8. Relative clauses and complex sumti: “vu'o”

The following cmavo is discussed in this section:

     vu'o    VUhO                relative clause attacher

Normally, relative clauses attach only to simple sumti or parts of sumti: pro-sumti, names and descriptions, pure numbers, and quotations. An example of a relative clause attached to a pure number is:

8.1)   li pai noi na'e frinu namcu
       The-number pi, incidentally-which is-a-non- fraction number
       The irrational number pi
And here is an incidental relative clause attached to a quotation:
8.2)   lu mi klama le zarci li'u
            noi mi cusku ke'a cu jufra
       [quote] I go to-the market [unquote]
            incidentally-which-(I express IT) is-a-sentence.
       “I’m going to the market”, which I’d said, is a sentence.
which may serve to identify the author of the quotation or some other relevant, but subsidiary, fact about it. All such relative clauses appear only after the simple sumti, never before it.

In addition, sumti with attached sumti qualifiers of selma'o LAhE or NAhE+BO (which are explained in detail in Chapter 6) can have a relative clause appearing after the qualifier and before the qualified sumti, as in:

8.3)   la'e poi tolcitno vau lu le xunre cmaxirma li'u
            cu zvati le vu kumfa
       A-referent-of (which is-old) [quote] The Red Small-horse [unquote]
            is-at the [far distance] room.
       An old “The Red Pony” is in the far room.
Example 8.3 is a bit complex, and may need some picking apart. The quotation “lu le xunre cmaxirma li'u” means the string of words “The Red Pony”. If the “la'e” at the beginning of the sentence were omitted, Example 8.3 would claim that a certain string of words is in a room distant from the speaker. But obviously a string of words can’t be in a room! The effect of the “la'e” is to modify the sumti so that it refers not to the words themselves, but to the referent of those words, a novel by John Steinbeck (presumably in Lojban translation). The particular copy of “The Red Pony” is identified by the restrictive relative clause. Example 8.3 means exactly the same as:
8.4)   la'e lu le xunre cmaxirma li'u lu'u
            poi to'ercitno cu zvati le vu kumfa
       A-referent-of ([quote] The Red Small-horse [unquote])
            which is-old is-at the [far distance] room.
and the two sentences can be considered stylistic variants. Note the required “lu'u” terminator, which prevents the relative clause from attaching to the quotation itself: we do not wish to refer to an old quotation!

Sometimes, however, it is important to make a relative clause apply to the whole of a more complex sumti, one which involves logical or non-logical connection (explained in Chapter 14). For example,

8.5)   la frank. .e la djordj. noi nanmu cu klama le zdani
       Frank and George incidentally-who is-a-man go to-the house.
       Frank and George, who is a man, go to the house.
The incidental claim in Example 8.5 is not that Frank and George are men, but only that George is a man, because the incidental relative clause attaches only to “la djordj”, the immediately preceding simple sumti.

To make a relative clause attach to both parts of the logically connected sumti in Example 8.5, a new cmavo is needed, “vu'o” (of selma'o VUhO). It is placed between the sumti and the relative clause, and extends the sphere of influence of that relative clause to the entire preceding sumti, including however many logical or non-logical connectives there may be.

8.6)   la frank. .e la djordj. vu'o noi nanmu cu klama le zdani
       Frank and George incidentally-who are-men go to-the house.
       Frank and George, who are men, go to the house.
The presence of “vu'o” here means that the relative clause “noi nanmu” extends to the entire logically connected sumti “la frank. .e la djordj.”; in other words, both Frank and George are claimed to be men, as the colloquial translation shows.

English is able to resolve the distinction correctly in the case of Example 8.5 and Example 8.6 by making use of number: “who is” rather than “who are”. Lojban doesn’t distinguish between singular and plural verbs: “nanmu” can mean “is a man” or “are men”, so another means is required. Furthermore, Lojban’s mechanism works correctly in general: if “nanmu” (meaning “is-a-man”) were replaced with “pu bajra” (“ran”), English would have to make the distinction some other way:

8.7)   la frank. .e la djordj. noi pu bajra cu klama le zdani
       Frank and (George who [past] runs) go to-the house.
       Frank and George, who ran, go to the house.

8.8)   la frank. .e la djordj. vu'o noi pu bajra cu klama le zdani
       (Frank and George) who [past] run go to-the house.
       Frank and George, who ran, go to the house.
In spoken English, tone of voice would serve; in written English, one or both sentences would need rewriting.