The consequential mood (

abbreviated An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

, less often or ) is a verb form used in some

Eskaleut languages The Eskaleut (), Eskimo–Aleut or Inuit–Yupik–Unangan languages are a language family native to the northern portions of the North American continent and a small part of northeastern Asia. Languages in the family are indigenous to parts of w ...

to mark dependent

adverbial clause An adverbial clause is a dependent clause that functions as an adverb. That is, the entire clause modifies a separate element within a sentence. As with all clauses, it contains a subject and predicate, though the subject as well as the (predicate ...

s for reason ('because') or time ('when'). Due to the broader meaning of the term ''mood'' in the context of Eskimo grammar, the consequential can be considered outside of the proper scope of

grammatical mood In linguistics, grammatical mood is a grammatical feature of verbs, used for signaling modality. That is, it is the use of verbal inflections that allow speakers to express their attitude toward what they are saying (for example, a statement o ...

. In Central Alaskan Yup'ik, the consequential expresses the meaning 'because': In Central Siberian Yupik the two forms of the consequential mood are used only for the meanings 'when' and 'while', whereas 'because' is expressed by a particle added to the indicative. Similarly, the consequential expresses the meaning of 'when' in North Alaskan Iñupiaq. The consequential suffix ''-nga-'' is a descendant of the

Proto-Eskimoan Proto-Eskimoan or Proto-Eskimo is the reconstructed ancestor of the Eskimoan languages. It was spoken by the ancestors of the Yupik and Inuit peoples. It is linguistically related to the Aleut language, and both descend from the Proto-Eskimo–Al ...

derivational suffix ''-nga-'', whose meaning is 'having Ved', 'having been Ved'.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * {{Eskimo-Aleut languages Eskaleut languages Grammatical moods Inupiat language Yupik languages