Learning Solresol, Lesson 3: Nouns

This is part of a series of lessons for learning Solresol. To start at lesson 1, click here.

In this lesson, we will learn how nouns are formed in Solresol, in addition to some new vocabulary.

First, to review, try to translate these sentences into English. Try to do it completely from memory, but if you can't remember a word, check your own notes or the previous lesson - check the answers when you're completely done. I encourage you to actually write down your responses; it will really help you learn.

Sidosi

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To learn

Domi milasi dore.

Dofa do domilado Solresol.

Domi re dore fasifa sidosi Solresol.

Dofa do milasi domi.

Dore faremi.

Dofa sidosi domilado Solresol.

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Answers:

You love me.

He does not speak Solresol.

You and I want to learn Solresol.

He doesn't love you.

I am.

He learns to speak Solresol.

How did you do? If you had to go back and look up some words, that's okay - but memorization is very important to learning Solresol, so keep working on the vocabulary. There will be new vocabulary every lesson, so you'll want to keep up.

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In Solresol, the same word is used for the verb, noun, adjective, and adverb - the various forms are distinguished by emphasizing specific syllables.

To form nouns, you accent the first syllable:

Domilado	-	To speak
Dômilado	-	Speech
Faremi	-	To be, exist
Fâremi	-	Existence, being
Milasi	-	To love (a person)
Mîlasi	-	Love (n) (for a person)

The accent over the letter indicates that you should emphasize that syllable - Sudre uses the term rinforzando, which is a sudden increase of emphasis, or another word for the musical term sforzando.

The notation for said accents isn't really set in stone - I like to use the accents I used above because they resemble an accent in music, but using 'normal' accents is also a popular choice (dó, ré, mí, fá, sól, lá, sí). You will occasionally see the accented syllable written in all caps (DOmilado), but try to only use that if there is no other option, because, frankly, it looks terrible.


In order to further the cause of this lesson, you will need some new vocabulary. I suggest you focus on each word carefully, and write them all down.

Redo	-	My, mine
Remi	-	Your, yours
Refa	-	His, its
Fare	-	That, that one
Fami	-	This, this one

These first five words are usually used to label nouns - they always come before the noun they label (redo mîlasi - my love). All these words, however, can also be used as nouns themselves (fare faremi redo - that is mine).

Note that the possessive pronouns are related to the corresponding subject pronouns:

Dore - I, me		Redo - My, mine
Domi - you		Remi - your, yours
Dofa - he, it		Refa - his, its

Also note that fare and fami are next to each other alphabetically, because they are related words.

Famisol	-	Have, possess, own
Milasol	-	Love (for things)
Solsisol	-	Smile, grin
Ladofa	-	Read
Remila	-	Give
Dosido	-	Help, aid, assist
Solmila	-	Remember, recollect
Resolsido	-	Need, require

These seven words are all verbs - but they can become nouns by accenting the first syllable: Solsisol - to smile; La sôlsisol - the smile. In the same way: la fâmisol - the possession, the thing owned; la mîlasol - the love (for a thing); la lâdofa - the reading, the read; la rêmila - the gift or present; la dôsido - the assistance, help, or aid; la sôlmila - the memory, the recollection; la rêsolsido - the need, the necessity.

Note the difference between milasi and milasol. Milasi is used to say you love a person; Milasol is used to talk of loving objects, animals, and activities. One may use milasi with poetic license in other contexts, but on a literal level it should only be used for people (or other sentient lifeforms, or fictional anthropomorphized creatures of some other nature).

Ladosol	-	Book (n.)
Fadofasol	-	Tree

These last two words, ladosol and fadofasol, are implicitly nouns - so they don't need the initial accent to be used that way.

Notice that ladofa - to read, and ladosol - book, are next to each other alphabetically, because they are related words.

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The best way to learn is through examples and practice (citation needed). So, some examples:

Fare faremi redo ladosol.	-	That is my book.
Dore remila la rêmila fa domi.	-	I give the gift to you.
Dore milasol remi sôlsisol.	-	I love your smile.
Dofa fasifa ladofa fami ladosol.	-	He wants to read this book.
Fami faremi remi.	-	This is yours.

Now that you see how these words work in sentences, try to translate some on your own. As always, try to do as much as you can without checking, and do actually write down what you come up with. This is as much a test of vocabulary as it is of grammar, so be familiar with the new words from this lesson before doing the exercises (It's not really a test, though, don't worry).

Translate these into English:

Dofa milasol fare ladosol.
Domi famisol redo mîlasi.
Fare do faremi Solresol.
Dore resolsido dôsido!
Dofa famisol remi sôlsisol.
Domi resolsido solsisol.

And these into Solresol:

He has a tree. [Solresol doesn't have a word for 'a' or 'an' - just leave it out.]
You have my book!
That is mine.
This book is yours.
I don't remember his smile.
He has your gift.
You remember his love.

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Answers:

English Translations:

He loves that book.
You have my love.
That is not Solresol.
I need help!
He has your smile.
You need to smile.

Solresol Translations:

Dofa famisol fadofasol.
Domi famisol redo ladosol!
Fare faremi redo.
Fami ladosol faremi remi.
Dore do solmila refa sôlsisol.
Dofa famisol remi rêmila.
Domi solmila refa mîlasi. [Using mîlasol here wouldn't necessarily be wrong, but it would imply that his love is for something else, such as an activity or object.]

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That's all for this lesson! Be sure you have all the vocab so far memorized, and that you understand everything from this lesson. If anything is unclear to you, feel free to leave a comment with your question.

To go on to the next segment of this series, click here.

Verb Tenses, Accentuation, &c.

I think one of the things that I'm most concerned about w/r/t learning Solresol is verb tenses. They're expressed by adding either Dodo, Rere, Mimi, &c. (Typically denoted in writing as DO or RE instead of dodo or rere) before a verb, which is simple enough as far as conjugation goes - but the fact remains that many of the forms are utterly foreign to me (imperfect indicative? pluperfect subjunctive?). I suppose I'll just have to brush up on my grammar. I know some from Spanish (which I have a basic decent grasp on. It helped me learn more on imperfect vs. preterite &c), but I'll still have to learn quite a bit. Many different verb tenses are expressed by each of the 7 words, which is probably more helpful than it is confusing - it'll at least increase my chances of being right.


There's also accentuation, which is quite a bit easier than the various verb tenses. I think it's just stuff that takes getting used to, and reading Gajewski's book more carefully.
From what I gather (from Sudre and Gajewski) -

• To indicate the feminine, one puts a horizontal line above the last syllable - this isn't a stress accent; it's pronounced by prolonging the vowel of the syllable "as if it were double" (Do-o, So-ol, Fa-a, &c)
• To form the plural, one places an acute accent on the final consonant. This is also not a stress, one pronounces it by prolonging the consonant "as if it were double". (lla, ssi, &c. (no advice is given on how to prolong the sound of a 'd'. Just one of the awkward things with Solresol again I guess))
• To indicate various parts of speech (noun, adjective, adverb, person doing something) one writes a horizontal line above the syllable in question (I assume above the vowel). This is a stress accent, as far as I can tell. Gajewski said to prolong it as if it were double, but I could see that causing confusion when also writing in a plural. Sudre, however, said it would suffice to rinforzando the syllable - a musical term meaning a sudden emphasis.
• If a word is preceded by a word such as 'this', 'that', 'the', or really anything that introduces it, the accents and marks go on that descriptive word, and the other word is 'perfectly understood'.

I feel like that clears things up for me, personally; I had to write it down to really understand the differences.


While I'm on the topic of verbs, I dug up a list of what I deemed the most useful verbs. These should be the first verbs that one should learn in this language, in my opinion:


Faremi - to be
Silami - to dislike, hate
Famisol - to possess, to have (also as an auxiliary verb)
Remila - to give
Sollasire - to know (a fact)
Fasolla - to do, to bring about
Farefa - to go
Domilado - to say, to speak
Dosolre - to eat [EDIT - This is Gajewski's definition. According to Sudre, Dosolre means "Believe", so that's how I'm using it.]


I believe that a verb with no 'tense' word before it (dodo, rere, mimi, &c.) is interpreted as either the simple present tense or the infinitive, depending on the context.
I'll be working on memorizing these words and the two letter words that I still don't know -


(Also, it's worth mentioning that the word order in Solresol is subject-verb-object and noun-adjective. (courtesy of http://www.communication.illinois.edu/csandvig/classes/solresol.pdf ))


I would say goodbye in Solresol, but I'm unsure how. (large lexical gap there, in my opinion. Perhaps I will discover it later)
Dore milasi dom´i!
(my attempt at putting an accent on a consonant - perhaps I'll just use an apostrophe henceforth.)