person’).
2.3.3. ABSTRACT NOUNS DERIVED FROM PARTICLE ROOTS AND STEMS. Only three abstract nouns in the
Calepino de Motul were derived from particle roots or stems:
(54)
Particle
Abstract
Root
Gloss
Noun
Gloss
bay
thus, as, like so
bail
condition, aptitude, capacity, inclination
yan
there exists, happen yanil
state, condition, worth, concern
manaan
there isn’t any
manaanil
lack, absence
manaan is a contraction of the negation of yan (ma yan) and functions as a particle stem. I have no compa-
rable data for Modern Yucatec.
206 NOUNS
2.3.4. ABSTRACT NOUNS DERIVED FROM TRANSITIVE ROOTS. I am aware of only two examples of abstract
nouns derived from transitive roots, one in Colonial Yucatec (bilil ‘hem’ < bil ‘to hem, edge /clothes/’ [Ci-
udad Real 1600?: fol. 52]) and the other in the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec ((kòolil ‘felling season’ <
kol ‘to fell trees, clear a field’ [V. Bricker et al. 1998:132]).
2.3.5. ABSTRACT NOUNS DERIVED FROM INTRANSITIVE STEMS. Abstract nouns were derived from the im-
perfective stems of root intransitives in Colonial Yucatec, not from their roots:
(55) Intransitive
Abstract
Stem
Gloss
Noun
Gloss
nahal
to merit, deserve, win nahalil
merit, benefit, advantage
nicil
to stop, cease
nicilil
end
Our dictionary of the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec lists no abstract nouns derived from intransitive
roots or stems.
2.4. VERBAL NOUNS. Transitive roots were the source of verbal nouns in Colonial Yucatec and had the same
shape as the antipassive stems derived from such roots:
(56)
Antipassive
Verbal
Stem
Gloss
Noun
Gloss
boc
to give off odor
boc
odor, smell
conol
to sell
conol
goods for sale
hoch
to harvest corn
hoch
harvested corn
kuch
to spin
kuch
thread, wick
tħan
to speak, call
tħan
word, language, speech
The same is true of verbal nouns in Modern Yucatec, for which there is phonetic evidence of the identical
shape of the two kinds of stems:
(57) Antipassive
Verbal
Stem
Gloss
Noun
Gloss
hùuč’
to grind /corn/
hùuč’
corn dough
kòonol
to sell
kòonol
sale goods
k’àay
to sing
k’àay
song
k’ùuč
to spin, make into
k’ùuč’
wick, mop (threads)
thread
pak’al
to plant
pak’al
planting
p’ìis
to measure, weigh
p’ìis
measure, measurement
toʔ
to wrap
toʔ
bundle
t’àan
to speak
t’àan
speech, word, language
Antipassives are formed by deleting the direct object from the verb stem and intransitivizing the verb
(cf. 1.1.3. in Chapter 7). The focus of such verbs is on the agent of the action. The same is true of verbal
nouns when they are inflected for possession with the suffix -Ø. Some verbal nouns can also be inflected for
associative possession with -il. In such cases, the possessor serves as the recipient, rather than the agent,
NOUNS 207
of the action specified by the noun. The following pairs of examples from the Calepino de Motul illustrate
the contrast between agentive and benefactive possession in Colonial Yucatec:
(58a) va ppul-en-ppul a kuche ca a paɔte
‘if your thread widens, extract the burls it contains!’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 357v)
(58b) v kuchil cib
‘the wick of the candle’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 252v)
(59a) y ocçah v ba t u yam v nupob
‘he reconciled himself with his enemies’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 341r)
(59b) lici tac v lubul vinic ti ahualbil kebane
‘as soon as a man falls into mortal sin,
ca ococ t u nupil Dios
he becomes an enemy of God’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 267v)
(60a) lah=cetcunex a ppiz
‘level your measure!’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 259v)
(60b) chek=octe v ppizil y otoch ku
‘pace out the size of the church!’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 139v)
(61a) manaan v chich=na a tħanex a beelex
‘there is no order in your words and your deeds’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 143v)
(61b) ma a pec=oltic v ɔa=yatzil Dios y etel v tħanil sancto euangelio
‘don’t doubt God’s mercy nor the words of the holy gospel’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 370v)
The same contrast exists in the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec:
(62a) túʔuš yàan u hùuč’ š pìil
‘where is Phyllis’ corn dough?’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:113)
(62b) t in manah u hùuč’il saʔ
‘I bought corn dough for gruel’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:113)
(63a) u k’àay š pìileʔ séen haȼ’uȼ
‘Phyllis’s song is very nice’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:149)
(63b) u k’àayil u k’ìin u k’àab’a š pìil
‘the song for Phyllis’s birthday’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:149)
(64a) hač yáʔab’ im pak’al yàan
‘my plantings are very numerous’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:206)
208 NOUNS
(64b) lelaʔ u pak’(a)lil in kòol
‘this is the planting of my cornfield’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:206)
(65a) ȼ’áah ten in toʔ yàan téʔeloʔ
‘give me my bundle that is over there!’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:277)
(65b) hay p’éel u toʔil wàah t a manah
‘how many bundles of tortillas did you buy?’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:277)
(66a) lelaʔ u t’àan šìib’
‘this is a man’s word’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:289)
(66b) u t’àanil in kàahaleʔ ma t a náʔatik
‘as for the language of my town, you don’t understand it’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:289)
2.5. RELATIONAL NOUNS. Only three particles served as prepositions in Colonial Yucatec: ti (phonetic
[tiʔ]) ‘to, at, in, from, for’; ich (phonetic [ʔič]) ‘in, within’; and tac (phonetic [tak]) ‘until, from.’ All other prepositional functions, as well as those performed by conjunctions, were handled by relational nouns
inflected for possession. In some cases, the roots of such expressions were nouns:
(67)
Relational
Noun
Gloss
Root
Gloss
y etel
with, and
et
equal, same
y ok(ol)
above, upon, on
ok
above
t u men(el)
by, because
men
deed
t u pach
behind
pach
back, rear side
t u tan
before
tan
front, presence
y etel and y okol were inflected for possession with the clitic pronoun and a -Vl suffix. The relational nouns
based on men sometimes co-occurred with -Vl and sometimes with -Ø (no suffix), apparently with no dif-
ference in meaning:
(68a) in menel puɔci Juan
‘it was because of me that John fled’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 305r)
(68b) peɔ hun t a kab ca maac v cħabal t u menel ik
‘press the paper with your hand so that it is not carried off by the wind!’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 372r)
(68c) pap in ich t u men buɔ
‘my eyes are burning because of the smoke’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 367r)
(68d) paayi v beel t u men v çucun
‘he was guided by his older brother’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 360r)
t u menel still served as an alternative to t u men as late as 1935 in eastern Yucatan, but is no longer in use
in Hocaba:
NOUNS
209
(69a) le š č’úupaloʔ táan u sèen lóoločáʔal t u mèen hwàan
‘that girl is constantly being embraced by John’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:170)
(69b) hwàaneʔ hač ȼ’oyáʔan t u mèen máʔ ȼ’ok=luk’ul u hàanliʔ
‘John, he’s very skinny because he doesn’t eat enough’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:174)
The history of the alternation between y okol and y ok is similar to that of t u menel and t u men, except
that y ok occurs only once in the Calepino de Motul:
(70a) tij tun vil hi=mac yantacob Judeae xijcob ti puɔul ti vitz
‘and those who are in Judea fled into the hills,
hex yanob y ok nae
as well as those above the house’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 184r)
(70b) bin tac cimil au okol ti ma kahan tech
‘death will come over you without you being aware of it’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 73v)
(70c) lubaan ya y okol
‘misery has fallen upon him’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 274v)
However, it appeared six times in a 1596 document from Sabacche in the Puuc region, of which two
examples were in identical contexts with six y okol examples in the same document:
(71a) xic ti xaman ti yan mul=tun y ok vitz
‘it might go north, where there is a mound above the cliff’ (SB596B-135-136)
(71b) xic ti nohol ti yan mul=tun y okol vitz
‘it might go south, where there is a mound above the cliff’ (SB596B-089-090)
Clearly, y ok was in free variation with y okol during the Colonial period.
Over time, the glottalized “k” in y okol (phonetic [y óok’ol]) was reduced to a glottal stop [y óoʔ]:
(72a) t uy óoʔ nah
‘on the house’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:17)
(72b) šíʔipal máʔ a kutal y óoʔ tùunič
‘child, don’t sit on the stone!’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:16)
But there are also examples of y óok’ and y óok’ol in Hocaba today;
(72c) y
óok’ ȼ’onóʔot
‘above the cenote’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:17)
(72d) t uy óok’ol čeʔ
‘on the tree’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:16)
210 NOUNS
On the other hand, although y etel ‘with, and’ was sometimes abbreviated as y et, the full form of the
relational noun, which serves both as the preposition “with” and as the conjunction “and,” has predomi-
nated through time:
(73a) kóʔoš t inw éetel hoʔ
‘come with me to Merida!’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:9)
(73b) t uy isíinsen y éetel hanal
‘he bathed me with food [clumsy waiter in restaurant]’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:13)
(73c) ȼ’óʔok u čáahal u ȼ’óʔokol u b’èel h pèedro y éetel š màas
‘Peter and Marcella’s engagement was broken’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:58)
However, it was often abbreviated further as y., yt., ytel, and .y. during the Colonial period in apparent imi-
tation of the abbreviation of Latin ytem ‘and’ as yt.
The preposition, ti, is the source of another relational noun, tial, that functions as a possessive pronoun
in Colonial and Modern Yucatec (see 5. in Chapter 4 for a detailed discussion of this pronominal base). The
third-person singular form of this pronoun, u tial (also u tiyal) in Colonial Yucatec and u tyáʔal in Modern
Yucatec, has been grammaticalized as a conjunction meaning ‘in order that.’
2.6. NOUN CLASSIFIERS. The use of the clitic particles, ah and ix, in Colonial Yucatec and their Modern cog-
nates, h and š, is not limited to kinship terms and agentive nouns. They can also be found in other semantic
domains, such as faunal and botanical terms and toponyms. As such, they fall under the rubric of noun
classifiers, instead of markers of sex gender.
2.6.1. NOUN CLASSIFIERS WITH FAUNAL TERMS. Animals can be grouped into the following general cate-
gories: birds, mammals, reptiles, insects, and fish.
2.6.1.1. AVIAN TERMS. Less than half of the 46 avian terms listed in the Calepino de Motul co-occur with
clitic particles, but those that do co-occur with ah.
2.6.1.1.1. AVIAN TERMS THAT CO-OCCUR WITH AH. The Calepino de Motul lists 23 avian terms that co-
occurred with ah in Colonial Yucatec, of which the following are representative examples:
(74)
Avian term
Gloss
ah bicħ
young duck
ah box
a small cock of the land
ah cuzam
swallow
(ah) cuy3
type of owl
ah çul
quail
ah tzoo
rooster with wattles, turkey cock
(ah) cħom
black vulture with red head
ah cħuy
any bird of prey
ah ij
type of hawk
ah lapp
raptor
ah pol
male quail
ah tab
pheasant
NOUNS 211
ah tħau
turkey cock
ah tħel
Spanish rooster that has a comb
The clitic particle in ah tzoo, ah pol, and ah tħau could have served as a gender marker because these
terms refer to male roosters, turkeys, and quail.
Seven examples in this list have cognates in the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec:
(75)
Avian term
Gloss
š kusàam
swallow
h ȼoʔ
turkey cock
h č’òom
vulture
h č’ùuy
hawk
(h) ʔiʔ
hawk
h t’àaw
three-to-four-month-old turkey
h t’èel
rooster
Note that the modern cognate of Colonial ah cuzam ‘swallow’ is š kusàam (not h kusàam) in Modern Yucatec.
In addition to the 23 monolexemic terms mentioned above, the Calepino also lists 25 compounds that
co-occurred with ah and referred to birds, of which the following are examples:
(76)
Avian term
Gloss
ah cencen=bac merlin, kestrel, sparrow hawk
ah colom=tee woodpecker [with red or black head]
&nbs
p; ah tzoo=bach male chachalaca
ah tzoo=cutz
ocellated turkey of the woods with wattles
(ah) ɔiu=aban thrush of this land
ah cħuy=tun
sparrow hawk, osprey, or kite of this land
(ah) ek=pip
a type of black hawk
ah lapp=cħicħ a raptor
Cognates of two of these avian compounds occur in the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec, but without the
noun classifier, h:
(77)
Avian term
Gloss
ʔéeʔ=píip
a type of hawk
kolon=teʔ
woodpecker
2.6.1.1.2. AN AVIAN TERM THAT CO-OCCURS WITH IX. The Calepino de Motul mentions only one avian term
that co-occurred with ix in Colonial Yucatec, ix tux ‘turkey hen,’ and š tùuš ‘turkey hen’ is its cognate in
Modern Yucatec. Clearly, the clitic particle marks the noun as feminine in both cases.
2.6.1.1.3. AVIAN TERMS THAT DO NOT CO-OCCUR WITH NOUN CLASSIFIERS. The Calepino de Motul lists 22
avian terms with neither ah nor ix as clitic particles. A representative sample of them is listed below:
(78)
Avian term
Gloss
baach
a type of pheasant
becħ
quail
212 NOUNS
coz
raptor that catches chickens
cutz
turkey hen of this land
çiiɔ
turkey buzzard
tzutzuy
small turtledoves of this land
cħahum
woodpecker with crest and red head
cħel
magpie
cħicħ
bird
icin
a type of owl
kuch
turkey buzzard, vulture
moo macaw
mucuy turtledove
nom partridge
op parrot
picħ
a small thrush of this land
ulum turkey
The Hocaba dictionary of Modern Yucatec lists fourteen cognates of these terms:
(79)
Avian term
Gloss
b’àač
chachalaca
b’èeč’
quail
kòos
a nocturnal hawk?
kùuȼ
wild turkey
ȼùuȼuy
wild dove
č’ahun
a bird similar to a woodpecker, but smaller
č’èel
magpie
č’íič’
bird
š ʔíikim
owl
mukuy turtledove
nòom
partridge
š ʔòop
parrot
pič’
thrush
ʔúulum
turkey
The names of only two birds on this list have acquired clitic particles since the late sixteenth century, in
A Historical Grammar of the Maya Language of Yucatan (1557-2000) Page 36
