xayumuakayayú, I make myself crazy, etc.
Such examples, however, are not rare, as may be seen by turning over the leaves of Montoya’s Tesoro de la Lengua Guarani. The most noticeable and most American peculiarity of such compounds is that they are not collocations of words, as are the agglutinative compounds of the Ural-Altaic tongues, but of particles and phonetic elements which have no separate life in the language.
Father Montoya calls special attention to this in the first words of his Advertencia to his Tesoro. He says:—“The foundation of this language consists of particles which frequently have no meaning if taken alone; but when compounded with the whole or parts of others (for they cut them up a great deal in composition) they form significant expressions; for this reason there are no independent verbs in the language, as they are built up of these particles with nouns or pronouns. Thus, ñemboé is composed of the three particles ñe, mo, e. The ñe is reciprocal; mo an active particle; e indicates skill; and the whole means ‘to exercise oneself,’ which we translate, ‘to learn,’ or ‘to teach,’ indeterminately; but with the personal sign added, anemboe, ‘I learn.’”
This analysis, which Montoya carries much further, reminds us forcibly of the extraordinarily acute analysis of the Cree (Algonkin) by Mr. James Howse.[[322]] Undoubtedly the two tongues have been built up from significant particles (not words) in the same manner.
Some of these particles convey a peculiar turn to the whole sentence, difficult to express in our tongues. Thus the element é attached to the last syllable of a compound gives an oppositive sense to the whole expression; for example, ajur, “I come” simply; but if the question follows: “Who ordered you to come?” the answer might be, ajuré, “I come of my own accord; nobody ordered me.”[[323]]
Cavalcanti observes that many of these formative elements which existed in the old Tupi have now fallen out of use.[[324]] This is one of several evidences of a change in structure in the language, a loss of its more pliable and creative powers.
This synthesis is also displayed in the Tupi, as in the Cree, by the inseparable union of certain nouns with pronouns. The latter are constantly united with terms of consanguinity and generally with those of members of the body, the form of the noun undergoing material modifications. Thus:
tete, body; cete, his body; xerete, my body.
tuba, father; oguba, his father; xerub, my father.
mymbaba, domestic animal; gueymba, his domestic animal.