Dothraki Verbal Auxiliaries

Dothraki word class that we'll call, for want of a better word, verbal auxiliaries, are not as closely related to verbs as auxiliary verbs usually are. They do not directly affect the verb's conjugation, they do not conjugate themselves and syntactically they are postpositions to the subject of the sentence. Nevertheless, they affect the relation between the subject and the verb and accommodate a large part of dothraki's voice, aspect and modality system.

Voices

Nem — Passive

Dothraki passive is effectuated with verbal auxiliary, nem. The subject takes the semantical role of an object, but retains it's position and case, and still affects the verb conjugation. The instigator of the action can be (re-)introduced as a complement with preposition ki.

Anha nem vo vaddrivok. — "I will not be killed."

Anha nem kem ma moon ki maisi mae. — "I was married to her by her mother."

Nemo — Reflexive

When the verb is transitive, but the subject inflicts the action on themself, auxiliary nemo is used. As with the passive, the syntactical place of the primary object is just left empty.

Anha nemo vo vaddrivok. — "I will not kill myself."

Anha nemo kem ma moon. — "I married myself to her."

Aspects

Ray — Perfect

Ray marks the perfect aspect, and can be loosely translated as "already".

Anha ray addriv mahrazhes. — "I had killed the man."

Anha ray addrivak mahrazhes. — "I have killed the man."

Anha ray vaddrivak mahrazhes. — " I will have killed the man."

Zin

Zin denotes to continuation of the action. It loosely translates to "still".

Anha zin addrivak mahrazhis. — "I'm still killing men."

Modalities

Laz

Laz closely compares to english auxiliary verb can. It of course does not inflect, but when used with a past tense verb, it acquires a counterfactual sense, could.

Anha laz addrivak mahrazhes. — "I can kill a man."

Anha laz addriv chiories, vosma otok rek. — "I could kill a woman, but won't do that."

Vil

Vil translates to to manage to.

Anha vil addriv mahrazhes. — "I managed to kill a man."

Eth

Eth translates to must.

Anha'th addrivak mahrazhes. — "I must kill the man."

Yer eth vos addrivi chiories. — "You must not kill women."

Ish

Ish translates to might.

Anha'sh addrivak mahrazhes. — "I might kill the man."

Yer ish vos addrivi chiories. — "You might not kill women."

Jif

Jif translates to should.

Anha jif addrivak mahrazhes. — "I should kill the man."

Chir

Chir translates to nearly or almost

Combinations

Some of these auxiliaries appear to combine themselves to mix their meanings.

Jifim

Most likely a combination of jif and nem, it translates to should be.

Mori vo dirgi meqoy jifim ayyoza. — "They don't think the blood should be diluted."