mophira nela lo kalora — Schleicher's fable

In 1868, August Schleicher published "Avis akvasas ka" in the Beiträge zur vergleichenden Sprachforschung: a small fable written in reconstructed Proto-Indo-European, to show that a dead ancestor-language could speak, together with his own German telling of what it says. Historical linguists have retold "The Sheep and the Horses" in every revision of the reconstruction since, and language-builders retell it to show their grammar under load. Phi's telling works from Schleicher's German, his own words for his own fable, parenthetical glosses included: the shorn sheep, the shearing that repeats, and the heart that grows tight, se peki, squeezed, rather than merely pained. Three animals' worth of vocabulary carry it (mophira, sheep; kalora, horse; rolutha, wagon), and one deliberate absence remains: the fable's master is missing, because Phi cannot grant him the title.

Each block below carries four lines: the Phi sentence, its word-by-word gloss, a back-translation into English, and Schleicher's own German wording, quoted verbatim from the 1868 printing, square brackets, parentheses, line-break hyphens and all.

nila — The seeing

rena mophi ma phelu mophira lo kalora to nila.
REL wool NEG hold sheep PL horse PST see.
(A sheep that held no wool saw horses.)
schleicher: "[Ein] schaf, [auf] welchem wolle nicht war ... sah rosse,"

shia mophi to ki se kati.
3SG wool PST PFV PASS cut.
(Its wool had been shorn away.)
schleicher: "(ein ge- schorenes schaf)"

ta kalora tumoa rolutha to natu.
one horse heavy wagon PST pull.
(One horse pulled a heavy wagon.)
schleicher: "das [einen] schweren wagen fahrend,"

ta kalora lo whalo thena to kolua.
one horse PL large thing PST carry.
(One carried a great load.)
schleicher: "das [eine] grofse last,"

ta kalora miona to reshi kolua.
one horse person PST fast carry.
(One carried a person, swiftly.)
schleicher: "das [einen] menschen schnell tragend."

Notes: the sheep arrives inside a relative clause, rena mophi ma phelu mophira, a sheep that holds no wool, one sentence with its seeing, as Schleicher writes it; and his own parenthesis, a shorn sheep, gets its own unit, to ki se kati, the wool had been cut away, so the fable's economy is on the table from the second breath: this is not a sheep that lacks wool but a sheep whose wool was taken. The three horses keep their three burdens, the heavy wagon pulled, the great load carried, the person carried swiftly; the load is lo whalo thena, great things, Schleicher's große last. The original's man is miona, person: the fable loses its gendering in transit without losing anything else.

mophira haolu — The sheep speaks

mophira wei lo kalora to haolu.
sheep DAT PL horse PST speak.
(The sheep spoke to the horses:)
schleicher: "[Das] schaf sprach [zu den] rossen:"

shola lu mia mena miona lo kalora ka wepu meno nila. mia korua se peki sholo.
QUOT.COMP COND 1SG DECL.COMP person PL horse CAUS go DECL.COMP.CLOSE see. 1SG heart PASS squeeze QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("When I see the person making the horses go, my heart is squeezed tight.")
schleicher: "[Das] herz wird beengt [in] mir (es thut mir herzlich leid), sehend [den] menschen [die] rosse treibend."

Notes: Schleicher's heart does not ache, it wird beengt, grows constricted, and Phi has the exact verb: se peki, is squeezed, pressure brought inward from both sides. His parenthetical gloss (es thut mir herzlich leid, it grieves me deeply) rides inside the same image. The driving is the causative, ka wepu, one will making other bodies go, and the particle's own consent-framing means the sentence arrives already uneasy: the grammar itself is the sheep's complaint.

lo kalora lonae — The horses answer

lo kalora wei mophira to haolu.
PL horse DAT sheep PST speak.
(The horses spoke to the sheep:)
schleicher: "[Die] rosse sprachen :"

shola kona mophira. no sheluo sholo.
QUOT.COMP VOC sheep. IMP listen QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("Sheep! Listen.")
schleicher: "Höre schaf,"

shola lao lo mia ha to ki nila lo mia korua se peki sholo.
QUOT.COMP BECAUSE PL 1SG PROX PST PFV see PL 1SG heart PASS squeeze QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("Because we have seen this, our hearts are squeezed tight.")
schleicher: "[das] herz wird be- engt [in den] gesehen-habenden (es thut uns herzlich leid, ... da wir wissen) :"

shola rena pilu miona wei miso mophira mophi sulae wethalu ka kelu sholo.
QUOT.COMP REL take person DAT REFL sheep wool warm garment CAUS become QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("The person, the one who takes, makes the sheep's wool into a warm garment for himself.")
schleicher: "[der] mensch, [der] herr macht [die] wolle ... schafe [zu einem] warmen kleide [für] sich"

shola wei lo mophira mawha mophi nai sholo.
QUOT.COMP DAT PL sheep NONE wool be QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("And to the sheep, there is no wool.")
schleicher: "und [den] schafen ist nicht wolle"

shola lo mophira mophi ro se kati sholo.
QUOT.COMP PL sheep wool HAB PASS cut QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("The sheep's wool is cut from them, again and again.")
schleicher: "(die schafe aber haben keine wolle mehr, sie werden geschoren;"

shola wei lo mophira sheo lo kalora mo kipona nai sholo.
QUOT.COMP DAT PL sheep THAN PL horse CMPR pain be QUOT.COMP.CLOSE.
("For the sheep there is more pain than for the horses.")
schleicher: "es geht ihnen noch schlech- ter als den rossen)."

Notes: here is the deliberate absence. Schleicher's horses say der mensch, der herr, the man, the master: the original grants the man a rank, and the rank half-excuses the taking. Phi has no such word to grant, since the vocabulary of domination is refused by canon; the apposition survives as description, rena pilu miona, the one who takes, whose sentence then takes. What he does with the taking is ka kelu on a noun predicate: he makes the wool become a warm garment, Schleicher's macht zu rendered as the grammar's own becoming, with wei miso, for himself, the fable's whole economy in one dative. The horses' grief matches the sheep's word for word, korua se peki, but theirs carries its reason as a fronted lao clause built on the perfect, because we have seen: Schleicher's gesehen-habenden, the having-seen ones. His closing parentheses stay in the horses' mouths, where the printing puts them: the shearing is habitual and passive at once, ro se kati, cut from them again and again, and the comparison lands with the value-neutral mo: more pain for the sheep than for the horses, which is as close to "it goes still worse for them" as a language without worse can come, and no closer than it needs to.

wemo — The field

pheo ha hea mophira kau wemo to rato.
POST PROX hear sheep ALL plain PST turn.
(Having heard this, the sheep turned away to the field.)
schleicher: "Dies gehört-habend bog (entwich) [das] schaf [auf das] feld"

shia to rashelo.
3SG PST run.
(It made off.)
schleicher: "(es machte sich aus dem staube)."

Notes: the famous ending, kept whole and in both of Schleicher's registers: the printed verb bog, turned aside, is rato, and his parenthetical es machte sich aus dem staube, it made off, is the running itself. pheo ha hea, after this hearing, carries the participle "having heard" as a time phrase over the event noun. The sheep does not argue, does not organize, does not stay: it flees the truth of its own shearing, and the fable's sting is that we understand. Phi could have softened this; the transmutation keeps it, because a language for facing things honestly should not look away first.

What the transmutation changed

Gap log: sheep → mophira (coined on mophi, wool); horse → kalora (coined by sound: hoofbeat rhythm); wagon → rolutha (coined on rolu, wheel); the great load → lo whalo thena, great things; man → miona, person, the fable de-gendered in passing; the master → no word, by refusal: rena pilu miona, the one who takes, standing where Schleicher writes der herr; the heart wird beengt → korua se peki, the heart is squeezed, the original's constriction rather than the English tradition's pain; drive → the causative ka, one will moving other bodies, judged by the grammar's own consent-framing; makes the wool into a garment → sulae wethalu ka kelu, the causative of becoming on a noun predicate; the having-seen ones → the fronted lao clause with the perfect, lao lo mia ha to ki nila; they are shorn → ro se kati, habitual and passive together; it goes still worse for them → sheo lo kalora mo kipona, more pain than the horses, comparison without a word for worse; having heard → pheo ha hea, the participle as a time phrase; turned aside (made off) → rato, then rashelo, both of Schleicher's verbs kept. The stored ground truth is the 1868 printing itself, and the citations quote its OCR faithfully, line-break hyphens, long-s spellings like grofse, and bracket conventions included; ellipses skip only the page apparatus and one scanner's error.