A DICTIONARY OF MADA, A PLATEAU LANGUAGE ... - Roger Blench

Mada dictionary: Front matter
CAVEAT LECTOR
The following version of the Mada dictionary still has problems you should be aware of. These are;
1. Verbs. The Mada verbal system is far from fully understood, but since all tense/aspect marking makes use of
tone and a basic CVC verb can bear up to four different tones in context, the tone of the head entry
becomes a matter of some importance. I now believe that the most useful form of the verb is the 2s present
tense, since from this all other forms can be predicted. At the moment, the head entries consist of the tone
in the present tense, and the past in the second column, except where a suppletive plural verb has been
identified, but these have not been checked. It is also clear that irregular verbs exist, but these have still to
be clarified. The tones may thus change in the final version of the dictionary.
2. Nouns. Whether a noun has a plural in Mada is hard to predict, and I have inserted a long dash in Column 2
where I have clear assertions that a word has no plural. However, many words seem to have two or three
plurals, a sign that the nominal system is in flux. Also some words may have plurals but they were
unknown at the time of elicitation. In this case, the cell is left blank.
3. Scientific identifications. Almost all the scientific names come from a single day spent in Rija, going through
books of images with a circle of elderly men. In the case of trees, we were sometimes able to see the tree in
question, but in most cases we have had to depend on the books. Scientific names should therefore be
regarded with appropriate scepticism.
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