Palye
Palye is a grammatical construct in Old Tongue which modifies a word from a material meaning to an immaterial meaning. When the word is a number word, the base form refers a number of physical or material things, and the -ye form refers to a number of immaterial or conceptual things. When the word is another kind of word, the shift in meaning is more subtle and often is used to indicate the use of the word as a metonym.
Etymology
Palatu means word; the -ye suffix itself makes a word refer to its immaterial meaning; palye is a novel term constructed to refer to the grammatical concept using the Old Tongue itself. There is no translation.
Out of Universe
The -ye suffix was originally only present as a pattern in the number words of the Old Tongue. It seems that Naomi Joy Todd extrapolated it as a larger pattern to create new words from existing words, extending the vocabulary of the Old Tongue without having to invent as much from whole cloth. It is unclear whether a rule was created and then -ye simply appended, or if it arose in some other more complex fashion. This article is describing an observed pattern, not an officially documented grammar rule, and should be taken accordingly.
Numbers
The first category of words which are attested with both -ye and regular forms are the numbers 1 through 19. The teens use the -pi suffix (e.g., navyat'pi or navye'pi = nineteen), and the -yat/-ye distinction is dropped for 20 and above. Tens use -shi (e.g., suk'shi = seventy). Hundreds use -deshi (e.g., chor'deshi = five hundred).
| Number | -yat (material) | -ye (immaterial) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | koyat | koye |
| 2 | dvoyat | dvoye |
| 3 | treyat | treye |
| 4 | otyat | otye |
| 5 | choryat | chorye |
| 6 | panyat | panye |
| 7 | sukyat | sukye |
| 8 | minyat | minye |
| 9 | navyat | navye |
| 10 | desyat | desye |
Other Words
| Base | Meaning | -ye Form | Modified Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| banta | seat | bantye | throne; metonym for rule, authority, hierarchy |
| bift | still | biftye | calm |
| mahdi | seeker | mahdye | beacon |
| fada | sad | fadanye | immaterial sadness; void; depression |
| wabunen | connection | wabunye | anchor |
| khadi | bone | khadye | bones (metonym); one's deep inner self |
| fonnai | place | fonnenye | walls; barriers between places (provisional) |
| shadar(in) | shadow(s) | shadar(in)ye | shadow(s) (shadows as metonym for Shaidar/the forces of dark) |
| tyakunen | one who keeps | tyakunen'ye | Keeper (formal role) |
note: need to add devorye
Banta means seat, bantye means throne. A throne is often a literal chair, but in context of the usage, it was referring to the Crystal Throne of the Seanchan, and not merely a literal royal seat but the monarchy at large, the same metonym used in English.
Bift to biftye takes still to calm, but more specifically, it takes an adjective describing material stillness (a thing literally not moving) to an abstract, immaterial stillness (calm).
Mahdi to mahdye, seeker to beacon, is a little stranger. A seeker is someone who goes and seeks something. A beacon is something someone lights or sets off, which attracts the attention of someone else. In a sense, it is "seeking" the observer of the beacon.
Fada to fadanye, sad as a general word (someone who is crying, frowning, materially sad) versus an immaterial inner sadness or depression (or in the context it was used in song Mat Cauthon, a void inside oneself).
Wabunen to wabunye, connection to anchor; not a literal anchor, but an immaterial connection, in the context, an emotional one.
Khadi, literal bone, to khadye, metaphorical bones, as in "it is in your bones". In English we simply use the same word, but in Old Tongue the word picks up the -ye suffix to indicate its immaterial/metonymic use.
Fonnai to fonnenye is a more tenuous derivation because the meaning of fonnenye in Mashiara is much harder to triangulate, it is included for completeness but is not strictly speaking good evidence, since the use of the -ye suffix was used to infer a possible meaning in that usage.
Similar for shadarin to shadarinye, the pattern observed was used to construct the translation of shadarinye.
Tyakunen to tyakunen'ye is however good evidence, particularly good, as it is used in Al'Naito to refer to the Amyrlin Seat, specifically, giving her title of "keeper of the seals" as wapyen tyakunen'ye. Tyaku means to keep, so tyakunen means a "keeper" in the sense of someone who keeps things or keeps a specific thing. It refers to the material act of keeping something, and refers to a person doing that. Tyakunen'ye is being used here to refer to the Amyrlin, who is not literally "keeping the seals", but is metaphorically keeping them as in keeping them safe. The seals themselves are somewhat material, somewhat immaterial, so the immaterial quality is not referring to the thing being kept, but to the keeping itself which is immaterial.
| Base | Meaning | -ye Form | Modified Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| devor | ask | devorye | summon |
| balad/vakar | slow / move | bala'vakye | caution; the disposition behind deliberate movement |
Devor to devorye, ask, to summon. In context, devorye was used in Nynaeve al'Meara, saying to "summon wisdom". There are two ways of looking at this transformation. The first is that the word "devor" should be mapped to the word "ask" wherever we see it, and "devorye" to summon. So, a summons sent from a queen would be called "devorye", not "devor". But alternatively, in the context of the song, it is instructing her to do not a literally summoning or asking, but a metaphorical one. Summon not a person, but her wisdom. This seems to be the more likely implication of the usage here; the -ye suffix is not mapping the word cleanly from "ask" to "summon", but is reflecting that in this context the word is in fact being used as a metaphor, for an immaterial sort of asking. Thus, there may be summons which would be referred to as "devor", not "devorye", when they were material summons.
Lastly, the word bala'vakye. Bala seems very likely to be a shortening of balad, and vak the stem of vakar/vakat. So bala'vakye's base form is something like "balad vakar" or "balad vakat", "slow move" or "slow motion". This would be a material sort of slow movement. If a person walked in slow motion you might say they are "bala'vakat". But the -ye suffix is mapping this to an immaterial slow movement, that is, caution or restraint.
General Interpretation
Looking at these words overall and the pattern formed, the -ye suffix seems to function something less as a rule to generate new words, and more as an indicator of a word being used as a metaphor, in an immaterial way, or as a metonym. In some cases, it seems that the metaphor/metonym is so common that the word itself may become baked into the lexicon. However, given the dispersion of meanings and that there is no single clean way to derive, for example "beacon" from "seeker", along with the way for example devorye is used, this suggests something beyond just additional vocabulary.
The overall conclusion we draw is that the suffix operates something like a kind of grammatical mood marker that casts a word into a more metaphorical form, and indicates a deeper grammatical structure and not just a vocabulary rule.
Words Without Base Forms
There are some attested words for which no base form is attested. They are listed here for completeness but they cannot as such be used to infer much about the -ye suffix's function.
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| zurye | grass |
| kloye | bell |
| suravye | peace |
| deyeniye | majesty |
| calichniye | welcome |