Captive in the rainforests of the West, they brought you to Rome, slave, they gave you the blacksmith work and you make chains.
The incandescent iron you take out of the oven can be adapted as you wish, you could make swords so your people could break the chains, but you, o slave, you make chains, more chains.
Ba kom:
Oya a fa si ta di bom cay aw wes a ben si la ciw rom, in hay pak, oya a gi han mel tem e si, si a yap il kip.
Si a po gon wa jo mel tem ray lum, si wa tek min sanok fo, uy wel si, si a po gon wa sa sep e pop si wa po wa rom il kip, en, si, in hay pak, si a yap il kip, il kip saysay.
Back translation:
They catch you in western rainforest (and) bring you to Rome, slave, they give you blacksmithing, you make chain.
You could fit the glowing iron that you take out of the oven to your will, you could make sword so your people can break chain, however, you, slave, you keep making chain, chain.
Oya a fa si ta di bom cay aw wes a ben si la ciw rom, in hay pak,
/ʔo̞ˈja ʔa fa si ta di bo̞m tʃaj ʔaw we̞s ʔa be̞n si la tʃiw ro̞m | ʔin haj pak/
oya – [pronoun] they
a – [particle] positive indicative
fa – [transitive verb] catch
si – [pronoun] you
ta – [stative verb] located in/at/on
di bom cay aw – [noun] rainforest
di – [noun] land
bom – [noun] tree
cay – [noun] fall
aw – [noun] water
wes – [noun] west
a – [particle] positive indicative
ben – [transitive verb] to bring
si – [pronoun] you
la – [stative verb] arriving at
ciw rom – [noun] Rome
ciw – [noun] city
rom – [noun] Roman
in hay pak – [noun] slave
in – [noun] person
hay – [noun] service
pak – [noun] coercion, compulsion, forced
oya a gi han mel tem e si, si a yap il kip.
/ʔo̞ˈja ʔa gi han me̞l te̞m ʔe̞ si | si ʔa jap ʔil kip/
oya – [pronoun] they
a – [particle] positive indicative
gi – [transitive verb] give
han mel tem – [noun] blacksmithing
han – [noun] work
mel tem – [noun] iron (“adding-metal”)
e – [stative verb] to/for/of
si – [pronoun] you
si – [pronoun] you
a – [particle] positive indicative
yap – [transitive verb] to create
il kip – [noun] chain
il – cord, thread, rope, string
kip – bond; link (of a chain)
Si a po gon wa jo mel tem ray lum, si wa tek min sanok fo, uy wel si,
/si ʔa po̞ go̞n wa dʒo̞ me̞l te̞m raj lum si wa te̞k min saˈno̞k fo̞ ʔuj we̞l si/
si – [pronoun] you
a – [particle] positive indicative
po – [stative verb] able (to), possible (to)
gon – [aspect marker] future/conditional
wa – [particle] positive subordinating
jo … uy – [transitive verb] to fit, to adapt, to adjust
mel tem – [noun] iron
ray lum – [noun] glowing, incandescence
ray – [verb] to radiate
lum – [noun] light
There's cel / чел / چئل, which means "sky" or, figuratively, "weather". This is from words in Romance languages like Spanish cielo, French ciel, Italian cielo, and Portuguese céu.
Before this, I was using haw nat / хав нат / هاۋ نات, literally "high air".
Then beng / бең / بئڠ, which means "bottle", "vase", or "pitcher", basically any kind of container for liquids which has a narrowed opening.
It's from Chinese 瓶, pronounced ping in Mandarin, peng in Cantonese, byou in Japanese, bình in Vietnamese, and byeong in Korean.
And finally there's sanok / санок / سانؤک, which refers to any kind of cube-shaped container that may have a lid, like a box, case, trunk, chest, crate, coffer, or casket .
This is from Arabic صندوق ṣandūq, Persian صندوق sanduq, Urdu صندوق sandūq, Hindi सन्दूक़ sandūq, and Serbo-Croatian sanduk/сандук.
Before creating these words, the word kiten / китен / کىتئن "container" had covered all the uses of beng and sanok. Now there are four words for containers or vessels: bek / бек / بئک "bag/sack/pouch", can / чан / چان "cup/bowl", and the two new ones.
e sun bo – healthy, wholesome, conducive to good health and wellbeing
e sun nobo – unhealthy, unwholesome, conducive to poor health and wellbeing
i sun bo – healthy, fit, sound, in good health
i sun nobo – unhealthy, unfit, out of shape, in poor health
kasun – hospital
kasun bis – veterinary, animal hospital
Etymology:
German gesund, Gesundheit, Dutch gezond, gezondheid, Danish sund, sundhed, Swedish sund, sundhet, Norwegian sunn, sunnhet.
This word used to be a compound haw bi, literally “air of life”, but I decided to create a separate root for the concept. Incidentally, haw bi now means “nitrogen”.
one limitation of ba kom is there's a lot of information i can't find.
for instance, the word for "blackfoot people" is <pop pu sut>, literally "black foot people", which is a translation of blackfoot ᓱᖽᐧᖿ siksiká.
however the name for the cahuilla people is just a phonetic loan, <pop iwiyu> from the first part of Ivilyuat ʔivil̃uʔat "Ivilyuat language" and ʔivil̃uqaletem "cahuilla people". this is because i can't find a source on what ʔivil̃u- translates as, if anything.
maybe at some point i'll do a lot of digging to find experts or somehow get access to scholarly works on poorly documented languages like Ivilyuat to fix this problem.
This word which I just coined, “sin po”, is inspired by the Chinese word 以為. It is a transitive verb which means “to be under the impression; has/had a belief which one may no longer hold by; to mistakenly believe.” This word is useful because Ba kom has no past tense, which in English is used to make the distinction of a past vs. present belief. It should be noted that this word can also be used in the context of the present or future, not just the past.
The word literally means “possibly believe”, from sin “believe” and po “possible”.
For example:
Mi a sin po ne bin wa ni malak.
“I thought that building was abandoned.” (Literally: “I was, although no longer am, under the impression that that building was without ownership.”)
An ni malak, a no en wan bon tomo in ta ne.
“It’s not abandoned, it’s just that no one lives there.”
Oya a sin po oya wa jan mi, en, an jan mi cin.
“They think they know me, but they don’t really know me.”
E wak wa ben simi la ben sem yak saw wi to te e de ben, inin a sin po si wa in cu hi mi.
“When we show up to the dance party together tomorrow, people will think you’re my significant other.”
A lot of Ba kom words have ended up being total or partial calques of Navajo terms, because a lot of Navajo words are transparent and easily calqued phrases where other languages have a single word of obscure etymology.
Anyways, here’s some examples of Ba kom words calqued from Navajo:
kus gamal nek biliw – cassowary
Literally “blue necked ostrich”, from Navajo tsídiitsoh bikʼos dootłʼizhí.
pet sil – glass
Literally “star stone”, from Navajo tsésǫʼ.
pet fo – charcoal; carbon
Literally “fire stone”, from Navajo tsékǫ’.
gok pun rang – Guinea fowl
Literally “spotted chicken”, from Navajo naaʼahóóhaiłkizhígíí.
bal mus ran aw – mink, marten
Literally “shore weasel”, from Navajo tábąąh dlǫ́’ii.
satan pi su aw – shrimp, prawn
Literally “water floor crustacean”, from Navajo táłtłʼááh chʼosh daadánígíí “bottom of the water worm meal”.
fuy daw – pepper (fruit of the capsicum plant)
Literally “medicine fruit”, from Navajo azeedíchʼííʼ “spicy medicine”.
| mi | a | pe | wa | dil | kak | si |
| I | ᴘᴀʀᴛɪᴄʟᴇ | through | ᴘᴀʀᴛɪᴄʟᴇ | deal with | rubbish | you |
“I’m done dealing with your bullshit.”
The stative verb pe “through” can be used in combination with a subordinate clause with the particle wa/wan to indicate an action that has been performed to its conclusion, like English “done with -ing” or “through -ing”.
