Mando’a Grammar

Mando'a is a weakly inflected analytic language. It also has no noun classes (‘grammatical gender’). The meaning of sentences is mostly determined by word order. Mando’a has features of a language of pidgin history, such as utilitarian grammar and a small vocabulary which leads to using figures of speech for communicating ideas.

1. Nouns

Gendered words are rare in Mando’a. Mando’a has a single word, buir, for a parent regardless of gender. Similarly, there are no gendered nouns for children or a parent’s siblings: a child is ad, a parent’s sibling is ba’vodu.

Adjectives and nouns to indicate a being of a given gender exist in the lexicon, but because of Mandalorian cultural mores, they see little use in everyday interactions.

1. Plurals

The plural suffix is -(’)(s)e.

verd (‘soldier, warrior’) → verde (‘soldiers, warriors’)
cyare (‘beloved, popular’) → cyare’se (‘loved ones’)
prudii (‘shadow’) → prudiise (‘shadows’)

Sometimes words ending in vowels may be irregularly pluralised by replacing the final vowel with the plural -e[5]:

ad’ika (‘little one’) → adike (‘little ones’)
aru’ika (‘small enemy’) → aru’ike (‘small enemies’)

Or by adjoining -’e[5]:

ba’vodu (‘parent’s sibling’) → bavodu’e (‘parent’s siblings’)

It is also possible that edee (‘teeth, jaws’) is an irregular plural of a hypothetical *ede. This would be a precedent for words ending in e being pluralised using -e[5].

Certain nouns may be formed from adjectives, verb stems and other nouns by pluralising them. Examples of this formation are tolase (‘system’, lit. joined things) and werde (‘darkness’). Breakdown of tolase:

to (‘join, connection’, noun)

*tola (‘joined, connected’, adj.)

tolase (‘system’, noun)

Following this pattern, for example, *mirde would be a valid construction for ‘thoughts, mind’.

2. Articles

Articles are rarely used but exist in the vocabulary. The singular indefinite article is eyn. There is no plural indefinite article. The definite articles are te and the more emphatic haar.

The articles may be used for distinction. For example:

A simple statement of having an uj cake:

- Ni gaana uj’alayi. (no article)

A statement of eating the whole uj cake:

- Ni epa ani uj’alayi. (no article)

A simple statement of having found a strill:

- Ni mar’eyi striil. (no article)

Distinctions:

- Tion gar mar’eyi te striil? (‘Did you find the strill?’ i.e. the specific strill which is being looked for, uses te)
- Ni mar’eyi eyn striil. (‘I found a strill.’ i.e. maybe not the strill being referred to, uses eyn)

3. Genitival construction

Ownership is usually indicated using be, similar in use to the Basic “of”. Sometimes possession is indicated by joining the owner and owned, e.g. Boba’kad for “Boba’s saber”.

Like many other Mando’a prepositions, be can also act as a prefix and attach to the owner. For example, in be’jetii (‘Jedi’s’) and b’aru’e (‘foreigner’s, enemy’s’)

2. Pronouns

Mando’a has no gendered pronouns. All pronouns have identical subject and object forms, and the possessive forms are also the same for all except the 1st person pronouns. The 2nd person singular and plural are represented by the same word.

Personal pronouns in their different forms:

Examples of use:

- Ni kar’tayli gar darasuum (‘I love you forever.’)

- Meh gar kyrayc, shuk bah ni (‘If you’re dead, [you’re] useless to me.’)

- Kaysh meg miit'gaana, oyacyi. (‘They(sg.)/he/she who writes, remains.’)

- Mhi slana at yaim be ner buire nakar’tuur. (‘We go visit my parents tomorrow.’)

- Val olaro at cuun yaim epar ibi’tuur. (‘They come to our home to eat today.)

In phrases, the pronoun-as-object may be suffixed to the verb[3][5]:

- Ne shab'rud'ni. (‘Don’t fuck with me.’)

- Tion'gar verbori'ni? (‘Are you hiring me?’)

3. Adjectives and adverbs

Many, but not all, adjectives and adverbs end in -la or -yc. Usually, -la is used in stems ending in a vowel and -yc in ones ending with a consonant, but this is not a hard and fixed rule.

Using these suffixes, new adjectives may be constructed from nouns and truncated verbs on the fly.

Mando’a doesn’t differentiate between adjectives and adverbs. Whether a word describes a noun or the manner of an action is determined by context. Compare:

- Ni kaden. (‘I am angry.’)
- “Ni nu’kaden!” ni sirbu kaden. (‘“I’m not angry!”, I say angrily.’)

Comparison of adjectives happens by adding the comparative -(’)shya or -shy’a or the superlative -(’)ne.

dral (1. ‘bright, glowing’; 2. ‘strong, powerful’) → dralshy’a (‘stronger, brighter’) → dralne (‘strongest, brightest’)

dush (‘bad’) → dush’shya (‘worse’) → dushne (‘worst’)

jate (‘good’) → jate’shya (‘better’) → jatne (‘best’)

For adjectives ending in -la or -yc, these suffixes usually replace the adjective suffix[5].

burk’yc (‘dangerous’) → burk’shya (‘more dangerous’) → burk’ne (‘most dangerous’)

chaaj’yc (‘far’) → chaashya (‘further’)

For kot’la, the comparative suffix is added after the adjective ending[2]:

kot’la (‘brave’, also kotyc[5]) → kotla’shya (‘braver’)

Note how the addition of the comparative or superlative endings may or may not cause elision of parts of the base word.

4. Verbs

Infinitive verbs end in -ir, -ar, -ur, -or or -er. Verbs are conjugated by dropping the infinitive -r.

Infinitive: Copaanir. (‘to want’)

- Ni copaani ibac. (‘I want that.’)

There are no irregular verbs, but in everyday speech, the terminal vowel of the conjugated verb may be elided[3][5]:

- Ni copaani ibac. (‘I want that.’)

- Ni copaan ibac. (‘ want that.’)

- Ni copaan’ibac. (‘I want that.’)

When stringing two or more verbs together, the first verb is conjugated while the following one(s) remain in the infinitive:

- Ni copaani epar. (I want to eat.)

- Ni nu’lise laarar. (I can’t sing.)

4. Zero copula

Using the copula, cuyir (‘to be’), is optional in Mando’a. It is usually omitted in predicative expressions, such as Ni cuyi verd (‘I am [a] warrior.’), which becomes Ni verd, or Tra cuyi kebiin (‘[The] sky is blue.’), which becomes Tra kebiin.

In sentences where the subject is bic, ibic, ibac or another word which refers to a previously mentioned subject, both the subject and the cuyir may be dropped, leaving Bic cuyi jate (‘It is good.) as simply Jate (‘Good.’)[3].

5. Tenses

Mando’a is natively a tenseless language[1][3][4]. Data on expressing the time frame in Mando’a is limited, but in the absence of tenses, the time frame may be related via adverbs, verbs and words which establish a time reference. Examples:

- Ni borari nakar’tuur. (‘I work tomorrow.’)

- Ni gotal’u shun sha kih vaar’shya. ‘I made bread a while ago.’ lit. I make bread at [a] little earlier)

- Ni dajuna epar. (‘I’ll eat soon.’, lit. I plan to eat.)

- Ni olaro teh epar. (‘I just ate.’, lit. I come from eating)

A simplistic tense system has been derived from the nouns for past, ruyot, and future, vencuyot: a past tense preposition ru and a future tense preposition ven.

The tenses don’t see widespread use in day-to-day interactions between Mandalorians but may be used for contracts and during business interactions with non-Mandalorians.[1][3]

Ru and ven are prepositions that are placed after the subject and before the verb. Before a verb starting with a vowel, ru becomes r’ which is attached to the verb.

- Ni ru gotal’u shun vaar’shya. (‘I made bread earlier.’)

- Ni r’epa sha kih vaar’shya. (‘I ate a while ago.’ lit. I ate at [a] little earlier)

- Ni ven epa du’carshy’a. (‘I will eat later.’)

6. Moods

Mando’a has at least two grammatical moods: the imperative and the interrogative mood.

7. Imperative mood

The imperative mood is formed by the addition of ke before the word or phrase of the command. It may be used as a preposition or as a prefix. When attached to a word starting with a vowel, the suffix form may be shortened into k’-.

In formal circumstances, the verb of the command will be in its infinitive, but in everyday usage, the verb is conjugated.

Examples:

- K’oyacyi! (‘Cheers’, ‘Stay alive!’, note the conjugation.)

- Ke narir haar'ke'gyce rol'eta resol! (‘Execute Order 66!’, note the infinitive and the emphatic definite article haar.)

Ke is also often used with what appear to be adjectives or even nouns, but are usually instances of clipped verbs.[5]

- Ke serim! (‘Take aim!’, a clipped form of Ke serimir! lit. ‘Be accurate!’)

- Ke’mot! (‘Halt!’, a clipped form of Ke’motir! lit. ‘Stand!’)

- K’olar! (‘Come here!’, a clipped form of K’olaror! lit. ‘Come!’)

- K’uur! (‘Silence!’, possibly a true case of imperative+noun, from uur, ‘silence’.)

The imperative mood may be co-opted to express suggestions as well:

- Ke mhi slana. (‘Let’s go!’, lit. ‘We go.’)

8. Interrogative mood

For questions, the interrogative preposition tion is used. The addition of tion transforms a statement into a question:

Statement:

- Wayii, gar epa gihaal. (Good grief, you ate gihaal.)

Question:

- Wayii, tion gar epa gihaal? (Good grief, did you eat gihaal?)

(For context, like garlic, gihaal doesn’t have the most friendly smell.)

Tion is often translated as “what”, but it is more accurately described as a “verbal question mark”.

Dative case

Mando’a uses the dative case to indicate the indirect object of an action[5].

• Meh gar kyrayc, shuk’yc bah ni. (‘You're no use to me dead.’ lit. If you [are] dead, [you are] useless to me.)

1. Expressing possibility

Unlike Basic, Mando’a does not have words that express conditional mood. To create constructions similar in meaning, words such as meh (‘if’) and sha ca’nara (‘when’), or ones indicating possibility: ret (‘maybe’), ret’yc (‘possible, possibly’), cuyla (‘probable, probably’), may be used.

• Ni ret’enteyo epar. (‘I should eat.’)
• Meh gar dinui kai’tome bah ni, ni lise epar. (‘If you gave me food, I could eat.’)
• Ni ret vaabi ibac. (‘I might do that.’)

1. Passive voice

Mando’a is not considered to have a passive voice[3]. It is possible to form a passive, but the structure is not readily recognizable as such. Passive voice is formed using the verb cuyir (‘to be’), which may be dropped, and an adjective:[4]

- Kurshi hokan’yc daab. (‘The tree is cut down.’)

- Tion’meg besbe cuyi linyc? (‘What gear is needed?’)

The latter may also be shortened to:

- Me’besbe linyc? (‘What gear [is] needed?’)

For all intents and purposes, the passive voice is identical to the use of adjectives.

A type of passive may also be formed using gar, val and adate, for example, Adate sirbu meg… (‘People say, that...’).

5. Negation

Words may be negated using a negative prefix, which may be n’-, nu-, nu’-, ne or ne’-, depending on the ease of pronunciation. It may be seen in words such as ne’waadas (‘poverty’, from waadas, ‘wealth’), neverd (‘civilian’, from verd, ‘soldier, warrior’), nuhaatyc (‘invisible’, from haatyc, ‘visible’) and n’epar (‘to not eat’, from epar, ‘to eat’).

Nu or ne may also be used as a preposition to negate a word (Nu draar, ‘No way’) or phrase.

Double negation is used for emphasis in Mando’a: Nu draar literally means ‘Not never’[5].

6. Word order

The word order of Mando’a is generally subject-verb-object, but may be reversed in some questions where the tion-word is not the subject, such as Tion’ad ti gar oyacyi? or Tion’ad gar oyacyi ti? (‘Who do you live with?’). The reverse word order is rarely seen, as most phrases can be paraphrased: Tion’ad oyacyi ti gar? (‘Who lives with you?’)

The expressions su cuy’gar (‘Hello’, lit. You're still alive.) and ret’urcye mhi (‘Maybe we'll meet again’) lead with the verb and end with the subject and may be relicts of an archaic VSO word order.

7.   Sources

1. Burton, Bonnie, 2006. Inside Mando’a Culture and Language. Star Wars Insider #86 Online Supplement. https://docs.google.com/document/d/13ExJ-1U3njrGB2jN6d307Z1N9L0YpJzLjeMmO_MBZ4A.

2. Traviss, Karen, 2006a. Legacy of the Force: Bloodlines. Del Rey.

3. Traviss, Karen, 2006b. Mandalorians: People and Culture. Star Wars Insider, 86, 18–26. https://docs.google.com/document/d/16qEFJxEDzgaNiBPJSpdVyUdmiU9V9-Ba8DaLHGxcuoQ.

4. Traviss, Karen, 2006c. Mando’a — Quick Grammar Guide. karentraviss.org. https://web.archive.org/web/20110717133854/http://www.karentraviss.com/html/grammarguide.htm, Wayback Machine.

5. Traviss, Karen, 2007. MandoaApril09.xls. karentraviss.org. https://web.archive.org/web/20100119194114/http://www.karentraviss.com/html/documents/MandoaApril09.xls, Wayback Machine. https://mandoa.org/, Mando’a Database.

Additional Resources

1. Canon and Fanon Vocabulary. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vgjEg5FyS-tWP0aBaJGus93jlZSWSTdH4XdlmzBjn60/edit?usp=drivesdk

2. Mando'a recordings by Karen Traviss and songs from Republic Commando. https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1uTDKiZXkQzGnbgBZ1Jd5L3pDQByv3I1M