Pronouns

High Valyrian 1

Course 1 · Chapter 5 · Pronouns and Demonstratives

High Valyrian is a pro-drop language: the subject pronoun is usually left out unless it is emphasised, because the verb ending already says who is acting. Even so, you need the pronouns, for emphasis, for objects, and because they take case endings like nouns. This chapter gives the personal pronouns, the possessive words ("my", "your"), the "this/that/which" words and the relative word lua that you met in Chapter 1.

The idea in a box
High Valyrian pronouns decline for case. The possessives are separate adjectives (ñuha "my"), not the genitive. The demonstratives are adjectives with different forms for living and non-living things, and "this" and "that" have a "which" partner, spare and skore.

The Personal Pronouns

The pronoun table on the grammar wiki's draft page (a user page, not an official reference) lists these forms. The nominative is the subject, the accusative the object, and the genitive "of":

CaseIyou (sg.)he/she/itweyou (pl.)they
Nominativenykeaoziryūjaīlonjeme
Accusativeyneavyziryūīīlōnjemī
Genitiveynoaōzijoūōīlojemo
Dativeynotaōtzijotūjotīlotjemot
Vocativenykysaōszirysūjusīlosjemys
  • No gender in the pronoun itself. The speaker picks the form of they to match the gender of what is meant; the table shows the solar/lunar form (jeme), and a separate form (pōnta) is listed for terrestrial and aquatic things.
  • Emphatic forms. The table also lists an emphatic or reflexive row, for example nykēla for "I myself".
Watch out: the source table is garbled in places
The wiki's table has seven columns of values but unclear headers, and the locative, instrumental and comitative rows are partly uncertain. This chapter shows only the five rows (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, vocative) whose pattern is clear and gives the columns in the usual order I, you, he/she/it, we, you (plural), they. Check the dictionary before using a pronoun form that is not in this table.

Possessives

A possessive adjective stands before a noun and means "my", "your", "his" and so on. It is not the genitive, which personal pronouns do not use for possession.

PersonPossessive
myñuha
your (sg.)aōha
his, her, itszȳha

The plural possessives are given as jāha, īlva, jeva and pōja, but the wiki places some of them ambiguously, so only the singular set is taught here.

A possessive can stand alone with the ending -on: ñuhon "mine", aōhon "yours", zȳhon "his/hers/its". The wiki's example, Kesy zȳhon issa "This one is his", is marked there as made up for the page and not an official line.

This, That and Which

The demonstratives are adjectives, with one stem for living (animate) things and one for non-living (inanimate) things:

MeaningAnimateInanimate
this (near me)bisakesa
that (farther away)bonakona
which?spareskore

Before a noun, the demonstrative takes an ending that matches the noun's gender: bisa muña "this mother" (lunar), bisys zaldrīzes "this dragon" (solar), and kesa brōzi "this name" (the inanimate stem). With nothing after it, the demonstrative stands for "this one":

AnimateInanimate
this onebisykesy
that onebonykony
which one? / who? / what?sparosskoros

Place and question words

  • kesīr "here", konīr "there", skoriot "where?"
  • Skorȳso? "why?", Skorī? "when?", Skorkydoso? "how?"
Watch out: animacy and gender are separate
Animate and inanimate is a separate split from the four genders. The demonstrative has two stems (bisa or kesa) and also an ending that agrees with the noun's gender, so a noun needs both choices made.

The Relative Word lua

Look again at the sample sentence from Chapter 1: Ābre ūndas lua vala raqiros issa "The man who saw the woman is a friend." The word lua is a relative adjective that goes before the noun it refers to and means "who" or "which". Its case comes from the main clause: lua as a subject, lue as an object.

Hands-On Exercises

Exercise 1

Give the nominative, accusative and genitive of "I", "you" (singular) and "we" from the table. Then say why a speaker would use the nominative pronoun at all in a pro-drop language.

📄 View solution
Exercise 2

Give the possessives for "my", "your" (singular) and "his/her/its", then the stand-alone forms for "mine" and "yours". Which ending makes a possessive stand alone?

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Exercise 3

Choose the right demonstrative stem for "this mother" and "this name" (animate or inanimate), and explain what sparos and skoros mean. Then say what lua does in Chapter 1's sample sentence.

📄 View solution

Chapter 5 Quick Reference

  • Nominative: nyke I, ao you, ziry he/she/it, ūja we, īlon you (pl.), jeme they
  • Possessives: ñuha, aōha, zȳha; stand-alone ñuhon, aōhon, zȳhon
  • Demonstratives: bisa / kesa this, bona / kona that, spare / skore which
  • Question words: sparos / skoros who/what, skoriot where, Skorȳso why, Skorī when
  • Relative: lua before the noun it refers to
Coming next
High Valyrian 1, Chapter 6 begins the verbs: the stem, the infinitive and the present tense.