180 Chapter 6 Clause types
(170) Badha reng lake' se andhi' ana' settong nyama-na Bang Pote.
exist man REL have child one name-DEF garlic
‘There was a man who had a child named Bang Pote.’
(171) Badha burus ngekke' tokang pos.
exist dog AV.bite worker postal
‘A dog bit the mail carrier.’
In (170), repeated from above, a new character is introduced into a narrative
unknown to the addressee. In (171), an unspecified, unknown dog attacked the
mail carrier. Of course, once these nominals have been introduced into the dis-
course, they are specified and are potential subjects for later sentences.
Subjects are the sole constituents of a clause with this restriction. Direct
objects, actors/agents of object voice clauses, and prepositional objects are un-
restricted. New discourse participants can also be introduced in any of these
positions.
(172) Soleha ngerem sorat ka Marhamah.
Soleha AV.send letter to Marhamah
‘Soleha sent a letter to Marhamah.’
(173) Ale' e-kekke' embi'.
yngr.sibling OV-bite goat
‘Little Brother was bitten by a goat.’
(174) Bapa' terro a-berri'-a pesse dha' mored.
father want AV-give-IRR money to student
‘Father wants to give money to a student.’
There is a systematic ambiguity, however. Any of the boldfaced NPs in these
sentences can be interpreted as specific or definite. So, (172) can also mean
‘Soleha sent the letter to Marhamah’ (173) can also mean ‘Little Brother was
bitten by the goat’, and (174) can also mean ‘Father wants to give the money to
the student’. The precise interpretation depends on the discourse context in
which the sentence occurs.