Grammar and logic free language from being at
the mercy of the tone of voice. Grammar
protects us against misunderstanding the sound
of an uttered name; logic protects us against
what we say have double
meaning.
Rosenstock Huessy
FUNDAMENTALS OF MODERN ARMENIAN
GRAMMAR
The fundamentals of grammar, regardless of the
language, are based on
function
and
usage,
irrelevant to the levels of usage –- vulgar,
colloquial or formal. Grammar also has logic, a
definite form and structure. “Form and
Structure” are parts of speech where words have
certain functions in communicating thoughts. In
Modern Armenian grammar, words are classified
according to their function in a sentence and
are divided into eight groups, although there
is nothing necessary and eternal in this
eight-fold division of words (Aristotle counted
only four):
Nouns
– Pronouns – Verbs – Adjectives – Adverbs
Adpositions – Conjunctions –
Interjections.
Although the fundamental elements of Eastern
and Western variants are almost identical,
slight differences exist between the
two.
Fundamentals
of Western Armenian:
NOUNS:
Nouns in Armenian have no grammatical gender.
They are distinguished by two numbers (singular
& plural). The declension of the nouns uses
suffixes and has six cases:
Nominative, Accusative, Genitive, Dative,
Ablative and Instrumental.
Being a highly agglutinative language, the
inflections of the nouns may include multiple
morphemes.
PRONOUNS:
Similar to the nouns, pronouns have no gender
and six distinct cases of
declension.
VERBS:
Verbs in the Armenian language are divided into
three groups. The conjugation of the verbs
includes three moods:
The Indicative, Imperative
and
Obtative (subjunctive). Present, Present
Imperfect, Past Perfect, Past Imperfect, Past
Pluperfect, Future
and
Future Pluperfect
are the tenses of the conjugation. In addition
to
Transitive
and
Neutral
verbs, Armenian has
Causative
and
Reflective
voices.
ADJECTIVES:
Adjectives are used before the nouns they
qualify.
ADVERBS:
In general,
Adverbs are used before the verbs they qualify.
It is also distinguished by the application of
a cluster of adverbs in a
sentence.
ADPOSITIONS:
In general, Armenian uses postpositions while
prepositions are very few and usually
associated with the Dative case of the
declension.
Fundamentals
of Eastern Armenian:
Coming
Soon