Kaurna

Introduction

Kaurna is no longer spoken as a native language, but it is being revived with the aid of a remarkable dictionary of Kaurna compiled by two German missionaries in the 1840s. Kaurna is the language of the Kaurna people, an indigenous ethnic group, in South Australia.

The verb

Indicative

• The Present Tense is expressed by the termination, -ndi, which remains in all persons and numbers the same
• The Preterite, or Aorist, -tti, throughout all persons and numbers
• The Perfect, a, i, or o, in all persons and numbers
• The Future, ta (and, according to the dialects, in ita, ota, ngutt*,) throughout all persons and numbers

Imperative

There occurs no common termination for the imperative, neither does there appear to be any distinction of time in it.

Prohibitive

• This terminates in urti, rti, ngutti, oti, or tit, in all persons and numbers the same.

Optative

• This mood, named thus because it expresses the wish or the will of a person, is not marked by a particular termination.

Verblist

• battendi
• kaintyirrinthi
• kaityanthi
• malariappendi
• mukapapanthi
• ngungulirdu
• nuki winturrinthi
• payinthi
• payirrinthi
• tadlibandi
• tadlibattendi
• wappendi
• watunthi
• wintunthi
• winturrinthi
• wirrkanthi
• wirrkarrinthi
• worniappendi
• yailtyanthi