Footnote:
[9] It must be remembered that all roots or root-words in Esperanto are either sexless, or have only the sex naturally belonging to the root, unless the feminine suffix—IN—be added. For instance, vir- gives the idea of "man" (male), therefore viro = a man; and we always speak of viro as li = he, because we are sure the noun refers to the male sex. But the root infan- gives only the idea of a "child" (neuter), so, unless we actually know the child is a male, we speak of infano = child as ĝi = it, just as we do in English. When a suffix denoting a person, such as -estr-, -ist-, -ul-, is added to a root, the noun is sexless, or may be presumed to be masculine, unless the feminine -in- be also added.
41. With reference to the above, it will be observed that Dr. Zamenhof calls all combinations of letters,[10] which convey an idea, a "word," as for instance frat, in, o, but in practice the student may find it helpful to use the terms which are defined in pars. [37]–39, and (with the exception of the primary words in the list, [Part V].) to call no
combination a "word" until it receives a grammatical termination.
Footnote:
[10] Not only combinations of letters, but each vowel (as already shown in the case of O), conveys an idea, and is therefore, technically speaking, a word; for instance—
- A conveys the idea of quality and marks the Adjective.
- E conveys the idea of modification and marks the Adverb.
- I conveys the idea of indefiniteness and marks the Infinitive mood.
- O conveys the idea of existence, entity and marks the Noun.
- U conveys the idea of order and marks the Imperative mood.
In the table of Correlative Words, Dr. Zamenhof carries out the idea of indefiniteness in the I series, ia, ial, iam, etc.; all, however, be it noted, independent indivisible roots (see par. [147]). In fact ia, ie, io, might be considered as adjective, adverb, and noun, regularly formed from the indefinite word (or grammatical termination as we call it) "i."
42. Grammatical Terminations (gramatikaj finiĝoj).—Every word in Esperanto, except the primary words, has a grammatical termination which shows:—
(a). The part of speech.