Adjectives as nouns (Northern Mansi)

AdjNotNMorph: Attributive adjectives are distinct from nouns in their morphological behavior; while nouns show inflection for categories such as number, case, and gender, attributive adjectives do not.


(1) akwmatērtn sip-n joχtǝ-s-yγ.
suddenly slope-lat arrive-pst-3du
’Suddenly, they arrived at the slope.’ (S. D.)


(2) akwmatērtn sip-ǝt-n joχtǝ-s-yγ.
suddenly slope-pl-lat arrive-pst-3du
’Suddenly, they arrived at the slopes.’ (S. D.)


(3) akwmatērtn ľūľǝŋ sip-n joχtǝ-s-yγ.
suddenly steep slope-lat arrive-pst-3du
’Suddenly, they arrived at the steep slope.’ (S. D.)


(4) akwmatērtn ľūľǝŋ sip-ǝt-n joχtǝ-s-yγ.
suddenly steep slope-pl-lat arrive-pst-3du
’Suddenly, they arrived at the steep slopes.’ (S. D.)


Northern Mansi nouns can take number and case marking suffixes (1)-(2), but in attributive adjectival constructions, these markers cannot be attached to the adjectives. There is no agreement between the adjective and the head noun in these constructions (3)-(4) (Kálmán 1976: 66).

Author: 

Szilvia Németh