ki'esai .ianis
At the risk of malglico lojban, I will try to gloss the parts of this to
see if I am making sense of it:
{do pa moi} you are first (in the set)
{lo dotco prenu} German people [moi x1 = set]
{lo ka ...} the quality of ...[moi x2 = ordering rule]
{... mi penmi ...} I meet
{... ce'u} refers all the way back 'up' to a specific German person
{ca ma kau} at what time (rhetorical)
So it seems to me that the {ce'u}, which I keep seeing called a lambda
variable or placeholder really just fulfills the place of a 'who' or
'them' in English -- it sticks a sumti from higher in the structure into
a place in a sub-clause.
Would it be correct then to say "This is the first of my books that I
have sold." as {ti pa moi lo mi cukta lo ka mi vecnu ce'u} ?
mu'o mi'e .aleks.
On Tue, 24 Jan 2006, Yanis Batura wrote:
doi .aleks. di'e bau la gliban.
{do pa moi lo dotco prenu lo ka mi penmi ce'u ca ma kau}
Explanation. The x2 of {pa moi} is the ordering rule.
xorxes suggests to order the set of German people by the date "when I
met them". Ordering rule here must be a ka (quality),
so the quality is {ka mi penmi ce'u ca ma kau [kei]}.
or, literally, "the quality of my meeting them [=ce'u], at what time"?
{ma kau} stands here, because "when" is an indirect question.
mi'e .ianis.