Lojban grammar examples

"verb" forms
ko'a dunda ko'a dunda ko'e ko'a dunda ko'e ko'i	He gives. He gives it. He, gives it to her.
ko'a se dunda	It is a gift.
ko'a te dunda	He is a recipient.
ko'a ca dunda ko'a pu dunda ko'a ba dunda	He now gives. He gave. He will give.
ko'a pu pu dunda ko'a ba pu dunda	He had given. He will have given.
ko'a ca ca'o dunda	He is now giving.
ko'a pu ca'o dunda	He has been giving.

Lojban grammar derives great flexibility and variety from manipulation of tense particles that do much of its work. as demonstrated here, it is the particles that determine whether a predicate—a term of extralinguistic reference, such as dunda and bajra—is to serve in a given statement as a noun, verb, adjective or adverb, as in more familiar grammars. thus pu (before), ca (now) and ba (after) give the predicate dunda (to give) the function of a verb (upper left) and "conjugate" it through the future, present and past tense. compound forms of these operators yield the compound tenses. for example, pu pu (before-before) indicates the pluperfect tense. in such combinations they not only duplicate all of the familiar grammatical forms but go far beyond to express relationships that can be only clumsily approximated in the natural languages, as is indicated by the translation of the compound operator ba zi ze'u at center left. the flexibility of the system is suggested further by the transformations of dunda (in this table give, giver, gift, generous, generously, generosity, and so on) in accord with its association with operators and connectives or its place in a multiple predicate.

"adverb" forms
ko'a ro roi dunda ko'a so'e roi dunda ko'a so'o roi dunda	She always gives. She usually gives. She sometimes gives.
ko'a pu zi dunda ko'a pu zu dunda ko'a ba zi dunda	She recently gave. She gave long ago. She will soon give.
ko'a vi dunda ko'a va dunda ko'a vu dunda	She gives here. She gives there. She gives over there.
ko'a bu'u ro da dunda	She gives everywhere (in all places).
ko'a ba zi ze'u vi dunda	Soon she will be giving here for a long time.

negatives
ko'a na ku dunda na ku da dunda no ko'a dunda	He doesn't give. It is false that anyone gives. None of them gives.

"noun" forms
lo prenu lo vi prenu lo va prenu	a person this person that person
lo ro prenu lo so'e prenu lo so'i prenu	all people most people many people
no lo prenu lo pa prenu lo re prenu	none of the people a person, one person two people
ro lo ci prenu	all of the three people

abstract "nouns"
lo nu dunda lo nu bajra	a/the giving a/the run

"adjective" forms
lo laldo prenu lo dunda prenu	an old person a giving person
lo melbi verba zdani lo verba melbi zdani	a pretty-child home a childishly pretty home
lo prenu poi laldo lo prenu poi na'o dunda lo prenu poi na'o dunda gi'e laldo	a person who is old a person who is generous a person who is generous and old
lo prenu poi dunda ko'e lo prenu poi dunda ko'e ko'i	a person who gives it a person who gives it to him
lo laldo prenu poi pu dunda ci ko'e lo ze vi bajra	the old person who gave three of them to these seven runners

identities
ko'a du la djon ko'a du lo nanmu ko'a du lo laldo nanmu poi pu dunda ci ko'e lo ze vi bajra	He is John. He is the man. He is the old man who gave 3 of them to these 7 runners.

compound forms
ko'a bajra gi'a cadzu ko'a bajra gi'e cadzu	He runs or walks. He runs and walks.
ko'a a ko'e bajra ko'a e ko'e bajra	He or she runs. He and she run
ko'a bajra i ja ko'e cadzu ko'a bajra i je ko'e cadzu ko'a cadzu i janai ko'e bajra ko'a bajra i jo ko'e cadzu	He runs or she walks. He runs and she walks. If he runs then she walks. He runs if and only if she walks
ko'a bajra ki'u lo nu ko'e cadzu ko'a bajra tai lo nu ko'e cadzu	He runs because she walks. He runs like she walks.
ki'u lo nu ko'a cadzu vau ko'e bajra	Because he walks, she runs.
ko'a bajra ca lo nu ko'e cadzu ko'a bajra ba lo nu ko'e cadzu ko'a bajra bu'u lo nu ko'e cadzu	He runs when she walks. He runs after she walks. He runs where she walks.
ca lo nu ko'e cadzu vau ko'e bajra	When she walks he runs.

universals
ro bajra cu cadzu ko'a bajra ca ro nu ko'e cadzu ko'a bajra bu'u ro nu ko'e cadzu ro dunda cu dunda da	Anyone who runs walks. She runs whenever he walks. She runs wherever he walks. Everyone who gives gives something.

attitudinal forms
le'o ko'a bajra ue ko'a bajra oinai ko'a bajra	What! She runs? [anger] Well! So she runs. [surprise] How nice that she runs! [pleasure]
xu ko'a bajra ma bajra bu'u ma ko'a bajra	Does she run? Who runs? Where does she run?
je'u ko'a bajra la'a ko'a bajra ju'o cu'i ko'a bajra je'u nai ko'a bajra	Yes; she runs. She probably runs. Perhaps she runs. No, she doesn't run.
ai mi bajra au mi bajra a'o mi bajra e'u do bajra	I'm going to run. I want to run. I hope to run. I suggest you run.
e'i mi bajra	I must run.