256 Fiona Me Laughlin
4.1. A NOTE ON IDEOPHONES
Ideophones in Wolof can either accompany a verb as an intensifier and are thus
known as coverbal ideophones, or they can be used in quotative constructions
with the verb ne say', as in the examples in (63) and (64).
(63) Sa mbubb dafa set wecc
2sg:poss gown 3sg:vpoc ADj:clean IDEO
'Your gown is perfectly clean'
(64) Ne-leen mott!
say-2pl:iMPER iDEO:of leaving
'Get out of here!'
Like ideophones in many languages they have phonological features that are
unique to the set of ideophones and not found elsewhere in the language, in this
case certain geminates (as inguyy 'of being cold' or jerr 'of being hot') and a high
pitch accent. Most frequently, but not uniquely, coverbal ideophones occur with
adjectives, but there are also adjectives that do not have coverbal ideophones. Cer-
tain classes of adjectives, especially those denoting COLOURS and PHYSICAL PROP-
ERTIES, are more likely to have coverbal ideophones that have a high frequency of
use in natural discourse.
4.2. SEMANTIC TYPES
Wolof has adjectives that cover the core semantic categories of DIMENSION, AGE,
VALUE, and COLOUR. The category of DIMENSION has upwards of fifteen members,
including mag'big, tuuti 'small', ngande 'enormous', cappe 'tiny', rey 'big,yaa 'wide',
njool 'tall', gatt 'short', gudd 'long', xat 'narrow, tight', xoot 'deep', and tell 'shallow'.
There are two adjectives that fit the category AGE: bees 'new, fresh', and magget 'old'.
The category of VALUE includes baax good', ban 'bad', neex 'nice', naqari 'unpleasant',
and tumuranke 'strange', among others.
There are three underived COLOUR adjectives in Wolof, nuul 'black', weex 'white',
and xonq 'red'. Additional colour terms include adjectives that are derived from
nouns, such as mboq 'corn; yellow', coy 'parrot; green', or doomu taal 'ashes; grey.' In
urban Wolof French colour terms, e.g. wert green' (>verte), soon 'yellow' (>jaune),
and bulo 'blue' (>bleu), are also borrowed as adjectives. The three underived colour
adjectives have coverbal ideophones that function as intensifies, e.g. nuul kukk,
'black as night'.
Some but not all members of the four core semantic types can be nominalized,
primarily by suffixation of the abstract nominal morpheme l-aayl, e.g. nuulaay
'blackness', guddaay 'length', and baaxaay goodness'.
Beyond the core semantic types, Wolof adjectives also fall into many of the
peripheral types. There is a relatively large set of adjectives that refer to PHYSIC-
AL PROPERTIES and which show a propensity to co-occur with their ideophones
in natural discourse. Several of these adjectives have an extended metaphorical