Esperanto · Chapter 2 · Lesson 10 · Grammar primer
Correlatives: the 45-word table
Who, what, where, when, why. Five beginnings crossed with nine endings gives you forty-five words from fourteen pieces.
The short version
Five beginnings by nine endings gives 45 words
The question, demonstrative, indefinite, universal and negative words all come off one grid. Five beginnings say which series: ki- asks, ti- points, i- is vague, ĉi- is all, neni- is none. Nine endings say the category: -u one, -o thing, -e place, -am time, -al reason and so on. Fourteen pieces, forty-five words, nothing to memorise one at a time.
kiam, tiam, iam, ĉiam, neniam
You can decode one you have never seen
This is the part that makes the grid worth an afternoon. You have never met nenial. Break it: neni- is the no-series, -al is reason, so it means for no reason, and you did not look it up. No natural language lets you do that. In English, knowing when tells you nothing whatsoever about never, though they belong to the same grid.
nenial, ĉiom, ties
kiu counts and pluralises, kio does not
Kiu picks an individual out of a set, so it takes the plural and the accusative like any other -u word: kiuj, kiun, kiujn. Kio asks about a thing in the abstract and only takes the accusative, kion. If you could point at the candidates, use kiu; if you could not, use kio. English who and what split along nearly the same line, so this one transfers.
Kiu homo venis? Kio okazis?
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