literally “may the sun god bless”, is used to wish someone good luck or as a farewell; in informal situations it contracts to engendistiga.

Semantic Fields

Colours

Muipidan has these six basic colour words:

Black

ugutïdo

White

patado

Red

sunïtïdo

Yellow

maytado

Green

flok'ïdo

Blue

hmetade

Numbers

Muipidan uses a hybrid base system built out of fives, twenties, and sixties, which is reflected in the writing system. Counting begins with ke=1, to=2, phi=3, nao=4, kim=5.

Numbers six to nine are compounds of kim, but they use different roots for the other component: tikim=6, mukïm=7, kosïgïm=8, naygem=9. Ten and fifteen are old dual and trial forms, kimme and kingüs, and these are compounded in the same way as kim to give the numbers from eleven (tikimme) to fourteen (naygemme) and from sixteen (tikingüs) to nineteen (naygengüs). Note how the words for multiples of five display vowel harmony (with nay- triggering E vowels rather than the expected O vowels), and they switch the initial /k/ to a /g/ when combined with kosï- and nay-.

Twenty is sey, and forty is again an old dual form seme. In numbers between twenty and forty and between forty and sixty, the word representing the fives and ones goes after the word for the twenties, and is not affected by vowel harmony: sey-kingüs “thirty-five”, seme-mukïm “forty-seven”, etc.

These are all the numbers from one to fifty-nine:

0

10

20

30

40

50

0

kimme

sey

sey-kimme

seme

seme-kimme

1

ke

tikimme

sey-ke

sey-tikimme

seme-ke

seme-tikimme

2

to

mukïmmo

sey-to

sey-mukïmmo

seme-to

seme-mukïmmo

3

phi

kosïgïmmo

sey-phi

sey-kosïgïmmo

seme-phi

seme-kosïgïmmo

4

nao

naygemme

sey-nao

sey-naygemme

seme-nao

seme-naygemme

5

kim

kingüs

sey-kim

sey-kingüs

seme-kim

seme-kingüs

6

tikim

tikingüs

sey-tikim

sey-tikingüs

seme-tikim

seme-tikingüs

7

mukïm

mukïngus

sey-mukïm

sey-mukïngus

seme-mukïm

seme-mukïngus

8

kosïgïm

kosïgïngos

sey-kosïgïm

sey-kosïgïngos

seme-kosïgïm

seme-kosïgïngos

9

naygem

naygengüs

sey-naygem

sey-naygengüs

seme-naygem

seme-naygengüs

Sixty is ndak’o, a kup’o-class noun. Multiples of sixty are formed by counting sixties in the same way that one counts objects: ndak’o to is 120, ndak’o mukïm is 420 (seven sixties), ndak’o seme-naygem is 2940 (forty-nine sixties). A ones digit prefixed with the instrumental marker i- can be added after the sixties: ndak’o i-kim is 65, ndak’o phi ï-naygemme is 194 (three sixties and fourteen).

To count a noun using a multiple of sixty, put the noun in the genitive case after the numeral: ndak’o nï-fu “sixty dogs”, ndak’o phi ny-oda “a hundred and eighty people”. But if a ones digit appears, put the ones digit in the normal numeral position after the noun (which forces the class suffix to appear) and put the noun in the instrumental case: ndak’o ï-fumuy tikim “sixty-six dogs”, ndak’o phi y-odakïn sey-to “two hundred and two people”. Though the resulting phrase has the singular noun ndak’o at its head, it’s treated as (greater) plural for agreement.

Muipidan has dedicated words for two higher powers of sixty:

  • 3,600 (\(60^2\)) is thoyk’o

  • 216,000 (\(60^3\)) is slak’o, literally “hill, mountain”

These work grammatically the same way as ndak’o does: thoyk’o ï-to is 3,602, thoyk’o ny-oda is “3,600 people”, etc. To combine powers of sixty, put them in order from largest to smallest, and put all but the first in the instrumental case. For example, to say “271,828 people”, you would say slak’o ï-thoyk’o kingüs ï-ndak’o sey-kimme y-oda sey-kosïgïm (\(216,000 + 15 \times 3,600 + 30 \times 60 + 28)\).

A word for a group of a given size can be created by treating the numeral as a kup’o-class noun, like ndak’o “sixty”: phik’e “trio”, mukïmk’o “group of seven”, etc. Also like “sixty”, the members of the group can be added in the genitive case: phik’e nï-fu “a group of three dogs”, mukïmk’o ny-oda “a group of seven people”. But unlike “sixty”, the resulting phrase is grammatically singular and takes singular agreement.