Lessons
Descriptive words: Adverbs
Adverbs are the words that modify verbs (hence the name) and other descriptive words. Adverbs usually express location (place, space), time and frequency, manner. There are not many adverbs in Nûrlâm's dictionary:
New words
- gûth (almost, nearly) – manner
- mag (too [much]) – manner
- sha (together) – manner
- sharz (very) – manner
- tîr (straight) – direction
Making adverbs from adjectives
Very few adverbs have the same form as adjectives (or other word classes):
New words
- lad (late) < adj. “late” – time
- raih (seldom, rarely) < adj. “rare” – time, frequency
- thil (often, frequently) < adj. “frequent” – time, frequency
- tug (only, just) < adj. “single, only” – frequency, manner
- zârsh (today) < noun – time
In majority of cases you need to add suffix -arz after the adjective (or sometimes other part of speech) to convert it to adverb. If the adjective already has suffix -ûrz, it should be replaced with -arz.
New words
- aktûrz (precise) ⇒ aktarz (precisely) – manner
- durt (sure) ⇒ durtarz (surely, of course) – manner
- hîs (fast, quick) ⇒ hîsarz (quickly, fast) – manner
- kîb (to live) ⇒ kîbarz (alive) – manner
- kog (true, real) ⇒ kogarz (truly, really, actually, indeed) – manner
Word order
The following rules are applied to position of adverbs in sentence:
- if adverb modifies the verb, it should be placed after the verb and it's object: the fire quickly burns the forest ⇒ ghâshum ghâshâ taum hîsarz;
- if adverb modifies the adjective that precedes the noun, then adverb is placed before the adjective: very old dirt ⇒ sharz kû dug;
- if adverb modifies the adjective that is placed after the noun, then adverb is placed after the adjective: really hot water ⇒ nîn gashûrz kogarz;
- if adjective has a modifying adverb, it cannot join the noun as a clitic: almost black blood ⇒ ghor mor gûth / gûth mor ghor (not “ghormor gûth”);
Word order of adverbs will be discussed again in the future lessons, when you'll learn how to make more complex sentences.
Exercise 1
Translate from English into Nûrlâm:
- bring the slaves alive
- come together
- demons rarely fly
- elves eat only fruits and bread
- the man comes precisely
- the slayer often kills
- too hot dragon
- these eyes see a very scary orc
- warriors are resting today
- wraiths surely rule this tower
Exercise 2
Translate from Nûrlâm:
- ash olog tûrz sharz
- gazatum lorâ zârsh
- golug throkhû âps raih
- gûth udug mink mauh
- kogarz bhog saub
- tark gimbû hlum hîsarz
- ukh tîr
- urukum maukû sha
- za shra skâtâ mag lad
- za snaga kâtâ mag
Exercise 3
Make new adverbs from adjectives you've learnt before:
- bad (fik) ⇒ badly
- good (bhog) ⇒ well
- heavy (bûrd) ⇒ heavily
- long (rodh) ⇒ [for a] long
- strong (bolg) ⇒ strongly
See also
Contents
Lessons
Here is the list of lessons for studying the conlang called Nûrlâm, yet another fan dialect of Tolkien's Black Speech.
- Overview of Nûrlâm dialect
- The very basics:
- Deeper knowledge:
- Cases: essive
- Pro-forms: demonstrative
- Existential sentences
- Cases: allative and elative
- Cases: adessive and inessive
- Cases: ablative and elative
- Directions
- Cases: instrumental and comitative
- Participles
- Predicatives
- Compound verbs and infinitives
- Pro-forms: relative. Complex sentences
- Cases: intrative
- Advanced:
- Pro-forms: indefinite
- Pronouns: reflexive and reciprocal.
- Pronouns: declension in cases.
- Compound sentences. Conjunctions.
- Verbs: passive
- Gerundive
- Possession and ownership
- Impersonal sentences
- Abundance and absence
- Verbs: subjunctive mood
- Verbs: grammatical voices beyond passive
- Direct and indirect speech
- Mastering the language:
- Making new words: derivational suffixes
- Verbs: phrasal verbs, prefixes
- Affix order: nouns
- Affix order: verbs