Chapter 5: Existence, Location, and Having

Starting point#

Ana has come to Tecpán on market day. She is looking for xta Ixchel's stall.

At the stall:

Every k'o in this dialogue is the same word. Sometimes the best English is "there is", sometimes "is (at)", and with a possessed noun it will turn out to mean "has". Take two pieces as wholes for now: rik'in "with" (Chapter 21) and Katz'uye' "Sit down", a command (Chapter 13).

How it works#

5.1 One word, three English jobs#

K'o is a non-verbal predicate, like the nouns and adjectives of Chapter 3. It is not a verb: it takes no aspect prefix and it takes Set B free forms as its subject. Its core meaning is "be present, be in existence (somewhere)". From that single meaning English needs three translations:

Here is the first one taken apart:

k'o jun tijob'äl pa Chiq'a'l
EXIST one school in Comalapa
"there is a school in Comalapa"

Since k'o is a non-verbal predicate, it takes the Set B free forms you know from in tijonel:

In k'o is what you answer when someone calls your name; ¿At k'o? "Are you there?" is what you call at a door (Chapter 2). Plural third person is e k'o, and it is used for "there are" whenever the things are several, especially people and animals, and very commonly for any counted things:

With things that are simply available rather than counted, speakers often keep singular k'o where English says "there are": K'o ch'akät pa k'ayb'äl "There are chairs (to be had) in the market." Count them and the plural comes back: E k'o oxi' ch'akät pa k'ayb'äl "There are three chairs in the market." The rule of thumb: for people, or whenever you count, use e k'o. Beyond that, speakers vary, and numbers are what push hardest toward e k'o.

The predicate comes first, as usual. A new, indefinite subject (a school, a chair) follows k'o right away, usually with jun "one, a"; a known, definite one (my mother, Tojil) usually comes last, after the place.

5.2 There is not: majun, manäq, man k'o ta#

Three negatives, with different jobs.

Majun "none, nothing, no one" is the everyday negative of existence. It replaces k'o and means "there is no X (at all)".

Used alone it answers a question: ¿La k'o ch'akät? Majun. "Is there a chair?" "None." Majun is built on jun "one"; it is literally "not one". You will also see it with a closing ta for emphasis: Majun kape ta "there is no coffee whatsoever".

Manäq "no" can also serve as the negative of existence (Manäq ch'akät "There is no chair"), but it is mainly the word for "no", and majun is the safer choice for "there isn't any".

Man k'o ta is the ordinary man ... ta frame around k'o. It is used above all for "is not here / is not there", that is, for the location sense:

man k'o ta ri a Tojil pa jay
NEG EXIST IRR the a Tojil in house
"Tojil is not at the house"

The difference between majun and man k'o ta is roughly "there isn't one" versus "it isn't here". Majun ch'akät means no chair exists in this place; man k'o ta ri ch'akät means the chair (a specific one we know) is not where expected. With people, man k'o ta is the normal way to say someone is out: ¿La k'o ri ma Kawoq? Manäq, man k'o ta. K'o pa awän. "Is Kawoq in? No, he's not. He's at the cornfield."

5.3 Asking where: akuchi' and the particle wi#

"Where?" is akuchi'. With k'o it forms the fixed question ¿Akuchi' k'o wi ...? "Where is ...?":

What is wi? It is the trace particle: a small word that appears right after the predicate when a phrase of place (or manner) has been moved to the front because it is the point of the sentence, the piece that answers "where?". It marks the spot the place phrase was moved from. A question word like akuchi' is always the point of its sentence, so in these questions wi is obligatory. A statement takes wi for the same reason when it insists on the place, the pattern English renders as "it is in X that ...":

Coming first is not the same as being the point. A place phrase often opens a sentence just to set the scene, as English does in "In the house there is a table," and then there is no wi: Chupam ri jay k'o jun ch'atal. The reading in 5.9 opens sentence after sentence this way. So wi appears when the place is the answer or a correction ("it's THERE that ..."), not when it is only the setting, and always after akuchi'. Nor does wi belong in a plain answer, where the place stays in its normal position after the predicate: K'o pa Chiq'a'l, not K'o wi pa Chiq'a'l. You will meet it again with verbs: ¿Akuchi' yab'e wi? "Where are you going?"

Answers to "where?" normally keep the place after k'o:

5.4 Here and there#

Chi ri' is chi "at" plus ri' "that (one)" (Chapter 6), and it is the normal way to refer back to a place in a story: "I went to the market. Chi ri' I saw Tojil."

5.5 The two prepositions: pa and chi#

Kaqchikel has only two real prepositions, and both are short.

Pa means "in, at, on, to, into, toward", the all-purpose preposition of place. Before a vowel many speakers say pan (pan ulew "on the ground", also pa ulew), and the n survives in some place names (Pan Ajache'l "Panajachel", Pan Q'än "Antigua"). It goes directly before a noun or a place name:

Chi means "at, to" and appears mainly in combination: with the relational nouns of 5.6 (chi ruwäch "in front of it") and with ri' (chi ri' "there"). On its own before a noun it is rarer than pa.

So for simply "in" or "at" a place, use pa. For "on top of", "under", "behind", "beside", "in front of" and "inside", you need the next section.

5.6 Locative relational nouns: on, under, behind, beside, in front of, inside#

The possessed body-part nouns of Chapter 4, ruwi' "its top", ruxe' "its base", ruwäch "its face", rij "its back", ruxikin "its ear, its side", rupam "its belly", ruchi' "its mouth, its edge", are the raw material for location. Combined with pa or chi, they mean what English prepositions mean. A noun used this way is called a relational noun: a possessed noun that expresses a relation between two things. The thing whose top or back it is follows, exactly as a possessor follows a possessed noun.

pa ru-wi' ri ch'atal
in 3sA-top the table
"on the table" (literally "in its top, the table")

The forms in parentheses are fused variants you will hear: chi ru- often contracts to chu- (chuwäch, chupam), and further to chwäch and chrij. -Kojol "between, among" (also spelled -kojöl) naturally wants a plural possessor, since "among" needs more than one: chi ikojöl "among you (pl)", chi kikojol "among them".

Examples with k'o:

Why call these nouns and not prepositions? Because they inflect. Change the possessor and the prefix changes with it: pa nuwi' "above me", chi awij "behind you", chi qawäch "in front of us".

-Ij is vowel-initial, so it takes w-, aw-, r-, q-, iw-, k-: "behind me" is chi wij, and rij "its back" is the same word as the body part of Chapter 4. Locative meaning and body meaning live in one word.

Why pa ruwi' but chi ruxe'? Pa is for being contained in or resting on a surface; chi is for being at a point or side. So "on top of" takes pa, while "at its base, face, back, side, mouth" take chi. "Inside" has both (pa rupam, chupam), and so does "alongside" (chi ruchi', pa ruchi').

5.7 To have: existence plus possession#

Put k'o in front of a possessed noun and you have "have":

k'o jun nu-xib'al
EXIST one 1sA-brother
"I have a brother" (literally "there is one my-brother")

Literally, k'o jun nuxib'al is "there is one my-brother": the brother exists, and he is mine. That is all "having" is in Kaqchikel, and three things follow from it:

• The "haver" is not the subject; the thing had is. So if the thing is plural, k'o becomes e k'o: E k'o ka'i' wal, and "they have two dogs" is e k'o ka'i' kitz'i', with e agreeing with the dogs.
• To ask "how many do you have", you ask how many exist: ¿Janpe awal e k'o? "How many children do you have?" (Chapter 9 covers janpe / jaru.)
• There is no separate verb "not have": use majun or man k'o ta with the possessed noun. Majun nupwaq is the usual way to say "I'm broke".

The possessor can be named after the possessed noun, just as in Chapter 4: K'o rawän ri ma Kawoq "Kawoq has a cornfield" (literally "there is his-cornfield, the Kawoq").

5.8 How many, how much: quantity with k'o#

Quantity words sit between k'o and the noun:

Other useful quantity words: jujun "some, a few", konojel "all of them", and xa xe "only, just". Chapter 9 builds the number system.

5.9 Reading: Kawoq's house#

Read the text twice. The second time, mark every k'o / e k'o / majun and every relational noun, and say for each relational noun what the possessor is. The place phrases that open sentences (Chupam ri jay ..., Chi rij ri jay ...) carry no wi: they set the scene rather than answer "where?" (5.3). Two words stand in for k'o when posture matters: kotz'öl "lying" and tz'uyül "seated", words that say how something is placed (Chapter 18).

Ri rochoch ri ma Kawoq k'o pa Iximche', chi rij ri k'ayb'äl. Man nim ta, po jeb'ël. Chupam ri jay k'o jun ch'atal chuqa' e k'o kaji' ch'akät. Pa ruwi' ri ch'atal e k'o ka'i' läq, jun xara chuqa' jub'a' wäy. Chi ruxe' ri ch'atal kotz'öl ri tz'i'. Majun mes. Chi ruwäch ri jay k'o jun che'; chi rij ri jay k'o ri awän. Ri te Ixk'at tz'uyül chi ruchi' ri jay; k'o rusamaj wakami. ¿Akuchi' k'o wi ri ma Kawoq? Man k'o ta pa jay; k'o pa awän rik'in ri a Tz'ikin.

Kawoq's house is in Tecpán, behind the market. It is not big, but it is beautiful. Inside the house there is a table and there are four chairs. On the table there are two plates, a cup and a little tortilla. Under the table the dog is lying. There is no cat. In front of the house there is a tree; behind the house is the cornfield. Ixk'at is sitting at the door of the house; she has work today. Where is Kawoq? He is not at the house; he is in the cornfield with Tz'ikin.

Patterns at a glance#

Core frames (with Set B: in k'o, at k'o, k'o, öj k'o, ïx k'o, e k'o)

Place words

Vocabulary#

Reference: positionals and commands in this chapter's texts#

These appear in the dialogue and the reading, but their grammar comes later (positionals in Chapter 18, commands in Chapter 13), so they are here to look up rather than to drill.

Usage and dialect notes#

• Fusions and xe. Towns differ in how far they fuse chi ru- (chuwäch, chwäch, chrij), and some say xe ruxikin or xe ruxkin for "beside". Understand them all; in your own speech, chi ruxe', chi ruwäch, chi rij and chupam are safe everywhere.
• Keep the wi. Younger speakers, perhaps under Spanish influence, often drop the wi after akuchi', but the full pair is still the norm, and without it a learner's question sounds unfinished. Treat akuchi' ... wi as one unit.
• Pa ruwi', not pa. Pa ri ch'atal is "at the table" in a loose sense; "on the table" is pa ruwi' ri ch'atal.
• No bare relational nouns. There is no unpossessed wi' "on" or ij "behind"; the prefix always comes along: pa ruwi', chi rij, chi wij.
• "At so-and-so's place." Rik'in "with" often covers "at someone's house": K'o rik'in rute' "She is at her mother's."

Looking back and ahead#

Set B subjects from Chapter 3 and possessed nouns from Chapter 4 were the two halves of this chapter. Chapter 6 takes up re', la' and ri', the pointing words inside chi ri'; Chapter 9 gives you the numbers to count what e k'o introduces; and wi will follow you into the verb chapters whenever a place is asked about.