Sotho Tonology - Verb Tone

Verb Tone

Sesotho verb stems fall into two categories: H stems and L stems. The difference lies in the "underlying tone" of the stem's first syllable (or the stem's "basic tone") being either high or null. When used with an object in the indicative remote future tense (the simple -tla- tense) the verb's stem is monotonous (all syllables high toned or all low toned) with the underlying tone of the first syllable spread to all the following syllables.

Nouns derived from the verb stem are fossilised with the tones of the simple class 15 infinitive as appears in medial positions without a subject or object. The procedure for creating this tonal pattern is intricate and involves several tonal rules.

These factors may also apply in normal verbal conjugations. Adding a verbal suffix (through derivation, not inflexion) creates a new verb stem which falls in the same tone category as the original, and is subject to the same rules.

-paqama (L verb stem) lie (face downwards) ⇒ ho paqama to lie ⇒ ho paqamisa to cause to lie ⇒ ho paqamisuwa to be caused to lie, etc.

-ahlola (H verb stem) judge ⇒ ho ahlola to judge kahlolo judgement, moahlodi judge, boahlodi state of being a judge

The tones of the noun prefixes of nouns derived from verbs are independent of the tones of the stem.

Some nouns derived from verbs have idiomatic tonal patterns independent of the original verb stem's tones.

-loka (L verb stem) be sufficient, okay ⇒ -lokela be sufficient for ⇒ tokelo human right (irregular tone instead of the expected )

Several "tonal melodies" may be assigned to certain verbal conjugations based on the desired tense, aspect, and mood (for example, with many verb conjugations the only difference between the indicative mood and the participial sub-mood is one of tone). These are applied before most other rules and may be indicated by a code including the symbols H (high tone), L (low tone), B (verb stem's basic tone), and * (iteratively applying the preceding tone).

For example, applying the (present) "Subjunctive Melody" (HL*H) to the H verb stem -bona (see) and the L verb stem -sheba (look for/at) results in both Ke shebe tau (So I may look at the lion) and Ke bone tau (So I may see the lion) being pronounced with exactly the same tone pattern .

Another way to designate the melodies is to use a standard template of the tense in question and indicate the melody by assigning tones to specific syllables in the resultant word (for example, the final syllable, the subjectival concord, etc.). So for the above example the Subjunctive Melody (actually, present-future subjunctive) may be specified by putting H tones on the first syllable (the subjectival concord's basic tone is ignored), the second syllable, and final syllable of the word and putting an explicit L tone on the fourth syllable (unless if the verb is disyllabic, in which case the fourth syllable is the final syllable and has an H tone) — thus preventing HTD.