məšt "this woman", zi säbočč "these men". Distal: za "that, those, that one, those ones"; zani "that one there". E.g. tä-za məss goy mät't'ahi "I came with that man". Interrogative pronoun ma "who?" (man before the copula): man mät't'a? "who came?" yäma "whose?" mən "what?"; yämən "why?" yitta, yittat "which?" E.g. yitta bayy mät't'am "which child came?" yittani "which one?" Indefinite pronoun (yähonä) säb "someone, somebody" mannəm (säb) "any(one)" ("no one" with negative verb) attəm "any" (="no one, nothing" with negative verb); attəmu "no one" (as pronoun) lela (säb) "other" yäk'irrä k'äy "other" (lit. "remaining thing") attə "a certain" ləyyu "different" k'una, zam, zəč'ə "same" äbälo (f. äbälit) "so-and-so" zihom "such" kulləm = "all" (placed before or after the noun); kulləm-u, bä-mollaw = "whole". yät'oma = "only, alone". "Each, every" is expressed by noun reduplication. Copula and existential verbs The copula (positive and negative) is irregular in the present tense: Example: zämmidi nähä "you are my brother". The past tense ("he was", etc.) is expressed by the verb näbbär conjugated regularly in the perfect; "he was not" etc. is with annäbär. The future tense is expressed by the imperfect of hono: yəhonu "he will be", etc. The negative future tense is likewise expressed by tihon. The present copula in subordinate clauses is expressed by the subordinate perfect of honä, e.g.: däffär yähonä tädi-goy yalfu "he who is courageous will go with me. "It is he", etc. can be expressed by adding an element -tt between the pronoun and the copula: e.g. kʷa-ttə-n "it is he". The existential verb "be at", "exist" in the present is: In the past and future, it is expressed just like the copula, with näbbärä and honä. In subordinate clauses the present is expressed with -allä conjugated in the perfect (negative -lellä), e.g.: bämeda yalləmi säbočč araš näm "the people who are in the field are farmers". The possessive verb "he has" etc. is expressed with the existential verb yino "it is" (agreeing with the object possessed) plus object suffix pronouns (i.e. "it is to him" etc.) Verbs A Soddo verb may have anywhere from one to four consonants, or may be a compound with balo "say" (e.g. bək'k' balo "appear".) In the former case, they fall into three "conjugations" differing in their vowels and in gemination of the imperfect, illustrated for a three-consonant verb: säbbäro, imperfect yəsäbru ("break") tikkälo, imperfect yətikkəlu č'affäro, imperfect yəč'affəru Derived