THE MEMORY OF THE CITY
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alúé (ighikhete), v. To omit words because they are obvious in context; linguistic ellipsis. (Literally, to make thoughts jump.) This style was almost unknown in Ksreskézaian literature as it was considered very rural, and early formal writers in Lilitika took great pains to spell out full sentences, often producing very circuitous results. After the Venrafíai period, such abbreviations became much more common. Sa rau amis, khé ra sau: "I love you, and you [love] me."

The following forms of omission are common in Lilitika:

1. Answer ellipsis. The placeholder words dzu, dzuvé, and their inflected or modified derivatives are understood as blanks to be filled in, and a question containing them can be handled with unadorned (but usually inflected) responses, rather than filling in the whole sentence:

Q. Dzú dzé dzuvatiris dí? (Who was doing what to whom?)
A. Sa, elí stet, illúbatiris. (I, those people, was teaching.)

2. Verb dropping. Either in whole or in part, a missing verb or verb clause can be pulled forward from a previous, related sentence.

Ra lau amis; sa lau híéú. (You love her; I her too.)

Dangling adverbs in subsequent clauses are assigned to the verb naturally:

Sa walaz ogiris, ra kewalaz. (I came fast, you slow.)

Usually these are placed at the end for clarity.

3. Noun dropping. As verb dropping:

Sa raní olret setiris, khé ra setiris saní. (I ate your food, and you ate mine.)

Note the relocation of the nounless adjective for clarity.

4. Combination dropping. This works most easily with transitive verbs:

Ra lau amis; sa híéú. (You love her; I too.)

See inflection scheme: iomanazinení noun
See inflection scheme: sarasí noun
See inflection scheme: zeyetaní noun
See inflection scheme: íomanazinení verb

tags: verb, linguistics, rhetoric, idiom, phrase
reverse terms: ellipsis