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3.9.0 The Associative case expresses accompampaniment and has two allo-cases : the Sociative and the Comitative, which may by considered complementary variants.

The Sociative allo-case expresses accompaniment or coming together in a social act of two or more animate nouns. It is marked by the freely varying z

or z

and z

with ze being much more frequent.

(39)(a) ¹ pu² z (d)³ v⁴	‘I¹ went⁴ with³ him²’
(b) k¹ ptk² A³z(d)⁴ vr⁵	‘They¹ all² came⁵ with⁴ me³’
(c) n¹ pu² z³ ns⁴ lyv⁵	‘You¹ may dance⁴ with³ her²’
(d) tf¹ pu² ny³ z(d)³ vi⁴	‘(The) dog¹ is going⁴ with³its puppy²’
(e) ¹ sd² ³ z⁴ ks ty⁵	‘I¹ will meet⁵ (with)⁴ you³ tomorrow²’
(f) ¹ ² pu³ z(d)⁴ by⁵	‘I¹ live⁵ with⁴ my² father³’

3.9.1 The Comitative allo-case also a situation of accompaniment but where the subject is primary and active and the object noun complements in the predicate phrase are passive and secondary in a scale of semantic primacy or importance. The subject may be said to have the noun complement referents in its possession. The comitative is marked by s* and the less frequent s*d* and occurs only with inanimate substantives.

(40)(a) ¹ lsd² s³ lsk⁴ n⁵ v⁶	‘I¹ took³ (the) book² to⁵
	(the) school⁴ or
(b) ¹ lsd² s³ lski⁴ n⁵ v⁶	‘I¹ went⁶ to⁵ (the) school⁴
	with³(the) book²’
(c) rvz¹ lbo² s³ vr⁴	‘Ravizo¹ brought³ (the) box²’
(d) k¹ kim² s vr³	‘They¹ brought³/came with³
	the dead body²’

3.9.2. The Comitative with animate nouns is not formally different from the Sociative. In other words,

) k

may mean either ‘I went home with her’ or ‘I took her home’

3.10 The Genitive which is not a case relationship but a surface neutralization of diverse underlying case relations, relates a noun or nouns and a substantive. This relationship is expressed

________________

⁷Notice the examples given to illustrate instruments of motion (in 3.8.1) : s

the comitative marker is used for owned or possessed vehicles and ze for public vehicles.

typically by juxtapostion, the order being the gentival-head noun The following semantic areas of the Genitive may be identifed :

(a) Human relationship

z	‘my friend’
pu kmi	‘his wife’

(b) possession-

(i) Inalienable. In alienable possessive phrases, the classifier is dropped as noted in 2.1.1. This includes kinship terms and body parts.

ny	‘son’	pu ny	‘her son’
pu	‘father’	pu	‘your father’
mh	‘eyes’	pu mh	‘her eye(s)’
m	‘body’	m	‘my body’
thz	‘name’	pu z	‘her name’

(ii) Alienable possession or ownership

sli k	‘Selie’ house’
n lsd	‘Ni’s book’

¹ rn²	‘our¹ village/nation²’
pu¹ thny²	‘his¹ khel²’

(d) Partitive

mz¹ ph2	‘leg² of(the) table¹’
¹ k² z³	‘part³ of my¹ house²’
br¹ bo²	‘arm² of (the) chair¹’

(e) Expressive of measurement of time or space.

khr¹ s² cht³	‘three² months¹ leave³’
dybd¹ pu² rv³	‘a² week’s¹ tour³’

(f) (i) Expressive of an internal or inherent attribute

kr¹ ks²	‘(the) depth² of the river¹’
pu¹ ch²	‘his¹ height²’
ji¹ kch²	‘(the) length² of the hand¹’
k¹ krkri²	‘(the) height² of the building/house¹’

(ii) Expressive of an extornal or acquired attribute

h¹ m²	‘(the) price² of this¹’
¹ k² i³	‘(the) rent³ of my¹ house²’
rn¹ krt²	‘village¹ head²’

(g) Purposive

thnmi¹ lesk²	‘women’s¹ college²’
thpfk¹ rzk²	‘boy’s¹ hostel/camp²’
mci¹ bo²	‘salt¹ container/ box²’
ts¹ pf²	‘winter¹ clothes²’


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