Handbook of Bulu
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HANDBOOK OF BULU BY GEORGE L. BATES REVISED EDITION, WITH THE VOCABULARY REVISED AND MUCH ENLARGED BY THE AUTHOR AND SILAS F. JOHNSON, M. D. ELECTRONIC EDITION BY T. OYONO, M.D. PRINTED BY THE HALSEY MEMORIAL PRESS ELAT, CAMEROUN WEST AFRICA 1926 ELECTRONIC EDITION BY THEOPHILE OYONO MEYE BESANCON FRANCE 2016 THE HALSEY MEMORIAL PRESS ELAT, CAMEROUN WEST AFRICA CONTENTS AND SYNOPSIS OF GRAMMATICAL SKETCH GRAMMATICAL SKETCH: PAGE ORTHOGRAPHY AND PHONETICS (1-13) 6 NOUN CLASSIFER (14-16) 13 CLASSES OF NOUNS (17-31) 15 CLASS I. PERSONAL CLASS (17-19) CLASS II. MU-MI Class of torrend (20-21) Class III. IN-(Z) IN Class of torrend (22-24) Class IV . (L) I- MA Class of torrend (25, 26) Class V. CI-ZI class of Torrend (27, 28) Class VI. Diminutive Class (29, 30) DERIVATIVE NOUNS (32-38) 30 NOUNS DISTINGUSHING PERSON (36) MODIFIERS OF NOUNS (39-81) 33 NOUNS IN THE GENETIVE RELATION. (41-44) NOUNS AS ADJECTIVES (45-53) OTHER PARTS OF SPEECH AS ADJECTIVES (54-55) ADJECTIVES PROPER (56-58) NUMERALS (59-62). 2 ADJECTIVE PRONOUNS. (63-81) Demonstrative Pronouns (64-69) Indefinite Pronouns (70-73) Interrogative Pronouns (74-77) Reflexive Pronouns (78) Possessive Pronouns (79-81) PRONOUNS PROPER (82-90) 54 Neuter pronouns (83-86) Personal Pronouns (87-90) TABLE (91) 59 VERBS (92-130) 60 Modifications of the Verb. Itself Simple Form (95-97) - k Form (98-10) -l form (104) Nasal Form (105) - ya Form (106,107) -ban Form (108,109) -an Form (110) Auxillary Verbs of Tenseand Mood (111-117) Auxillary Verbs as Adverbes (118) Negative Auxilliaires (119-122) The Copula (123-127) The Encletic negative ke (128) 3 DERIVATIVE VERBS (131-138) 85 ADVERBS AND CONNECTING WORDS,. (139-142) 91 REPITITION OF WORDS (143) REDUPLICATION (144) VOCABULARY ....................................................................................................................................... 97 A. ................................................................................................................................................................................................... 97 B. ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 134 D. ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 156 E. ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 162 F .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 212 J . ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 225 K. ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 234 L ............................................................................................................................................... Erreur ! Signet non défini. M ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 307 N ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 307 Ñ. ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 349 O…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 369 S .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 392 T ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 414 V .............................................................................................................................................. Erreur ! Signet non défini. W ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 446 Y.................................................................................................................................................................................................. 453 Z .................................................................................................................................................................................................. 462 4 A B D E É F G I J K L M N Ñ O Ô P S T U V W Y Z SYNOPSIS OF GRAMMATICAL SKETCH ORTHOGRAPHY AND PHONETICS 1 The following letters and marked letters are used in writing Bulu : a b d e é f g i j k l m n ñ o ô p s t u v w y z Note.— The letter h is not used, but the sound of h is heard in some exclamations, and in a sort of corrupted pronounciation of v, as ‟ hé” for vé. 2 Sounds of Vowels. a has the “Italian” sound as in “father,” but shortened; yet never be- coming flat like “a” in “cat.” e is like “short e” in “met,” but often modified into an obscur sound like “u” in “but,” or final “a” in “ Emma. ” The sound is always clear ( short “e”) in syllables ending in n, e.g., ten is pronounced just like English ‟ten”; it is always obscur ( like ‟u” in ‟but”) in syllables where it is final, e. g., fe, ke, &c. ; and in syllables ending in k or ñ, e, g., bek is pronounced just like English “buck”, and señ like English ‟sung.” In 5 syllables ending otherwise the sound of e is really intermediate between the two sounds; e, g., in mes it has a sound intermediate between the vowel sounds in “mess” and in ‟must.” é is like ‟ey” in “they;” but short. It is used only at the end of words, and in the préfix é. i is like ‟i” in ‟machine”, and is shortened in some words, yet never becomes the flat sound of ‟i” in ‟pin”; dim in Bulu has a sharper vowel sound than “dim” in English. O is French ‟o”, or English ‟o” in ‟nor.” ô is French ‟ô ”, or English “o” in “note;” but it has a tendency to ap- proach the sound of u, and is often mistaken for it if carelessly pronoun- ced by a Bulu. u is sounded like German ‟u”, or English ‟oo” in ‟noon.” 3 COMBINATIONS OF VOWELS — Two vowels often stand together in the same syllable, e, g., kaé, kôé, koé, kui ; but they have each its proper sound, and though not separated sufficiently to produce two syllables, are not quite amalgamated into diphtongs. Note.─In this the pronunciation of Bulu differs from that of Fang. For instance, in the Bulu word kui, the u and i have their proper sounds ; in the same word in Fang, the u and i unite to form a sound like French ‟u.” In this book a double vowel is used to represent a prolonged vowel sound, as in the word dii and loon. 4 SOUNDS OF CONSONANTS. — These generally have their ordinary English sounds. The following need furthur explanation : f ( which is used only at the biginning of syllables) has something of an 6 explosive sound like ‟ pf ,” yet not strong enough to justifie use of ‟pf ” in spelling ; e, g., fôn, almost pfôn. w in combination with a preceding guttural ( k or g) has a similar ex- plosive sound, obtained by bringing the lips ligthely together in beginning to utter it. The combinations which it occurs are kw, ñkw an ñgw. Note. ─This explosive sound deos not seem to the author of this Grammatical Sketch sufficiently strong to justify the insertion of p and b making kpw, ñkpw, and ñgbw, witch represent more of a sound than there is and making long and hard-looking combinations. The attempt to simplify these by spelling ñpw and ñbw errs by leaving out the essential sounds k and g. (See note on the spelling at the beginning of Vocabulary.) ñ has the sound of “ng” in “singer” ( not of “ng” in “finger,” which is really two sounds, ñ and g). ty is used for the sound of English ‟ch” in ‟church.” Note. ─ This is inacurrate, as the sound of ‟ch” is not really a combination of t and y. But the use of ty has become established in Bulu ; otherwise the auther would have liked to use the letter c, which has been adopted for this sound in many Bantou languages. 5 COMBINATIONS OF CONSONANTS. — Syllables are always either open ( i. e. end with the vowel), or end with one of the following consonants :—k, p, t, s, l, or a nasal ( m, n, or ñ). Syllables may begin either with any single consonant( except p or ñ) ; or a combination in which either ( a) a nasal is prefixed to another conso- nant, as nt, mb, ñk &c. ; or (b) y or w follows another consonant, as kw, k, ny, ty, &c. ; or (c) a nasal precedes and w or y follows another consonant, as nty, mbw, ñkw. The above tends greatly to limit the range of combination of sounds to 7 form words in Bulu. As the language is also averse to long words, the numb- er of possible words is much restricted, and there is a great employment of homonyms,