The «iv» Infix

Kaltxì! And welcome to Lesson 8.

This time we talk about «iv», a bit that goes inside a verb, like «am» and «ìm» do, if you remember those from a previous lesson.

Topics

«iv»: When It's Required

Word Order

«iv»: General Use

Vocabulary Used

«iv»: When It's Required

Getting right to the point, here are some examples of when you know you use iv.

Na'vi English
Oe tsun kivä. I can go.
Nga zene yivom. You must eat.
Nga ke zene ziva'u. You don't need/have to come.
Nga zenke tiverkup! You mustn't die!
Po fmi tspivang ngat. He tries to kill you
Oe kan tspivang pot. I mean/intend/aim to kill him
Fo new rivey. They want to live.
Oe nulnew tìkangkem sivi nì'awtu. I prefer to work alone.
Oe mamay' mivakto pa'liti; ke sunu oeru tsakem. I tried out pa'li riding; I don't like it.
Ftang tìsraw seykivi pot! Stop hurting her!
Ayoeng sngä'i txivula ko. Let's start buliding.
Var tivìran vaykrr ngal tse'a kilvanit. Keep/continue to walk until you see a river.
Sto po hivum fohu. She refuses to leave with them.

Each of these sentences has two verbs. The first one causes the second one to have iv inside. The verbs which cause iv to be used are all marked as vtrm. or vim. in the dictionary.

Side Note: Any vtrm. can be used just like a regular vtr. without a second verb. See Lesson One about using vtr. words.

Anyway, here they are listed out:

vim.

Na'vi English
ftang stop
sngä'i begin, start
tsun can, be able
zene must
zenke must not
var to persist in a state, to continue to perform an action
leym call, cry out, exclaim

vtrm.

Na'vi English
fmi try, attempt
kan aim, to intend; aim, to direct a weapon or other object at a target
new want
nulnew prefer
sto refuse (to do something)
may' taste, try, sample, evaluate, check out, testdrive

Also, iv will be used inside the action that comes after either of these two words:

Na'vi English
fte so that; in order to
fteke so that not; lest

Examples:

Nga zene kivar poru fte tsivun pivlltxe sì tivìran nìayoeng.
You must teach him so that ((he)) can speak and walk like us.

Here we see that we can use fte or fteke along with one or more of the vtrm. or vim. words and cause iv after iv to be used. That is to say, fte causes tsun to become tsivun, and tsun (now tsivun) causes plltxe to become pivlltxe and tìran to become tivìran.

Txewì tskxekeng si fte yivora' säwäsulit
Txewì trains/practices in order to win the competition

Word Order

Rule: when using a word from these lists, it must come somehow before the other action in the sentence. See above examples.

Nìvingkap (By the way, it just occured to me), those examples have English word order just for ease of understanding. Flexible order still applies, but follow the above rule.

To consider all possible word orders, let's use this example from above:

Po fmi tspivang ngat.
He tries to kill you.

Here are all valid forms of this sentence:

  1. Po fmi tspivang ngat.
  2. Po fmi ngati tspivang.
  3. Po ngati fmi tspivang.
  4. Pol ngati fmi tspivang.
  5. Ngati Po fmi tspivang.
  6. Ngati Pol fmi tspivang.
  7. Ngati fmi tspivang po.
  8. Fmi tspivang ngati po.
  9. Fmi tspivang po ngat.
  10. Fmi po tspivang ngat.

(4 and 6 are special forms, 6 is 50% acceptable):

An interesting thing to note here: Even though there is a word with the -ti ending in every one of these, there is not any word with an -l ending (except in the special forms 4 and 6). Forms 4 and 6 only feature the -l ending because it naturally follows the same format as a sentence like oel ngati kameie. In general, here is the process for creating this type of sentence:

  1. Start with any noun or pronoun proper noun (n. or pn. or prop.n.) from the dictionary to be the doer of the action.

Let's say in this example, po.

  1. Next, add a vtrm. or vim. verb from the dictionary.

Now, we have po fmi. (This is a valid form, but we wish to say more than S/he tries.)

  1. Now, somewhere after the verb from the previous step, add any other verb.

For example, tspang. Now we have: po fmi tspang, an improper form.

  1. Add «iv» inside the verb from step 3.

Now we have po fmi tspivang, which is valid, but very vague: S/he tries to kill.

  1. If there is nothing more to say in the sentence, then we're done. Otherwise, continue with the next step.

We wish to say more, and thus continue.

  1. If the verb from step 4 is vtr. (or even vtrm.), and there is noun receiving the action, add that noun and add the -ti ending to it.

We now have po fmi tspivang ngati. a complete ad valid sentence that means s/he tries to kill you.

The word order of this is free to be mixed in any of the 10 ways listed above.

«iv»: General Use

Okey so that was one major usage of «iv». The other usage is to turn hard facts into hopes/wishes. Some popular examples:

Eywa ngahu ((livu)).
((May)) Eywa ((be)) with you

Txon lefpom ((livu ngaru))
Peaceful night ((be to you))

Nawma Sa'nok lrrtok sivi.
May the Great Mother smile.

Notice the mood here. It's not hard fact, but more like wishing or expressing hope. That's what «iv» is all about when it's not required by grammar.

These first two have parts left out. It's like in English when you say "Good night", you are leaving off "May you have a" or "I hope that you have a"

Vocabulary Used

Na'vi English
oe pn. I, me
tsun vim. can, be able
vin. go
nga pn. you
zene vim. must
yom vtr. eat
ke adv. not
za'u vin. come
zenke vim. mustn't, must not
terkup vin. die
po pn. she, he
fmi vim. try, attempt
tspang vtr. kill
kan vtrm. aim, intend; aim [a weapon]
fo pn. they[many]
new vtrm. want
rey vin. live
nulnew vtrm. prefer
tìkangkem si vin. do work
nì'awtu adv. alone
may' vtrm. taste, try, sample, evaluate, check out, testdrive
makto vtr. ride
pa'li n. direhorse (a Pandoran animal)
sunu vin. be pleasing or likeable, bring enjoyment
tsakem pn. that (action)
ftang vim. stop
tìsraw seyki vtr. hurt (someone or something)
ayoeng pn. we [many, including you]
sgnä'i vim. begin, start
txula vtr. build, construct
ko part. (solicit agreement)
var vim. to persist in a state, to continue to perform an action
tìran vin. walk
vaykrr conj. until
tse'a vtr. see
kilvan n. river
hum vin. leave, depart
fte conj. so that, in order to
fteke conj. so that not, lest
kar vtr. teach
nìayoeng adv. like us, as we do
Txewì prop.n. (a Na'vi person's name)
tskxekeng si vin. exercise, train
yora' vtr. win
säwäsul n. a competition
nìvingkap adv. by the way, incidentally
Eywa prop.n. Who's Eywa? Only their deity! Their goddess, made up of all living things. Everything they know! You'd know this if you had any training whatsoever.
hu adp. with
lu svin. be, am, is, are
txon n. night
lefpom adj. happy, peaceful, joyous, pleasant (not for poeple)
nawm adj. great, noble
sa'nok n. mother
lrrtok si vin. smile
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