Vogu is the language spoken by the Kadanë people of Zyem. Actually, its full name is vogukadane, for vogu means simply 'language', but it is usually referred to just as Vogu. Since the Kadanë and their language are the prime focus of this Website, the names for other peoples and places are usually given in their Vogu forms.
For much of their history, the Kadanë nations have been isolated geographically and politically, a situation ripe for the development of dialects. Until recently, there were many dialects of Vogu, more or less mutually intelligible. The spread of literacy and of communications is tending to level many of the dialectic distinctions, but there still remain pockets of speakers whose version of Vogu differs considerably from the main. The dialect of Vogu that is taught in schools and used as a medium of communication in print and in broadcasting is Standard Vogu, the dialect of the city of Fimo, capitol of Hihowisen, the most important of the nations of the Kadanë Union and long a center of artistic and political activity.
Vogu is based on roots, which are modified by the addition of prefixes and suffixes. Both word-formation and morphology are variations on this process. The basic words of Vogu vocabulary are derived from roots, and the words formed, nouns, verbs and adjectives, are called stems. In sentence formation, these stems are modified by the addition of more prefixes and suffixes.
Vogu possesses a true alphabet, in which each sound maps to a single character. Its orthography was derived from the Dunnek people. There are 39 phonemes in Vogu:
Consonents
Labial | Dental | Palatal | Alveolar | Velar
Stops b d zg g
p t k
Fricative v th zh z
f sh s
Affricative j
ch c
Nasal m n ng
sn
Liquid
Lateral l gl
sl
Non-lateral r gr
Glide w
h
Although Vogu permits consonant clusters, certain consonants trigger sound changes when brought together in the process of affixation. This is called crasis.
Vowels
Front Back
High i / ih [yih ] u [yu] / uh
Mid / e [ye] o [yo]
Low a [ya] /
{ tense / lax [palatal] }
Certain of the letters have alternative renderings as digraphs, usually encountered in less scholarly contexts: Q/zg, D/th, Z/zh, S/sh, C/ch, c/ts, N/ng, M/sn, L/sl, G/gl, R/gr, I/ih, U/uh.
There is no letter ë; this symbol is used only when writing the name Kadanë in the roman alphabet, to indicate that the final 'e' is pronounced. Similarly, the initial letter in "Zyem" is not the phoneme 'Z/zh', but the phoneme 'z', capitalized according to English language usage.
There is no letter 'y' as such. The y-vowels (ya, ye, yih, yo, yu) actually represent two distinct processes in Vogu. When used as the first sound in the syllable, they represent a y-glide onset: yihshok 'history'. When they follow a consonant, they represent the palatalization of that consonant: tyazat 'to worship', zyem 'Terra'.
Note that the vowel represented by the phoneme ih is pronounced yih when initial in a word, although there is no separate Vogu letter for it. Elsewhere it is pronounced ih. The other y-vowels are distinct letters and are always pronounced with the y-glide.
Vowels are grouped into 3 classes:
Predominating: i, o, u
Strong: a, yu, yo
Weak: e, ya, uh, ye, ih
Vogu does not allow two vowels in a row, so when -V(C) suffixes are added to CV- roots and stems, the class of the vowels determines which vowel drops out and which is retained, a process called elision. In general, the vowel of the higher class prevails. The vowels of certain grammatical suffixes predominate over all other vowels.
The addition of stressed suffixes to a stem may cause the loss of final e, ih, or uh, a process called the fleeting vowel.
The Vogu word is based on roots, of any number of syllables. In the simplest case, a prefix is added to the root to form a noun, verb or adjective. For example, from the root lat 'reading' are formed lat (v.) 'to read' and nalat (n.) 'reading'. (The verb lat may seem identical to the root lat, but Vogu grammarians consider that a zero-prefix has been added to the root to form the verb.)
The prefixes not only determine part of speech of the word to which they are added, but have a semantic content as well. For example, from the root vek 'person' come the nouns kavek 'tribe, nation', vovek 'crowd', and tsihvek 'humankind', all of whose particular meanings are conditioned by the prefix added to the root. This semantic content can be seen most clearly in the gender prefixes a-, po-, and mi-, used for neutral, male and female persons, respectively; thus: avek 'person', povek 'man' and mivek 'woman'. Some representative prefixes and words derived using them:
The prefixes a-, po-, mi- always prevail over other vowels of any strength when added to a -V(C) root.
Suffixes can also be added to words. These suffixes usually modify the meaning of the base word, eg. abwe 'dog' becomes abweton 'puppy' with the addition of the diminutive suffix -ton. Occasionally, the addition of a suffix also changes the part of speech: eg. ova 'to live' becomes ovana 'dwelling' with the addition of the 'purpose' suffix -na. Some representative suffixes and words derived from them:
Words can be used in compounds with additional prefixes or suffixes, or with other words. Quite complicated derivatives can be formed in this way. The origin of such words is sometimes difficult to see, because sound changes take place which obscure the constituent parts. An example of multiple compounding is the root pod 'foot', from which comes thapod (n.) 'foot' by the addition of the concrete noun prefix tha-. From this comes kathpod (n). 'stride' by addition of the collective noun prefix ka- (note the loss of the vowel in tha-), and from this derives kathpodna 'road', by the addition of the 'purpose' suffix -na. Some other examples:
vesaveketl 'bathroom scales', from ves 'weigh' + avek 'person' + agentive suffix -etl
poluber 'to fish', from poluv (n.) 'fish' + verb suffix -ber
thabmavgu 'dictionary', from thabmag 'book' + vogu 'language'.
The order of elements in compounds closely mirrors the order in sentences. Compounds based on verbs usually have the "predicate" of the phrase first. Noun compounds can be understood as representing a noun phrase that has been eroded; the relation between first and second noun can be expressed by any number of implied postpositions:thabmavgu <: thabmag voguf 'book of language'.
Vogu is able to adopt loanwords from other languages. Some of these borrowings are very old, and the borrowed terms have become assimilated to the root system of Vogu. An example is the root vek, taken from the Dunnek, which has become a true root in Vogu (the archaic Vogu term for person, dane, is now used exclusively to denote the ethnic group of Vogu speakers). More recent loanwords are used as-is, sometimes with minor changes to accomodate Vogu phonology, eg. lumila 'electicity' from Ranamemi. Such words can still be productive in word formation: gelumila 'electrified'.
Use of the noun is simple in Vogu. There are no changes made for case or number, as in an inflecting language. Plural number can be shown by addition of the suffix -ihngu, but is not required, especially if number can be determined from context. Some animate nouns (nouns relating to living beings) change the initial prefix to a-, po- or mi- to reflect the proper gender.
For the most part, Vogu nouns are used by adding to the stem suffixes corresponding to prepositions and certain adjectives in English. For example, from thabmag 'book' come thabmagoteb 'this book' and thabmagotebihf 'of this book'. As in word-formation, there are sound changes which accompany the addition of suffixes. These changes are rule-based and usually easy to understand.
Those suffixes noted above which have a grammatical function in the Vogu sentence are called postpositions. They are analogous to English prepositions and define the relationship of the nouns in the sentence. Every noun that is the head of a noun phrase must take a postposition. The most commonly-used are:
The postpositions -a, -i and -o always predominate in both elision and accent over any other vowels in the noun. The nominative is indicated by a zero-suffix, that is, the subject of the sentence receives no postposition.
Postpositions also can be applied to nominal and verbal roots like other word-forming suffixes to create new words: pul 'to go' > pulki 'go away, leave'.
Vogu verbs are conjugated by the addition of prefixes to the verb stem to express the tense of the verb, eg. from pish 'to write' comes upish 'writes' and papish 'will write'. The verb also has modes such as passive and causative, which are shown by infixes placed between the verb stem and the tense prefix, eg. udupish 'is written', usrepish 'causes (someone) to write', usredupish 'causes to be written'. As this example shows, modal infixes can be combined; they are interpreted in the order encountered.
Vogu verbs come in transitive and intransitive forms; some verbs can be used as either. Mechanisms exist for using transitive verbs intransitively, and vice-verse. There are also participial forms of the verb, that can be used to express agents of an action, among other things: ahalat 'a reader'. Finally, there is a gerund (verbal noun) formed by the addition of o- to the verb stem. Person or number are not shown in the Vogu verb, and must be indicated by the use of pronouns or nouns, or by context. The verbal prefixes of Vogu are:
Tense:
u- presentMode:
gre- perfect past
kih- imperfect past
pa- future
da- concessive: 'possible future'
o- infinitive/gerund
- imperative (no prefix)
du- passiveParticiples:
sre- causative
mo- potentative ('can')
cha- initiative ('begin')
kre- desiderative ('want to')
ha- present
ho- past
hi- future
The vowels of prefixes u-, o-, ha-, ho-, hi- always predominate over other vowels when added to VC- stems. The past participle makes no distinction between perfect or imperfect past; ho- is used for both: hodulat 'that which was (being) read'. Simple imperatives are expressed by the naked verb stem; a more polite version uses the prefix da-: lat thu 'read!', dalat thu (kdasi) 'Would you (please) read?'
The object of most transitive verbs takes the postposition -a, although some take other suffixes. The causative mode takes two objects: a direct object (usually with -a) indicating the target of the action of the verb, and an ergative object with suffix -o, indicating the one compelled to action (the subject is the one who does the compelling): usrelat ani thabmaga povko 'I cause the man to read the book'.
Verbs are negated by addition of the suffix -ak: ulat 'reads', ulatak 'does not read'. The suffix -ak always attracts word stress, sometimes causing loss of the final vowel of the stem: uvbel 'it is far', uvblak 'it is not far'.
Verbs with the pattern CVC, where V is ih, e or uh, lose the vowel with the addition of the verbal prefix: shihkyu 'cry' > ushkyu. The gerund is an exception to this: addition of o- does not cause loss of the vowel: oshihkyu 'a crying'. Crasis does not usually apply when the vowel is lost, unless the two consonants are identical: rihrtet 'to turn' > urtet. The verbs u 'be' and hahu 'have' are the only irregular verbs, and are conjugated:
positive/negative
Present u/uk uhu/uhuk
Perfect gre/grak grahu/grahuk, etc.
Imperfect kih/kak kahu
Future pa/pak pahu
Concessive da(re)/dak dahu
Infinitive ore/orak ohahu
Imperative re/dak hahu
Passive - -duhu
Causative -sre/-srak -srahu/-srahuk
Potentative -mo/-mok -mohu/-mohuk
Initiative -cha/-chak -chahu/-chahuk
Desiderative -kre/-krak -krahu/-krahuk
Participles
Present hare/harak hahu/hahuk
Past hore/horak hohu/hohuk
Future hire/hirak hihu/hihuk
(One sometimes encounters in speech the form ulkrak, palkrak, etc. for negative
forms of the verb lekr 'to want', although this strictly speaking is
considered incorrect.)The root of the verb 'to be' is actually re, as can be seen from the imperative. This root participates in word-formation: reta 'to accompany', rerata 'to be intended for'.
There are two types of adjective in Vogu: dependent and independent. Dependent adjectives have the form of suffixes and are added to the noun they modify. These are basic modifiers such as demonstratives, interrogatives and relatives. An example shown above was the suffix -oteb 'this': thabmagoteb 'this book'. Another is the suffix -asn 'much, many': thabmagasn 'many books' Some other common dependent adjectives are:
-banda, -kal and -asn always attract the accent of the noun to which they are added, but if the noun also receives a postposition that attracts the accent (eg. -a), the accent goes to the postposition.
Independent adjectives are formed from word roots by the addition of prefixes and are distinct words. These adjectives follow the word they modify and are placed in agreement with it by the addition of a prefix called the noun complement. Each noun-forming prefix in Vogu can be assigned to one of 5 classes, and each class has a characteristic noun complement. The noun complement identifies the noun to which each adjective in the sentence refers:
slathap 'good' (from athap 'goodness')The five noun classes arepovek poslathap 'good man'
mivek mislathap 'good woman'
thabmag thaslathap 'good book'
a-class: neutral gender
po-class: masculine gender
mi-class: feminine gender
tha-class: concrete nouns
na-class: abstract nouns
ka-class: collective nouns
Every noun in Vogu belongs to one of these classes. Since every word-forming prefix has a semantic component, every prefix can be assigned to one of these classes (not that the noun has to begin with the corresponding class prefix; the noun complement of tsihvek, for example, is ka-: tsihvek kapagul 'a large crowd'). Some Vogu words have more than one complement, for different meanings of the noun. When the word avek is used in its usual meaning of 'person', it takes the complement a-, but it can also mean 'a score (number)', in which case it takes the complement ka-.
In the case of loanwords, agreement is almost always semantic, regardless of the initial letters of the noun, except for those very old loanwords that have been assimilated to the root system of Vogu. Nouns that refer to animate beings (titles, names, occupations, etc.) take the noun complement proper to their gender: hematl poslathap 'a good priest', hematl mislathap 'a good priestess'.
Adjectives of either dependent or independent type can be used as predicates by conjugating them like verbs. The prefix po- is first added to dependent adjectives. Examples: uslathap povek 'the man is good', upoteb thabmag 'this is a book'.
Adjectives of either type can also be used as substantives by receiving the proper noun complement. As substantives, they can take postpositions or other adjectives, as needed: poslathapotebeta 'with this good man'. Some dependent adjectives are regularly used as substantives: nakal 'everything', akal 'everyone', avep 'who?', navep 'what?'.
Vogu does not share the ability of English to turn virtually any noun or verb into an adjective. In many cases, the Vogu equivalent of an English adjective will be a prepositional phrase, eg. wesok rablowakm 'apple juice' (lit. 'juice from apples').
There is no definite or indefinite article in Vogu. A noun like povek can mean 'a man' or 'the man', the correct reading usually determined from context. If greater specificity is needed, the dependent adjectives ihIndad and -oteb are sometimes used. The adjective -ole can be used in the sense 'the one previously mentioned.'
Adjectives may be compared by addition of the suffixes -uzg, comparative, -arsl, relative superlative, and -isl, absolute superlative. The postposition -chem is given to the noun being compared. This postposition is used with any noun comparison, even positive degree:
snagul 'big'snagul ihsnuchem 'as big as him/her'
snaguluzg ihsnuchem 'bigger than him/her'
snagularsl akalchem 'biggest of them all'
snagulisl 'biggest of all/in the world'
Participles are formed from the verb by addition of the verbal infixes ha-, ho- or hi-: halat 'reading (one)', holat '(one) which read', hilat '(one) which will read.' They can also take modal infixes after the participial infix: hamodulat 'readable'. To the participle is added the noun complement required by the noun it modifies or to which it alludes.
Participles can be used as adjectives, in which case they follow the noun they modify: chidi thahobraka 'a broken automobile'. They can also be used as a form of relative clause. In this case, they function partially as verbs, and so any nouns associated with them must take the proper postpositions: sensetl pohalat thabmaga 'the teacher who is reading a book'. Finally, participles can be used as substantives, to express agent: mihalat 'the reader (fem.)'.
Adverbs are of three types: adjectival, postpositional and particulate. Adjectival adverbs are those derived from adjectives. To use an adjective adverbially, one simply uses it without a noun complement (dependent adjectives add the prefix na-). Examples: ulat slathap povek 'the man reads well', ulat nasn povek 'the man reads a lot', ulat nabanda povek 'the man is always reading'. These types of adverbs are used to modify individual verbs. This is the only type of adverb which can be compared, by addition of the comparative adjective suffixes noted above: ulat nasnuzg ani ihsnuchem 'I read more than him/her'.
Participles are a kind of adjective, and they can also be used adverbially by omission of a noun complement. Many of the forms involving this usage are highly formal and not often used, but one common use of an isolated participial adverb is to render impersonal expressions: hadunyat 'I understand (lit. 'understood').'
Postpositional adverbs are actually noun phrases used as adverbs. The most common of these have frequently undergone severe reduction through sound changes and are considered single words, eg. jojmobri 'today', from jojyom 'day' + -oteb 'this' + -kri 'at, on'. These adverbs usually denote time or location. Some others derived from -kri are: nasbri 'here', and katbri 'now'.
Particulate adverbs are independent words, often borrowed from other languages (especially Udank). They function as adverbs that generally modify the entire sentence. Examples: ma 'here' and ge 'voila, indeed', from which we can form (u) ma ge ani 'Here I am!' Other particles serve a quasi-grammatical function, such as olzh 'obligation': dapul olzh ani 'I must go'. Some others are: ker 'gladly', ohihr 'just, simply', wa 'this one', yo 'hello', jebl 'by no means', dang 'suddenly', doduzg 'gently', owi 'today', syech 'now' (many particles have meanings that are difficult to express simply; many others seem almost to behave like adjectives in that they tend to modify nouns rather than verbs).
The astute reader may have noticed that some adverbs, such as 'here' and 'now', have more than one type of Vogu equivalent. In general, the more formal the context, the more the postpositional form will be preferred. But it is common in speech to use both adverbs, with the effect of emphasizing or intensifying the meaning: nasbri ma 'right here', katbri syech 'right now'.
The pronouns of Vogu are
ani I glu we
thu you gru you (pl.)
ihsnu he,she ihngu they
-ole it
The first vowel of the 3rd person pronouns attracts the accent and is pronounced ih (minus the y-glide) even though it is initial. The accent of ani moves from its usual place on the i to the a whenever suffixes are added to it (unless the suffix itself attracts the accent): ani` 'I', a`nita 'with me', ana` 'me (d.o.)'.
The 3rd person pronouns ihsnu and ihngu are used only for animate beings. The dependent demonstrative adjective -ole is used substantively to express the 3rd person of inanimate nouns, by addition of the proper noun complement. It does not usually take a pluralizing suffix to render 3rd person plural, unless needed for clarity or emphasis.
The impersonal 'they' of English can be rendered in Vogu by the noun avek: nasbri uchowyot avek hwisha 'they're building a house here'.
The possessive pronouns are dependent adjectives, added to the noun to which they refer:
-athani my -aglu our
-athu your -agru your
-asnu his/her -asnu their
thabmagathani 'my book'
sensetlaglu 'our teacher'
There is no difference between the 3rd person singular and plural possessive. The possessive of the 3rd person of inanimate nouns is -olef, used substantively with proper noun complement: patihs nolef 'its top'.
The possessive suffixes (except for -olef) can be used independently, providing emphasis, and predicatively like other dependent adjectives: thabmag thathani 'MY book', uposnu thabmagoteb 'this book is his/hers'.
The Kadanë use a base-5 numbering system, that is, they have separate names only for the digits from zero to five, after which they use combined numbers. The Vogu numbers are:
Base-10 Base-5 Names
0 0 nok
1 1 azg
2 2 nazg
3 3 tazg
4 4 gozg
5 10 apong
6 11 apongihzg
7 12 apongazg
8 13 apongtazg
9 14 aponggozg
10 20 napong
11 21 napongihzg
12 22 napongazg
15 30 tapong
20 40 gopong
25 100 apongpong
26 101 apongponihzg
27 102 apongpongazg
30 110 apongpong apong
31 111 apongpong apongihzg
35 120 apongpong napong
50 200 napongpong
75 300 tapongpong
100 400 gopongpong
125 1000 tabjpong
250 2000 nazgtabjong
375 3000 tazgtabjpong
625 10000 gobjpong
3125 100000 apobjpong
Numbers are considered nouns in Vogu and can take postpositions and even dependent adjectives. Nouns following the numbers must take the suffix -u, which predominates in vowel strength but does not attract the accent: apongpongihzgotebav thabmagu 'using these twenty-six books'. Note that nouns do not need the pluralizing suffix -ihngu when their number is explicitly stated.
The numbers can be used as ordinals by addition of the prefix tse-, eg. tsazg 'first', tsegobjpong '625th'. As such, they are treated like other adjectives and follow the noun with proper noun complement: mivek mitsapong 'fifth woman'. There is an alternative to tsazg, tseglitihs, which means both 'first in a sequence' and 'main'.
The ordinal numbers can be used without noun complement as adverbs indicating sequence of events: tsazg palat ani, tsenazg paplesht 'First I will read, then I will eat'; tseglitihs vire ge shara 'First/the main thing is, catch the ball!'
Conjunctions can unite independent sentences or connect subordinate sentences to a main sentence; the former are termed coordinating conjunctions and the latter are subordinating. Coordinating conjunctions are simple particles in Vogu which stand between the sentences being linked: ulat ani ebihr uspita povek 'I read and the man sleeps.'
There are two types of subordinating conjunctions. The first type uses particles in the same manner as the coordinating conjunctions. One of these is the correlative pair es/go 'if/then', used in conditional phrases: es ulat ani, go uspita povek 'If I read, then the man sleeps.' Another subordinate conjunction is di, used to introduce reported speech: ugu ani, di uspita povek 'I say (that) the man is sleeping'.
The other type of subordinating conjunction is a derived form made from the particle buhn and the noun fragment nat- (from natem 'fact'. The particle buhn has the effect of turning a verb phrase into the equivalent of a noun. When used in the phrase nat- buhn, it turns a verb phrase into the object of the main verb, the exact relationship between the two being determined by the postposition used with nat-. Examples: using direct object suffix -a, ulekr ani nata, buhn uspita povek 'I want the man to sleep'; using -duku 'because of', ulat ani naduku, buhn uspita povek 'I read because the man sleeps'.
There are two other types of subordinate phrases that do not use conjunctions. The first is the relative phrase, formed from the dependent adjective -guhd 'who, which'. This adjective is always used independently, with addition of the proper noun complement, and takes the postposition and location proper to its place in the relative clause. Examples: uvihd ani povka, uspita poguhd 'I see the man who is sleeping', uvihd ani thabmaga, kihlat povek thagda 'I see the book which the man was reading'.
The other type of subordinate phrase is formed from the verbal noun, or gerund, derived from the verb by the addition of the prefix o-. The gerund can be used as the object of a verb in simple sentences: ulekr ani opolubra 'I want to go fishing' (although the desiderative ukrepoluber ani would be more common). It is also used in subordinate clauses: ospitakri povekav, ulat ani 'While the man is sleeping, I read' (the logical subject of such clauses always takes the instrumental suffix -av). Vogu grammarians actually consider this latter a type of adverbal phrase.
The normal order of the Vogu sentence is predicate-subject-object. Adjectives follow the nouns they modify. Simple adverbs follow the verb to which they refer. Adverbs of time and location usually come first in the sentence. Other adverbs, noun phrases or particles can come anywhere in the sentence except between predicate and subject. However, since every noun in the Vogu sentence must be qualified by a postposition, and every adjective related to its noun by the noun complement, word order is frequently altered, especially in highly rhetorical situations.
Vogu syntax is often extremely brief, at least in the spoken form. Speakers tend to leave out as much as possible, short of obscuring the meaning of the sentence. Pronouns and the verb re 'to be' are frequent candidates for omission. An example is the sentence ma ge ani 'Here I am', from above, which does not contain a verb.
Interrogative sentences are of two types, those which ask for confirmation of a fact and those which ask for information. The first type of sentence is easily constructed by adding the particle dyu to a declarative sentence: uspita povek dyu 'Is the man sleeping?' The answer to such a sentence is either the affirmation or negation of the question. Vogu usually repeats the relevant verb in the desired form: uspita 'yes (lit. is sleeping), uspitak 'no (lit. is not sleeping)'. The particles umo and dak can be used as shorthand to render 'yes' and 'no', but this is common only in the most informal speech.
The second type of sentence is formed using interrogative adjectives, pronouns or adverbs. It does not take the particle dyu. The interrogative adjectives are used just like regular dependent adjectives: ulekr thu thabmagvepa 'Which book do you want?', ulekr thu thabmakabna 'How many books do you want?'. The other interrogatives are formed from the adjective -vep 'what, which?': pronouns: avep 'who?', navep 'what?', adverbs: nsuvri 'where?', navav 'how?', navduku 'why?', kavkri 'when?' (the v is the only visible remnant of -vep in the latter, highly eroded forms).
The interrogative pronouns stand in the sentence at the same place the corresponding positive pronoun would be found: ma u avep 'Who is it? (lit. Who is here?), upoteb navep 'what is this (thing)?'. Interrogative adverbs usually stand at the head of the sentence: kavkri uplesht povek 'when does the man eat?' In all cases, the answer to the question is the provision of the desired information. In the case of the pronouns, the same pattern will usually be followed: ma u powag 'It's Powag (lit. Powag is here)', upoteb thabmag 'It's a book'. The answer to an interrogative adverb will usually be more complex and depend on the context.
Vogu uses the particle di to introduce reported speech. There is no distinction between direct and indirect discourse: the reported speech is given within the di-phrase as if being spoken at the time: uplesht ani 'I am eating', ahyer gruhgu ihsnu, di uplesht ani 'Yesterday he said he was eating'. But Vogu carries the use of di- beyond reported speech and tends to use it for any discourse statement, including interior thoughts and opinions: ubjbyo ani, di upotko thu 'I believe you are right'.
Each Kadanë has five names: a surname, personal name, patronymic/matronymic (father's or mother's personal name plus -av), clan name (plus -ihf) and birthplace name (plus -ihkm). Sons receive the patronymic, which is derived from the father's name, and daughters receive the matronymic, derived from the mother. Clan names are generally monosyllables, derived from words for natural objects, flora and fauna. Kadanë society was traditionally based on clan, or tribe, affiliation, hence the inclusion of the clan name. There are only 106 clan names among the Kadanë, and so they sometimes refer to themselves as the 'Hundred-Name People'.
Surnames are derived from the names of occupations, locations, qualities or personal names, each with characteristic suffixes. Most personal names are meaningful words in Vogu, although sometimes used in ad-hoc combinations: anasis 'Honeybee', powag 'Falcon', prabaset 'Truelight', jitopol 'Striving-for-God'. A few personal names have been borrowed from other languages, primarily Dunnek. Although they may be meaningful words in their original languages, they are not in Vogu: terengo (in Dunnek, 'Servant-of-the-One').
One's full name will seldom be used, except for identification or in very formal situations. In daily life, only surname and personal name are commonly used. Even when the full name is employed, the other names are often given only as initials. Thus, danelwegi terengo lyonav ngunihtihf fimokm 'Terengo Danelwegi, son of Lion, Rock Clan, from Fimo', will be danelwegi terengo l. ng. f. when he signs his name, and danelwegi terengo to his acquaintances.
The Kadanë generally name ethnic groups and nationalities according to the name given by the people themselves, with appropriate modification for Vogu phonology. They designate members of an ethnic group or nationality by the prefix ka-, for the whole group (kathihsbo 'the Thisbo people', kudank 'the Udank'), and a-, po- or mi-, to denote individuals (misaambu 'Saambu woman', aduhnnek 'Dunnek persons'). Although kadane 'the Kadanë', midane 'a Kadanë woman', etc., follow this same pattern, there is no separate word *dane. The name of the language, for example, is vogukadane, not *vogudane (whereas the others are voguthihsbo, vogusaambu, etc.).
There is much we could not cover in this brief introduction, both elaborations to the scheme presented above and exceptions to it, but we trust that this has provided a concise but clear picture of the language of Vogu.
© 1997, Terrence Donnelly