Causative constructions in Copala Triqui, continued

In an old post, I pointed out some unusual causative examples in Copala Triqui.

Here is another example in a text that shows some more of the syntax:

The literal translation is something like 'Although [[you suffer problems] causes Spanish]..' corresponding to 'Although Spanish causes you problems..'

More on causative in Copala Triqui

I wrote a bit about the odd causative construction in Copala Triqui in this post.  To recap, the normal syntax is

[VSO] cause SUBJ.

In the examples cited there, the aspect of the verb 'make' ('yaj) seems to match the aspect of the verb in the complement.  The following example -- if I am interpreting it correctly, seems to show a failure of aspect-matching:

One slight uncertainty -- this text comes from Hollenbach's (1977) version of these texts, published in Tlalocan.  The orthography uses a macron over the vowel to represent low register tone, rather than a line under the vowel.  So the original form of the word that I've retranscribed as cacaa̱ was written cacaā.  

In the usual form of the practical orthography for Triqui tone, cacaa̱ represents only cacaa³¹,  while
cacaa is either cacaa³ or cacaa³².  So as the text is written, it would normally correspond to c-acaa³¹. However, the word for 'burn' in Triqui is acaa³² (practical orthography acaa) and its potential is c-acaa² (c-aca̱a̱).

I'm tentatively guessing that this represents an earlier version of the practical orthography where perhaps both 31 and 32 tones were written vv̱…

If my interpretation is correct, then the two instances of the verb 'burn' are completive, while 'will make' qui'ya̱j is potential.

Update  11/23/2012

Barbara Hollenbach has kindly clarified for me by email the way the older practical orthography for tone worked.  I've tried to summarize my understanding in this post.  That means that my analysis in the earlier post is incorrect in identifying the instances of the verb <cacaā> as cacaa³².  Instead, it is an older way of writing c-acaa², which is the potential aspect form of 'burn'.  Thus the aspect of make (potential)' does match the aspect of the potential, and I don't have a counterexample to the tentative generalization that the two always match.  (A counterexample might still be found, but this doesn't turn out to be a valid counterexample.)

The new analysis of this passage is shown below:

Causatives in Colonial Valley Zapotec

Does the following passage from the Feria Doctrina (1567) show a /ko-/ or /go-/ causative prefix?  I don't think modern Valley Zapotec languages have this morpheme:

Causative constructions in Copala Triqui

The causative construction shows an unusual word order in Copala Triqui.  The normal order for these constructions is

[caused event]  'yaj SUBJ

Although the normal word order for Triqui is VSO, I do not think that causative constructions are ever in VSO order in natural text.  (The caused event clause, however, is in normal VSO order.)

The following passage shows a characteristic example.  (Note also that the aspect of the cause verb 'yaj typically matches the aspect of the verb(s) in the caused event.

Another similar example:

Far less common is the reversed pattern:

SUBJ 'yaj [caused event]

The examples I have seem to involve a causer subject that is fronted for some other reason, such as negation, or missing, due to relativization:

Another open question is the type of constituent the caused event may be.  In the examples above, it seems like a simple VSO clause.   But it is also possible for the caused event to contain some fronted material:

Here the caused event is [there:is:no illness [hit me]], where the noun chi'ii 'illness' has undergone the typical fronting to preverbal positions found with negative constituents.  (Maybe that is some sort of Focus Phrase?)

Zapotec valence

Reading through the description of a proposed volume for Brill on valence-changing devices in Zapotecan languages. I'd like to contribute something on San Dionisio Ocotepec Zapotec.

Following Kaufman, the editors (Aaron S and Natalie O) talk about *o- as one of the markers of causative, but I have always thought of it in the terms that Briggs (1961) (and maybe Pickett, but I don't remember) laid out, where some of the aspect markers have two allomorphs. So the habitual is ru- for some verb classes and ri- for others, but the -u and -i portions of these prefixes are not synchronically segmentable.

Also, an interesting comparison to the causative in Copala Triqui, which is usually tuk- added to the verb. The t- portion here is cognate to si- or ti-/di- prefixes in Zapotec and Chatino; the u- is possibly cognate to *o-, and the k- to the fortition prefix.