Subjunctive mood

Subjunctive mood (abbreviated as SJV) is the grammatical mood that is used to indicate various states of unreality, such as opinions, possibility, things that not occurred yet or things that already did not happen. It is mostly used in subordinate clauses, in conditional clauses (after “if”) and after relative “that”, however the latter may be sometimes expressed with Gerundives instead. Subjunctive mood may occur in simple sentences too.

In Nûrlâm subjunctive mood is formed by adding suffix -ulg in place of markers of tense and nonfinite forms. It may be considered as special tense, similar to English or French “future-in-the-past”, like adding English auxiliary verb “would” before the verb, however it differs from English and may be applied to modal verbs (e.g. to transform “can” into “could”). Both subjective and objective pronouns may be added to the verb in subjunctive mood. But subjunctive mood does not require 3rd person nominative suffixes “-â(t)” or “-û(t)”. In compound predicate (modal verb + infinitive) objective pronoun joins the infinitive. Examples:

• “I would bring the ring into Mordor” = “Dathrakulg nazgum Uzgbûrzishi”
• “You could hurt yourself!” = “Fipâshulg rulutîm”

Some modalities require certain modal verbs, in that case suffix -ulg is added to modal verb, while main verb is placed in infinitive form. Some modalities require also specific expressions in addition to subjunctive form of verb.

The grammatical form of subjunctive mood is used in following modalities:

• with various conditions (in complex sentences):
  • Predictive (to express uncertain condition): “If he would/should leave the ring for himself, he will be corrupted by it” ⇒ “Ghung tarangulg nazgum îmûr, takub nirzat zarzi”
  • Suppositional (to express uncertain but desirable condition): “Could they come, I shall make a feast!” ⇒ “(Ghung) takpâshulg skâtut, dakrampub ash birt”
  • Eventive (to express uncertain consequence of quite possible condition): “I would kill a dragon if you will bring me a magical sword” ⇒ “Dadogulg ash lûg ghung fithrakubiz ash lagdush”
  • Counterfactual (both condition and action of main sentence are uncertain or already didn't happen): “I would kill a dragon if haven't lost my magical sword” ⇒ “Dadogulg ash lûg ghung danarbûfulg lagdush dab”
• With some variants of Desiderative modality (wishes, expressions of desire): “I'd fuck her” ⇒ “Dahtolulg nash” = “Dahtolulgan”¹⁾
• Presumptive (condition without “if” expressed with verbs “imagine”, “suppose”, “let's assume”, “be it so”): “Suppose he got the magical sword, he could defeat the dragon” ⇒ “Ton tabrashuz dush lagum, tapâshulg faikut lûgum”
• some forms of Dubitative: “Whoever the killer is, I will find him” ⇒ “Maikon thrugum kulg, dagimbuban”
• Hypothetical (already didn't happen, similar to Counterfactual, but condition is not presented in the same sentence): “You could kill me!” ⇒ “Fipâshulg dogutiz”
• Speculative (the statement made without any evidence): “They could kill the dragon (by) themselves” ⇒ “Takpâshulg dogut lûgum îmirzi”.

In analytic form of colloquial speech auxiliary verb kulg is placed before main verb in Past tense, or other modal verb in past tense together with kulg and main verb in infinitive (ending with -at). “Izg kulg” = “I would”, in analogy with English and because of similarity of adjacent consonants, is often shortened to “Izg'ulg…” = “I'd …” in colloquial analytical Nûrlâm.