A Grammar of Tamashek (Tuareg of Mali)

660 12 Extraction processes

c. war sssen-aev

Neg know.PerfN-lSgS

[msndajüAd i-mmu-t]

[when?-\Comit 3MaSgS-die.PerfP-Aug]

Ί don't know when he died.'

Another construction is to replace the WH-interrogative with an
appropriate non-interrogative expression. The attested conversions are given in
(782).

(782) Conversions From WH-Interrogative to Indefinite

WH-Interrogative gloss indefinite gloss

ma

ml

man-iket

andske

sndak ammsk

man-ammak

'what?'

'who?'

'how much?'

'where?'

'how?

α

ere

aniket

e

smmak

'what(-ever)

'who(-ever).

'amount...'

'where...'

'how...'

The indefinite element functions as the head noun of a definite relative
clause. The construction is therefore translatable as e.g. '(I don't know) the
thing that he ate', '(I don't know) the place to which he went', and so forth,
except that some of the indefinite nouns are reduced in form. The form e
'where?' is evidently reduced from e-dasgg 'place'. Other forms that are
arguably in the same etymological family are ed 'when/because' (§13.1.1.1,
§13.2.2) and ed 'whenever ...' (§12.1.6.4). Comparison of maniket with aniket
suggests that the former historically contains an interrogative initial beginning
with m (most other WH-interrogatives begin with m).

(783) [a-d: following "I don't know ..." etc.]

a. ... [a i-ksa]

... [what 3MaSgS-eat.PerfP]

'... what he ate'

b. ... [ere w-a

... [who Ma-Dem.Sg

i-zzaer-asn d-l-ha]

3MaSgS-dwell.Reslt-Partpl.MaSg here]

'... who is living here.'