Lesson #2: Adjectives and Adverbs
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How adjectives and adverbs work in Iteloge Nowernve
This public article was written by [Deactivated User], and last updated on 8 May 2020, 22:21.
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2. Lesson #1: Nouns
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Agreement
The Modern Tongue, as an artificial language, has a very rigid system. It works through the adjectivisation and adverbisation of base common nouns, and adjectives employ gender and number agreement.
Taking the "e mbade" (/e b̃ade/; "an evil/something bad") as an example, it follows this pattern:
| Number | Base Common Noun | Neutral Adjective | Masculine Adjective | Feminine Adjective | Adverb |
| Singular | (e) mbade | mbadve | mbadvo | mbadva | mbadi |
| Plural | (es) mbades | mbadves | mbadvos | mbadvas |
Classes
Adjectives have the following classes:
- Descriptive: they describe a noun. Examples: mbadve ("evil"/"bad"), xardrve ("armonious"), malferve ("sick"). Most of these can be nominalised in different ways; besides the ones mentioned in the first lesson, adjectives such as "weökve" ("old") can be nominalised as "weöketce" ("old person"), though in Korzja, it's not unusual to use "weöke" as well
- Ordinal: they indicate a position. Examples: utlve ("last"), ngughve ("ninth"), onghve ("first"). Note: numbers are considered interjections when counting, pronouns when subjects, and articles when indicating quantity
- Possessive: indicate possession, ownership, or strong relation. Examples: döarfve ("dwarven"), umanve ("human"), desmve ("mine"). Note: possessives such as the equvalent of "your" or "my" are considered articles rather than adjectives
- Demonym: they indicate origin. Examples: yrhogzulerve ("Rhoxuler") or çìlwazve ("Cylvan"). Note: when preceded by an article, demonyms lack the "-v-" and are instead considered nouns.
Adverbs have the following classes:
- Manner: they describe the manner or intensity of an action (verb), characteristic (adjective), or another modifier (adverb). Examples: mbadi ("badly"), milli ("very"), hlegri ("happily")
- Ordinal: they indicate the order of a position. Examples: utli ("lastly"), troyghi ("thirdly"), onghi ("firstly").
- Time: they indicate when an action takes place. Examples: dèmnjeri ("tomorrow"), stediyi ("today"), stetixmi ("now"). Note: most of these are nominalised if they are the subject or object of a sentence; the names of ages, seasons, months, weeks and days of the week are considered nouns, and therefore never end in "-i"
- Frequency: they indicate how often an action takes place. Examples: diyi ("daily"), nejtixmi ("never"), psefti ("often").
- Place: they indicate the place an action is occuring in. Examples: sti ("here"), nejspi ("nowhere") sli ("there")
Order
Most classes of adjectives may only be placed after the noun. However, descriptive adjectives tend to be placed after the noun for literal meaning and before the noun for a more poetic meaning. Thus "amife wëokve" connotes a friend that is old in age, whereas "wëokve amife" connotes a long-time friend. Multiple adjectives can have any order when modifying the same noun, provided that they are still placed after the article when applicable. Adjectives can also replace the object complement in a sentence, acting as an adjective phrase; for example, "de tamande sel eönikve" means "the anteater is unique", and the order can also be reversed to achieve a more poetic effect: "eönikve sel de tamande".
Adverbs tend to work similarly: "mbadi hur" ("to badly wound") is more poetic than "hur mbadi" ("to wound badly"); the former can connote evil intent or severity of the wound, while the second implies that the attack was not well done. Thus changing the order of manner adverbs can imply an almost antonymous sentiment. Manner adverbs can also be stacked in any order as long as they are adjacent to the modified word or another manner adverb modifying the same word. Adverb phrases also can occur with sentences such as "hebém sle nklöeki" ("I did it quickly"), but reversing the order here is not possible. Time adverbs are usually placed in a separate clause at the beginning of the sentence to indicate certainty, as is the case of "dèmjere, woróm te" ("tomorrow, I'll see you"), as opposed to "woróm te dèmnjeri", which connotes intent. Frequency and place adverbs can be positioned in almost any part of the sentence, though final positions (or penultimate in case a time adverb is placed in the final position) are preferred for the latter. Ordinal adverbs are usually used as connectors, and along with some manner adverbs, such as "nuryali" ("generally"), are used in a separate clause to introduce the sentence.
Comparison
Adjectives and adverbs can both have intensifier, comparative, superlative and null forms indicated by additional adverbs and prefixes. Some are "true absolutes" and cannot be modified this way; such is the case of demonyms, and words such as "mefhve" ("dead"), "onghi" ("firstly"), or "mbargve" ("pregnant"), among others. Otherwise, they may be modified the following way:
| Adjective | English Equivalent | Adverb | English Equivalent | |
| Null | nej ksimblve | not simple | nej ksimbli | not simply |
| Negative Superlative | hlihti ksimblve | least simple | hlihti ksimbli | least simply |
| Negative Comparative | hli ksimblve | less simple | hli ksimbli | less simply |
| Insufficient | nej wahti ksimblve | not simple enough | nej wahti ksimbli | not simply enough |
| Mild Intensifier | e pekti ksimblve | slightly simple | e pekti ksimbli | a bit simply |
| Sufficient | wahti ksimblve | simple enough | wahti ksimbli | simply enough |
| Intensifier | milli ksimblve | very simple | milli ksimbli | very simply |
| Comparative | mbi ksimblve | more simple | mbi ksimbli | more simply |
| Superlative | mbihti ksimblve | most simple | mbihti ksimbli | most simply |
| Excessive | tri ksimblve | too simple | tri ksimbli | too simply |
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