Verse:Mwail/Qua

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Verse:

Mwail/Qua

• Mwail/Qua/Lexicon

Verse talk:

Qua
Qua kī̄
Pronunciation	[qɨɑ̯˧ ki˥]
Created by	Inthar
Setting	Verse:Angai
Language family	Keric Qua

This concerns one of many timelines for Angai.

Qua (natively Qua kī̄ /qɨɑ̯˧ ki˥/) is an analytic monosyllabic tonal language with 12 tones: 5 level tones, 3 rising tones, 3 falling tones, and 1 glottalized tone. It is head-final and SVO.

Qua is inspired by East and Southeast Asian tonal languages, Ojitlán Chinantec, Toda, and Saanich.

The native Qua orthography is a deep one (like Tibetan's).

Phonology

The following is the phonology of Standard Qua.

Phonotactics

A morpheme is almost always monosyllabic. A syllable always has the structure IR^T, where I = initial, R = rime, and T = tone. Qua has 43 initials, 9 rimes, and 11 tones, making 4257 theoretical syllables. However, not every rime-tone combination is actually allowed.

Rimes

i/e/ə/ɑ/ej/əj/ɑj/iɑ̯/ɨɑ̯

i/e/ə/a/ey/əy/ay/ea/ua

Notes

• /ɑ/ and /ɑj/ are phonetically [a̠] and [a̠j].
• /ɨə̯/ is commonly monophthongized to [ɨ] or [ɨ̞].

Initials

43 initials

		Bilabial	Linguolabial	Lamino-dental		Apico-alveolar		Subapical		Postalveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
				nonsib.	sib.	nonsib.	sib.	nonsib.	sib.
Nasal		m /m/	mʌ /n̼/	nh /n̪/		n /n/		nr /ɳ/
Stop		p /p/	pʌ /t̼/	th /t̪/	tz /t̪s̪/	t /t/	ts /ts̠/	tr /ʈ/	tsr /ʈʂ/	tx /tʃ/	c /c/	k /k/	q /q/	/ʔ/
Fricative		f /ɸ/	fʌ /θ̼/	zz /θ/	z /s̪/	ss /θ̠/	s /s̠/		sr /ʂ/	x /ʃ/	ch /ç/	kh /x/	qh /χ/	h /h/
Resonant	central	w /w/	ʌ /ð̼/	zh /ð̞/		r /ɾ/		rr /ɻ/			y /j/	g /ɰ/
	lateral		lʌ /l̼/	lh /l̪/		l /l/		lr /ɭ/			ly /ʎ/	lg /ʟ/

Tones

Rom.	IPA	English name	Example	Description
ā̄	/˥/ (55)	top	qā̄ /qɑ˥/ 'short'	Often marked by stiff voice.
ā	/˦/ (44)	high	qā /qɑ˦/ 'coat'
a	/˧/ (33)	mid	qa /qɑ˧/ 'to take'
a̱	/˨/ (22)	low	qa̱ /qɑ˨/ 'to burn (intrans.)'
a̱̱	/˩/ (11)	bottom	qa̱̱ /qɑ˩/ 'to exhale'	Often marked by vocal fry.
a̗	/˨˦/ (24)	mid-rise	qa̗ /qɑ˨˦/ 'roof'
á	/˧˥/ (35)	high-rise	qá /qɑ˧˥/ 'fencepost'
à	/˥˧/ (53)	high-fall	qà /qɑ˥˧/ 'crow, raven; (ideophone) caw'
a̖	/˧˩/ (31)	low-fall	qa̖ /qɑ˧˩/ 'finger'
ạ	/˩˨/ (12)	low-rise	qạ /qɑ˩˨/ 'oil, fat, grease'
â	/˦˨/ (42)	mid-fall	qâ /qɑ˦˨/ 'to imprint, to stamp'
ả	/11ʔ/ (11)	stop	qả /qɑ11ʔ/ 'Ulva lactuca'

Tone box

	A (null or resonant coda) (2/5)	B (glottal stop coda) (1/5)	C (fricative coda) (1/5)	D (voiceless stop coda) (1/5)
Glottalized initial (2/8)	53 (à)	44 (ā)	11 (a̱̱)	55 (ā̄)
Modal initial (3/8)	33 (a)	12 (ạ)	22 (a̱)	35 (á)
Breathy initial (3/8)	31 (a̖)	24 (a̗)	42 (â)	11ʔ (ả)