One natlang which makes considerable use of moods is Nenets (Uralic, Samoyedic; Siberia) which has IIRC two tenses and the following mood distinctions:
| Indicative | 'He stands.' |
| Imperative | 'Stand!' |
| Hortative | 'Let me stand.' |
| Optative | 'Let him stand.' |
| Conjunctive | 'He will stand (request).' |
| Necessitative | 'He must stand (demand).' |
| Interrogative | 'Did he stand?' |
| Probabilitative | 'He may stand.' |
| Obligative | 'He should stand (expectation).' |
| Approximative | 'He seems to stand.' |
| Superprobabilitative | 'He probably stands.' |
| Hyperprobabilitative | 'He must have stood.' |
| Narrative | 'He has stood (and is still standing).' |
| Reputative | 'He is supposed to stand.' |
| Habitive | 'He is used to standing.' |
Additionally some of these (I forget which) also have perfective forms, eg. *Perfective Probabilitative 'He may have stood.', etc.
The central Australian language Aranda/Arrernte is supposed to have about 22 verb moods, but so far I have not found anything which gave a decent description of the verbal/mood system for this language. Anyone out there happen to know a reference or resource?
Copyright © 1997, Don Blaheta
Last updated: 19 Oct 1997