Dictionary Humburi Senni (Songhay of Hombori, Mali) - English - French Dictionnaire Humburi Senni (songhay de Hombori, Mali) - anglais - français Jeffrey Heath, University of Michigan Language Description Heritage Library (online, open source) Max Planck Institute 2015 i Heath, Humburi Senni dictionary Introduction This dictionary is a companion for Grammar of Humburi Senni and for the forthcoming Humburi Senni Texts, all to be published electronically in open format by the Language Description Heritage library and on the author’s personal site at University of Michigan. For the fine points, some knowledge of HS phonology and morphology is presupposed (consult the grammar). Cognates in other Songhay languages, and related forms in Fulfulde and other languages, are given selectively. Headword transcriptions are “underlying,” prior to tonal interactions with adjacent words. In phrases and sentences, verbs undergo tonal changes triggered by preceding constituents including some types of NP, several subject and object pronominals, and certain inflectional particles. Often these elements induce raising of the tone of the verb’s initial syllable (or mora, for monosyllabic stems) from L[ow] to H[igh]. In the dictionary entries, I omit “+H” at the end of words and particles that induce this raising, to avoid clutter; full details are given in the grammar. Singular-subject imperatives also show tone changes due to a final -ŋ̂ suffix that is segmentally deleted after a consonant. For intransitive verbs, the frame that reveals the verb’s lexical tones 3Sg subject à plus verb. For transitive verbs, the best frame is one with 3Sg object allomorph -à:. In example phrases and headwords for compounds, up-arrow ­ at the beginning of a word or morpheme is an index that initial-syllable tone-raising has occurred under the influence of the preceding element, as in gàŋgà [ẁ ­dú cìɲà] ‘prevented from having rain’. ­ is not a phonetic diacritic and it can be omitted, as the affected syllable (here ­dú, from underlying dù) already shows the H-tone induced by infinitival ẁ+H. Similarly, ­ at the end of a word or morpheme indicates that the following element has induced tone-raising of the final syllable, as in kú↑=ŋ́=ŋ́ ꜜdêy ‘to buy it’ from kù=ŋ̂=ŋ̂. This is very common when an enclitic sonorant beginning with H- or <HL> tone, like any of the =ŋ̂ or =m̂ enclitics (object, 3Sg object, subjunctive), syllabifies with the preceding word-final CV. Here the tone-raising is phonologically automatic, since rising-toned syllables are not allowed in HS. There are also a few other cases of word-final tone-raising, such as that affecting a L-toned noun before strong definite dì, demonstrative wô, or some forms of gò: ‘be’. By contrast, downstep ꜜ before a word or syllable beginning with H-tone, and upstep ꜛ after a word ending in L-tone, indicate a (full or partial) pitch raising or lowering, respectively, of the input, which is transcribed with underlying tones. Downstep occurs when a final <HL>-toned syllable has its L-tone delinked and realized as pitch lowering on a following H-tone, as in cíjín ꜜkûl ‘every night’ from cíjîn kûl. Downstep is extremely common in HS because of the huge number of words and particles that end with a <HL>- toned syllable, either lexically or after a monosyllable gets a H-tone from the left. Upstep is more restricted; it affects 3Sg pronoun à and 2Pl imperative wò before certain L-toned postpositions and verbs, as in àꜛ gà: ‘on him/her’. <HL>-toned postpositions like sê (dative) are treated in prepausal position as L-toned for this purpose: àꜛ sê, pronounced àꜛ sè prepausally = is used (without spaces on either side) in transcriptions as an enclitic boundary instead of - (morpheme boundary). ii Heath, Humburi Senni dictionary As an example, mè fó=­ŋ́ ꜜ­bó ẁ ­kâ ? ‘when are you-Sg coming’ is from “underlying” /mè fô ŋ̀+H bò ẁ+H kà/. The floating H-toned attach to the right, indexed by the arrows: /mè fô ŋ̀ ­bó ẁ ­kâ/. Then /fô ŋ̀/ fuses into one syllable as /fó=­ŋ̀/ (with enclitic boundary =). Then the final L-tone of this syllable delinks to the right, downstepping the following /­bó ẁ/ to ꜜ bó ẁ. A rough phonetic transcription: [mèfóḿbōw̄kâ]. Tonal interactions between verbs and following constituents (such as postpositional phrases) are more inconsistent and difficult to analyse and my text transcriptions are only approximate. I have also struggled with tonal markings of trisyllabic words, often hesitating between L.H.L and H.H.L in particular. Many Fulfulde loanwords of this shape have given me trouble, as H.H.L words tend to have a pitch rise on the second syllable to accentuate the tone break. The headword for each noun is the most common form used in isolation. In many cases this is etymologically the old definite singular form with *-o: or *-a:, now generalized as the final singular (FinSg) form, i.e. used in the absence of a following modifier regardless of definiteness. In this case, a form derived from the original unsuffixed indefinite singular is now the nonfinal (NF) form used before a following modifier, though the tendency is to reshape all such NF forms with final -u. In other cases the headword for a noun is the original unsuffixed indefinite singular, and is distinct from the (synchronic) definite singular (DefSg) form. Forms other than the headword are given in parentheses. For verbs there are no similar issues due to the lack of tense-aspect suffixation. Nouns undergo tonal as well as suffixal changes when possessed. For example, hùmbùr-ò ‘mortar’ has a third-person possessor form hùmbùr-ô. This in turn has its initial tone raised by a preceding 3Pl possessor ɲòŋ+H, hence ɲòŋ ­húmbùr-ô ‘their mortar’. For inalienables (kin terms, body parts) there is also a special tonal form for the pronominal 3Sg possessor as opposed to all other third-person possessors, as in bùŋ-ò+H ‘his/her head’ versus logophoric possessor ʔáŋgá bùŋ-ô. Readers coming to HS from other Songhay languages should be warned that final -o or -a: on a noun (or adjective) may be any of two, three, or more segmentally homophonous (but often tonally distinct) look-alike morphemes. The details are explained in the grammar (synchronically), and in my Diachronica paper (historically).1 No diacritics are used in transcriptions to index such changes. Brackets [ ] organize lengthy examples into syntactic phrases, and lengthy words (compounds) into morphological components. The brackets are optional and may be omitted in text transcriptions. There is extensive HS-Fulfulde bilingualism in Hombori and almost any Fulfulde noun or verb can be borrowed spontaneously. In such borrowings, Fulfulde “implosives” (really preglottalized voiced stops) {ɓ ɗ ʄ ɠ} can either be retained as such or nativized as {b d j g}. Alphabetical order: because of variation between {ki ke} and {ci ce}, and between {gi ge} and {ji je}, {ki ke} are alphabetized as though {ci ce} and {gi ge} are alphabetized as though {ji je}. For example, to find gèsùm-ò ‘roselle’, look for jèsùm-ò. Because of syllable-final alternations between n and ŋ and vocalic nasalization, velar nasal ŋ is 1 J. Heath. 2011. “Innovation of head-marking in Humburi Senni (Songhay, Mali),” Diachronica 28(1):1-24. iii Heath, Humburi Senni dictionary alphabetized as though n even word-initially, so ŋùnìŋúnì ‘mumble’ can be found immediately after nùkùr-ò ‘belly-strap’. Palatoalveolar ɲ, by contrast, has its own alphabetical slot after n/ŋ. Nasalized vowels are alphabetized as though vowel plus n. Words beginning with nasal-obstruent clusters: the nasal is disregarded in alphabetization (ńdù can be found next to dù). Long and short vowels are not distinguished in alphabetization. Headwords for separate entries involving homonyms, or near-homonyms differing only in tone, are assigned numbers like 1 and 2 for easy cross-reference, sometimes subdivided (1a, 1b) if they belong to the same word-family. Most of the work for this dictionary was done as a by-product of grant-supported fieldwork focused on other Songhay and non-Songhay Malian languages between 1991 and 2005, with some mopping-up and editing done subsequently. The funding most relevant to Humburi Senni was from the National Science Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Full details on the grants were given in the Humburi Senni grammar. iv Heath, Humburi Senni dictionary Abbreviations Absol absolute (prefix on adjective or numeral) adj adjective adv adverb ant antonym (semantic opposite) Ar Arabic Bam Bambara (language of southern Mali) Caus causative cpd compound Def definite Dimin diminutive DN95 1995 lexicon of Koyraboro Senni by DNAFLA, Bamako Eng English Fact factitive (deadjectival transitive verb: ‘cause X to be ADJ’) FinSg final singular (form of singular noun not followed by a modifier) Fr French Ful Fulfulde (language of Fulbe people, traditionally cattle herders) Hass Hassaniya Arabic HS Humburi Senni Impf imperfective Imprt imperative inal inalienable (noun), such as kin or body-part term Intens intensifier (of adjective etc.) interj interjection intr intransitive verb Ka Kaado (Songhay variety in western Rep. of Niger) KCh Koyra Chiini (Songhay of Timbuktu) KS Koyraboro Senni (Songhay of Gao) Logo logophoric pronoun n noun NF nonfinal form of noun (e.g. before adjective) NP noun phrase O object (in 3SgO, etc.) Partpl participle Pl plural poss possessed postp postposition PP postpositional phrase PotPass potential passive (suffixal derivation of transitive verbs: ‘be VERB-able’) Rdp reduplicated ResPass resultative passive (suffixal derivation of transitive verbs) servb serial verb Sg singular v Heath, Humburi Senni dictionary Sp Spanish sp. species (plural: spp.) syn synonym Tam Tamashek (Tuareg language of northern Mali) tr transitive verb TSK Tondi Songway Kiini (Songhay language of Kikara, Mali) UnspecO unspecified-object (suffixal derivative of transitive verbs) VblN verbal noun VO transitive verb that is regularly followed by the object VP verb phrase Za Zarma (Songhay language of Rep.