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Topics - pyrehn

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Beginners / The use of "vos"
« on: February 22, 2014, 06:48:47 pm »
hi everyone,

New here and just learning dothraki and writing a paper for a morphology class!

I am curious about the use of "vo(s)" in sentences. I found the appearance of vos quite interesting!

I can see that in negative sentence "vos" is placed before the verb. But, because the verb is in negative form as well, is vos redundant? Can it be dropped? Can it appear after the verb (as vosecchi does)?

Vo(s) lekhos jin mawizze -> lekhos jin mawizze. To both mean "Do not eat the rabbit"?
Or is the meaning slightly different between the two version?

Does "vos" just perhaps act as a word that clarifies the negative in the sentence with regard to verbs? It just seems redundant, but I could be wrong.

But it seems different with Adjectives.... (from what I have read so far)
With something like
arakh osamvae "The sword is unbroken"
arakh vos samvao "The sword is not broken"

meaning "The sword is unbroken/not broken" could you even do:
arakh vos osamvae
would this mean
"the sword is unbroken" (just with with the double negative with verbs) OR the "sword is NOT unbroken?" (meaning that it is broken, perhaps with more emphasis?)

Also, can you use "vos" with nouns?

like in english you can say "I am a fighter" and "I am not a fighter"
Anha lajak -> I am a fighter
Anha vos lajak -> I am not a fighter
vos Anha lajak -> not I am a fighter (?)

Me oge oqet oskikh. He slaughtered a sheep yesterday.
Me oge vos oqet oskikh. He slaughtered not a sheep yesterday (meaning he slaughtered something, just not a sheep?)

Or would you get the same effect as with vosecchi where vos in that circumstance would still apply to the verb "He did not slaughter a sheep, yesterday"

Thank you so much!
Any commentary is appreciated! Or even direction to other threads about vos!

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