Ad. pronouns grammar.
There are no attested independent pronouns in Adûnaic. Where pronominal elements appear, they are attached to verbs or prepositional suffixes. These elements form an almost complete pronoun paradigm:
Person | Singular | Plural |
---|---|---|
1st person | hê “me” | nê “us” |
2nd person | ki “you” | ? |
3rd person neuter | a “it” | ya “they” |
3rd person masculine | u “he” | yu “they” |
3rd person feminine | hi “she” | *yi “they” |
The first person pronouns are only attested as objects: kitabdahê “[you] touch me” (SD/250), nênud “on us” (SD/247); it isn’t clear whether they can be used as subjects. The other pronouns are only attested as subjects and it is not clear whether they can be used as objects. The 3rd person feminine plural pronoun is not attested, but generalizing from the neuter and masculine plural pronouns, the form *yi seems likely.
The second person pronoun ki is attested only in the phrase bâ kitabdahê “Don’t [you] touch me”. It is not glossed, but many authors have suggested it is probably the second person pronoun (AL/Adûnaic, LGtAG, NBA/18). It resembles the Primitive Elvish 2nd person familiar pronoun ✶ki, to which it might be related. If so, it is probably a singular pronoun; whether it can also be used for the plural is unclear. None of the other Adûnaic pronouns have clear Elvish cognates, so the resemblance could just be a coincidence.
Finally, Thorsten Renk suggested (NBA/18) that hê may instead be a marker for the imperative. He suggested an invented word !ni for “I, me” to use for the 1st persons singular pronoun instead (NBA/18), as a cognate of Q. ni.
Related