8.6 Verbal nouns 511'remember' aekt t-a-kaeto-t t-i-kaeto-t-en
'bellow' arku t-a-rseko-t-t t-i-raeko-t-en
'moo, roar' anju t-a-nasjo-t-t t-i-naejo-t-eni. VblN t-a-CaCCi-t-t
'sprout' aeks t-a-kassi-t-t —
[also t-a-kassaw-t]j. VblN t-a-Cu-t-t or t-aCu-t-t
'(dog) bark' asu t-asu-t-t (T-ka) t-asu-t-en
'bray' aru t-a(-)ru-t-t —
'cough' asu t-a-su-t-t t-l-su-t-enk. VblN t-iPPu-t-t (or t-ePPu-t-t)
'gag (vomit)' aqqu t-iqqu-t-t t-iqqu-t-en
[arguably t-eqqu-t-t]The subtypes in (541.a-d) form one cluster, and for all of them the most
common PI is t-i-CaPP with final geminate. This PI corresponds to "tiCaPPa"
in Niger Tamajak, e.g. Sg "tenäre", PI "tinaqqa" as VblN of 'kill'
(LTF2:246), but in Mali Tamashek the connection between t-i-CaPP and
regular unsuffixed ablaut plurals with
(§4.1.2.24). In the Sg, the medial C is geminated in (541.c-d) but not in
(541.a-b). It may be that the Sg gemination correlates with the choice of
medial C (anterior fricatives including sibilants), but the small number of
examples makes it difficult to confirm such a correlation. The Sg vocalic
prefix is -α-, and the stem-final V is a, in (541.b,d). By contrast, the Sg vocalic
prefix is -e-, and the stem-final V is e, in the more abundant types (541.a,c). α
and e are elsewhere closely related phonologically. It is likely that stem-final α
and e here represent original Fe suffixes (MGT 5.336ff.), but I do not favor a
synchronic segmentation.
The VblN's in (541.e), of type t-aCCa (or t-aeCCa), are somewhat
problematic. If the first C is a BLC, as in 'want' and 'triumph', the form is
heard as phonetic [tasCra], and only the analogy to t-akma 'disease' and t-anfa
'usefulness' with clearly audible a points to representations of the type t-aCCa.
The short V does not function as a vocalic prefix and is therefore unchanged in
the PI, which has either suffix -ten (postvocalic variant of FePl -en), or ...w-en
with stem-extension w.
These t-aCCo (or t-aeCCa) VblN's might also be taken as special
"nominal" verbalizations of the 3FeSg form of the PerfP, e.g. t-arha [tae'rha]
'she wanted', t-akma 'she got sick'. See also t-aeqqaen (and variants) 'tying'
(546.c) in §8.6.1.2, below.
The types (541.f-k) have the complete FeSg circumfix t-...(-t)-t. They have
regular suffixal plurals in -(t-)en. The most common of these has Sg
t-a-CaPPaw-t in (541.f), where the w is connected (in a synchronically non-