Phi practice Evidentiality in Phi

Reading 3 of 11

Part 2

Witness (hi)

With hi, a speaker says that their own senses met the event or state. It makes witnesshood explicit when witnesshood matters.

01What hi adds

suliwa mua phitura nai. mia suliwa hi nila.

snake LOC well be. 1SG snake DIR see.

(A snake is at the well. I see it with my own eyes.)

The same sight can be asserted without an evidential: mia suliwa nila. The unmarked form names no source. Adding hi puts the speaker on record as a direct perceiver.

News and testimony are common places for that distinction, but grammar does not require it there. A speaker may leave provenance unstated. Choosing hi makes a source statement that another person can question.

02Where witnessing ends

Sight is not privileged. Hearing, touch, taste, and smell can support hi when the sense meets the event or state being described.

mia lohau hi hea.

1SG dog DIR hear.

(I hear the dog directly.)

mia sulopa hi thorima.

1SG soup DIR taste.

(I taste the soup directly.)

Traces call for another particle. Wet ground may support past rain, an empty room may support a departure, and a trail may support a snake's presence. In those conclusions the senses meet a sign and reasoning reaches beyond it, so ke names the route more accurately.

mia suliwa ma nila. mia mua muila ruela nila.

1SG snake NEG see. 1SG LOC earth path see.

(I do not see the snake. I see the trail in the earth.)

The elder leaves both perceptions unmarked and later places ke on the conclusion. The source particle belongs to the clause it describes.

03Past witness and memory

Tense comes before evidentiality:

mia suliwa to hi nila.

1SG snake PST DIR see.

(I saw the snake myself.)

The sentence presents the original seeing as direct. It says nothing about the quality of the speaker's present memory. If the current account is reconstructed from a trail, a note, or somebody else's report, the source particle follows that actual route instead.

A future event cannot yet have been witnessed. A prediction from tonight's clouds takes ke; one based on the season takes ho; a forecast received from another source takes ti. hi can return after the event, if the speaker was there to perceive it.

04Drill: when witnesshood matters

For each situation, decide whether hi contributes information worth stating. An unmarked assertion remains grammatical and leaves source unstated.

  1. You answer where the dog is while looking at the dog.
  2. Someone says your friend never came to the garden, and you watched them arrive.
  3. You remark that the soup is warm while eating together.
  4. The child reports a snake at the well, and you later see it too.

The first and third can rest naturally as plain assertions: lohau mua thepalu nai. and sulopa sulae nai. In the second, ne sulae to hi shua. makes witnesshood relevant to the disagreement. In the fourth, mia suliwa hi nila. records a second direct account. Two hi clauses still belong to two speakers; agreement between them is evidence to examine, not automatic verification.