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Grammar

Grammar links morphology to relationships between words. Read cases, agreement, clause structure and information structure together. A “default word order” is a statistical description, never permission to ignore the order in a particular text.

Grammar

The clause

A clause organizes a predicate and its participants. A predicate may be a verb, but nominal and other nonverbal predicates occur in many languages. Argument structure concerns what participants a predicate licenses; adjuncts add optional information such as place or time. Begin with overt markers and distribution, then test a translation.

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Lessons

Clauses and grammatical rolesUnderstand predicates, participants, subject and object without relying on translation order.Phrases and dependenciesTrace how words belong together and where a clause begins and ends.Tense, aspect and informationConnect verbal form with discourse context while keeping categories distinct.

A reading check

Worked question

A translation makes the first noun the agent, but case marking points elsewhere. Which evidence should you inspect next?

Show the analysis

Check the verb’s agreement, construction and clause context, then compare parallel forms. Do not let English word order decide the ancient parse.