Re: ago

[ucleaar <ucleaar@ucl.ac.uk>]

Jorge:
> > >         ko'a jbena pu le nunjamna za lei ci nanca
> > >         He was born past of the war, magnitude (medium) three years.
> > >         He was born three years before the war.
> > What is the rule whereby the za is understood as the displacement
> > of the pu?
> That is how tenses pile up. {ko'a puza jbena} means "he was born in the
> past (of now), magnitude of offset: a medium time. I propose that the
> sumti complement specifies better each component, the origin for pu
> and the more specific magnitude for za.

That all seems well and good. I merely wonder whether there is a rule
that says the ZI specifies the displacement of the most recent PU.
Is it always unambiguous which PU any ZI specifies the displacement of?

> I wonder whether it might be possible to give {pu} and its ilk an
> extra argument, for the displacement: x1 is before x2 in magnitude
> x3. I suspect that that might impose too great a change upon the
> syntax.
> And is not really needed, because that is exactly the function of the
> ZIs: to give the magnitude of the displacement.

I mentioned it only because the ZI (as you propose it) seems to specify
an argument of the PU.

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And