Upper Necaxa is a highly polysynthetic, largely head-marking language with nominative/accusative clausal alignment.
| (1) | wa:ho:tán i’ki:la’hama:’hs’onchi’panánli’ | ||
| wa:ho:tán | i’k–ki:–la’ha–ma:–a’h–s’o–n–chi’pá–nan–li’ | ||
| yesterday | 1sg.sub–rt–face–cs–head–fire–vbl–hold–dtrn–pfv | ||
| ‘I went out fishing at night with a light again yesterday.’ | |||
| (2) | pus chuwá: tataxtúlh tza’má misín | ||||
| pus | chuwá: | ta–taxtú–lh | tza’má | misín | |
| intj | now | 3pl.sub–dcs–out–pfv | that | jaguar | |
| ‘Well, now the jaguars came out.’ | |||||
| (3) | kit i’ka:li:la’has’owili:ni’má:lh sé:raj tza’má lakstín | ||||
| kit | i’k–ka:–li:–la’ha–s’o–wilí:–ní’–ma:lh | sé:raj | tza’má | lakstín | |
| I | 1sg.sub–pl.obj–inst–face–fire–put–ben–prog | wax | that | children | |
| ‘I am lighting up the children’s faces with a candle.’ | |||||
Constituent-order is flexible and governed primarily by information structure, although the unmarked order seems to be V-initial (VS/VO).
Grammatical relations are marked exclusively on the verb, verbs agreeing with their subjects and up to two objects in ditransitive constructions.
| (4) | kinta:tá nakimaxki:yá:n | |
| kin–ta:tá | na–kin–maxkí:–ya:–n | |
| 1po–father | fut–1obj–give–impf–2obj | |
| ‘My father is going to give me to you.’ | ||
There is no nominal case in the language, nor are there adpositions. In place of adpositions, the language makes use of a range of causative, applicatives, and body-part prefixes which can be added to the verb to allow for the expression of added event-participants or circumstantial/locative expressions corresponding to adverbial prepositional phrases in Indo-European languages.
| (5) | na’kta:’li:tanka:yá:n kí’wi’ hentín kimachi:tká’n | |||
| na–i’k–ta:’–li:–tanká:–ya:–n | kí’wi’ | hen–tin | kin–machit–ka’n | |
| fut–1sg.subj–cmt–inst–fell–impf–2obj | tree | cls–one | 1po–machete–pl.pos | |
| ‘I am going to fell the tree together with you with our machete.’ | ||||
| (6) | kina’hapi:wilí:ka’ kina’hasliwít | |
| kin–a’hapi:–wilí:–ka’ | kin–a’ha–sliwí–t | |
| 1obj–earlobe–put–idf | 1po–ear–swing–nm | |
| ‘They put earrings on my ears.’ | ||
Further reading
- Grammatical notes. Extracted and modified from the Upper Necaxa Totonac Dictionary.
- Beck, David. (2004). Upper Necaxa Totonac. Berlin: LINCOM.