Details

General

Morphemic form: {nappaq}V
New orthography: napparpoq
Old orthography: náparpoĸ
Sources: [MFSJLK10], [SK71], [CWSL58], [JP67], [CBBJRPIKJR97]
Combinations: View list
Constituents: {napə}V + V{'-q}V
Right sandhi: Default/none
Inflection sandhi: Default/none
Stem type: q-stem
Diathesis: Subjective
Valency: Preserving, Monovalent

Description and behaviour

Form and usage:

The meaning of this stem is 'Actor gets/becomes/falls ill'. However, the origin of this meaning is obscure:

According to the Comparative Eskimo Dictionary [MFSJLK10], this stem is presumably formed from a combination of {napə}V, 'break in twain', or 'is broken in twain', and the non-productive affix V{'-q}V, 'become Vb'ing'. The latter causes gemination in the preceding stem, here of /p/ to /pp/, and gemination could historically also cause an adjacent /ə/ to take the sound [a]. As this sound rule is not regularly active nowadays, we write this /ə/ as /a/ in the morphemic form given here.

However, if this etymology is correct, the literal meaning of this stem is thus: 'Actor becomes broken in twain'. It is not clear, how this has come to mean 'to become ill'.

Note also the (unrelated) stem {napa}V, 'is standing upright', which sometimes is thought to be the root of the present stem, albeit not according to the Comparative Eskimo Dictionary. This may be due to folk-etymology, since the change of /ə/ to [a] in this not active nowadays, so it is not surprising that native speakers would find it natural to view the root as /napa/ instead.


Meanings and examples


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