The grammar of Classical Nahuatl is agglutinative, head-marking, and makes extensive use of compounding, noun incorporation and derivation. That is, it can add many different prefixes and suffixes to a root until very long words are formed. Very long verbal forms or nouns created by incorporation, and accumulation of prefixes are common in literary works. New words can thus be easily created.
Contents
- Orthography used in this article
- Morphophonology
- Assimilation
- Morphology
- Nouns
- Possessedness
- Number
- Possessor prefixes
- Inalienable possession
- Derivational morphology
- The structure of verb forms
- Affixes for the arguments of the verb subject and object
- Temporal and aspectual affixes
- Applicative
- Causative
- Unspecified SubjectPassive
- Directional affixes
- Derivational
- Verbal compounds
- Relational Nouns and Locatives
- Noun Incorporation
- Syntax
- Non configurationality
- VSO basic word order
- Nouns as predicates
- Number system
- Compound numbers
- Classifiers
- Ordinal numbers
- References
Orthography used in this article
Vowel length was phonologically distinctive in this language. Long vowels are indicated with a macron above the vowel letter: <ā, ē, ī, ō>. Saltillo (glottal stop consonant, [ʔ]) is indicated with an h. The grammarian Horacio Carochi (1645) represented saltillo by marking diacritics on the preceding vowel: grave accent on nonfinal vowels <à, ì, è, ò> and circumflex on final vowels <â, î, ê, ô>. In the history of this language, both in its actual use and in the studies by all other colonial era grammarians other than Carochi, long vowels and the saltillo were rarely indicated. To give an adequate description of the classical Nahuatl language, it is, however, essential to mark them.
Morphophonology
The phonological shapes of Nahuatl morphemes may be altered in particular contexts, depending on the shape of the adjacent morphemes or their position in the word.
Assimilation
Where a morpheme ending in a consonant is followed by a morpheme beginning in a consonant, one of the two consonants often undergoes assimilation, adopting features of the other consonant.
Almost all doubled consonants in Nahuatl are produced by the assimilation of two different consonants from different morphemes. Doubled consonants within a single morpheme are rare, a notable example being the verb -itta "see".
Morphology
The words of Nahuatl can be divided into three basic functional classes: verbs, nouns and particles. Adjectives exist, but they generally behave like nouns and there are very few adjectives that are not derived from either verbal or nominal roots. The few adverbs that can be said to exist fall into the class of particles.
Nouns
The noun is inflected for two basic contrasting categories:
Nouns belong to one of two classes: animates or inanimates. Originally the grammatical distinction between these were that inanimate nouns had no plural forms, but in most modern dialects both animate and inanimate nouns are pluralizable.
Nominal morphology is mostly suffixing. Some irregular formations exist.
Possessedness
Non-possessed nouns take a suffix called the absolutive. This suffix takes the form -tl after vowels (ā-tl, "water") and -tli after consonants, which assimilates to a final /l/ (tōch-tli, "rabbit", but cal-li, "house"). Some nouns have an irregular form in -in (mich-in, fish). These suffixes are dropped in most derived forms: tōch-calli, "rabbit-hole", mich-matlatl, "fishing net". Possessed nouns do not take the absolutive suffix (see Noun inflection below).
Number
Only animate nouns can take a plural form. These include most animate living beings, but also words like tepētl ("mountain"), citlālin ("star") and some other phenomena.
The plural is not totally stable and in many cases several different forms are attested.
Possessor prefixes
Example: nocal, 'my house'
Some other categories can be inflected on the noun such as:
Honorific formed with the suffix -tzin. cihuā-tl "woman" + tzin+ tli absolutive = cihuātzintli "woman (said with respect)"Inalienable possession
The suffix -yo — the same suffix as the abstract/collective -yō(tl) — may be added to a possessed noun to indicate that it is a part of its possessor, rather than just being owned by it. For example, both nonac and nonacayo (possessed forms of nacatl) mean "my meat", but nonac may refer to meat that one has to eat, while nonacayo refers to the flesh that makes up one's body. This is known as inalienable, integral or organic possession.
Derivational morphology
The structure of verb forms
The verb is marked with prefixes in order to agree with the person and number of the subject and the object of the sentence; additionally, verbs inflect for tense and aspect. Here are three sentence types, each containing a single word: a nominal predicate, an intransitive sentence, and a transitive sentence.
Caution: ti- means 'you (singular)' but ti-____-h means 'we'.
From these examples, it can be seen that the arrangement of a verb stem and its argument affixes is as follows:
SUBJECT PREFIX + OBJECT PREFIX + VERB STEM + 'h' (example: 'ti-quim-itta-h', we - them - see - we, i.e., 'we see them')
Affixes for the arguments of the verb (subject and object)
In the table below, Ø indicates there is no marker in the given position.
Temporal and aspectual affixes
Applicative
The applicative construction adds an argument to the verb. The role of the added argument can be benefactive, malefactive, indirect object or similar. It is formed by the suffix -lia.
Causative
The causative construction also adds an argument to the verb. This argument is an agent causing the object to undertake the action of the verb. It is formed by the suffix -tia.
Unspecified Subject/Passive
The construction called "passive" by some grammarians and "unspecified subject construction" by others removes the subject from the valency of the verb, substituting it with a null reference, and promoting the argument marked by object prefixes to subject. The passive or unspecified subject construction uses one of two suffixes: -lo or -hua.
Directional affixes
Deixis:
Introvert: Imperfective: -qui "comes towards the speaker in order to X" qui + itta "to see" + qui ="quittaqui "he/she/it will come here to see it" Perfective: -co "has come towards the speaker in order to X" qui + itta "to see" + co =quittaco "he/she/it has come here to see it"
Extrovert: Imperfective: -tīuh "goes away from the speaker in order to X" qui + itta "to see" + tīuh ="quittatīuh "he/she/it will go there to see it" Perfective: -to " has gone away from the speaker in order to X" qui + itta "to see" + to =quittato "he/she/it has gone there to see it"
Derivational
A number of different suffixes exist to derive nouns from verbs:
tla "something" + ixca "roast" + l + tli = tlaxcalli "something roasted/ a tortilla"
tla + ihcuiloa "write/draw" + l - tli = tlahcuilolli "scripture/ a drawing"
miqui "to die" + liztli = miquiliztli "death"
tlahcuiloa "to write something" + liztli = tlahcuiloliztli "the concept of writing or being a scribe"
ichtequi "to steal" + qui = ichtecqui "a thief"
tlahuāna "to become drunk" + qui = tlahuānqui "a drunkard"
miqui "to die" +ni = miquīni "a mortal"
cuacua "to bite" + ni = cuacuāni "someone that is known to be capable of or to habitually bite"
tla- "something" + ihtoā "to speak" + ni = tlahtoāni "one that says things; a speaker"
Verbal compounds
Two verbs can be compounded with the ligature morpheme -ti-.
Relational Nouns and Locatives
Spatial and other relations are expressed with relational nouns. Some locative suffixes also exist.
Noun Incorporation
Noun incorporation is productive in Classical Nahuatl and different kinds of material can be incorporated.
Syntax
The particle in is important in Nahuatl syntax and is used as a kind of definite article and also as a subordinating particle and a deictic particle, in addition to having other functions.
Non-configurationality
Classical Nahuatl can be classified as a non-configurational language, allowing many different kinds of word orders, even splitting noun phrases.
VSO basic word order
The basic word order of Classical Nahuatl is verb initial and often considered to be VSO, but some scholars have argued for it being VOS. However, the language being non-configurational, all word orders are allowed and are used to express different kinds of pragmatic relations, such as thematization and focus.
Nouns as predicates
An important feature of Classical Nahuatl is that any noun can function as a standalone predicate. For example, calli is commonly translated "house" but could also be translated "(it) is a house".
As predicates, nouns can take the verbal subject prefixes (but not tense inflection). Thus, nitēuctli means "I am a lord" with the regular first person singular subject ni- attached to the noun tēuctli "lord". Similarly tinocihuāuh means "you are my wife", with the possessive noun nocihuāuh "my wife" attached to the subject prefix ti- "you" (singular). This construction is also seen in the name Tītlācahuān meaning "we are his slaves", a name for the god Tezcatlipoca.
Number system
Classical Nahuatl has a vigesimal or base 20 number system. In the pre-Columbian Nahuatl script, the numbers 20, 400 (20²) and 8,000 (20³) were represented by a flag, a feather, and a bag, respectively.
It also makes use of numeral classifiers, similar to languages such as Chinese and Japanese.
Compound numbers
Multiples of 20, 400 or 8,000 are formed by replacing cēm- or cēn- with another number. E.g. ōmpōhualli "40" (2×20), mahtlāctzontli "4,000" (10×400), nāuhxiquipilli "32,000" (4×8,000).
The numbers in between those above—11 to 14, 16 to 19, 21 to 39, and so forth—are formed by following the larger number with a smaller number which is to be added to the larger one. The smaller number is prefixed with om- or on-, or in the case of larger units, preceded by īpan "on it" or īhuān "with it". E.g. mahtlāctli oncē "11" (10+1), caxtōlonēyi "18" (15+3), cēmpōhualmahtlāctli omōme "32" (20+10+2); cēntzontli caxtōlpōhualpan nāuhpōhualomōme "782" (1×400+15×20+4×20+2).
Classifiers
Depending on the objects being counted, Nahuatl may use a classifier or counter word. These include:
Which classifier a particular object takes is loose and somewhat arbitrary.
Ordinal numbers
Ordinal numbers (first, second, third, etc.) are formed by preceding the number with ic or inic.