Lesson 7 — Making verbs out of nouns 1 — the suffix –i  

Like other languages, Samala has ways of making nouns out of verbs and verbs out of nouns. You've already seen the prefix  al–, which turns a verb into an agent noun — one who does or is whatever the verb describes.
Derivation is the term for when you make a noun into a verb or vice versa. For example, in English the noun "arrival" is derived from the verb "arrive," and the verb "crystallize" is derived from the noun "crystal." Derivative is the technical term for a derived form, such as "arrival" and "crystallize."
A very common derivative suffix is –i. It turns nouns into verbs. In the examples below youll see that the vowel of this suffix may vary and sometimes it drops out if the noun ends in a vowel or glottal stop. The range of meanings with –i covers:
"to be characterized by the noun," as in eto be smoky  
  tow–i > towo "to be smokey" < tow "smoke" to be wet
    o–i > o "to be wet" < o "water"
    nuy–i >   "to be grimy, dirty" < nuy "grime, grunge"
towo
o
"to own, possess, or be related to the noun," as in  
    qo–i > qo "to have a pet" < qo "pet" (man) to be married, have a wife
    talik–i   "(man) to be married, have a wife" < talik "wife"
    itn–i   "to have a child/children" < itn "child" qo
"to put on, wear, carry or use the noun," as in
to put on/wear a headdress
 taliki
    cux–i > uxi "to put on/wear a headdress" < cux "headdress" to be armed, carry a weapon
    ickuyan-i > ikuyani "to be armed, carry a weapon" < ickuyan "bow, weapon"
    tiwalulay–i   "to play the flute" < tiwalulay "flute"
uxi
"to affected by the noun," as in   ikuyani
    yasis–i > yaii "to have (a case of) poison oak" < yasis "poison oak" to have (a case of) poison oak yaii
    momoy–i   "to be drunk, intoxicated with Jimson weed — momoy
     
The particle inu "true, truly," also shows up with the suffix –i:
inu–i>   inu   "to be true, valid"    
This suffix usually shows up as –i but sometimes the vowel changes or drops out, especially after another vowel or a vowel plus glottal stop, as in
  o–i > o "to be wet" o ha huu the dog is wet
  qo–i > qo "to have a pet"
  inu-i >    inu   "to be true, valid"  
Later lessons will cover the details of these changes.

The overlap of meanings with –i
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The –i form of nouns may cover more than one of the categories of meaning you just saw. For example,  tiwalulay–i could mean
  "to play the flute"       he's playing the flute
or  
 "to own a flute"     tiwalulayi
or  
 "to have or carry a flute"      
So –i is a highly productive suffix, meaning that you can add it to a great many nouns, even if you'd never heard it with that particular noun before.
           
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