Cwengâr

Blackbird's Song	Ôsha nGwecwâr	Péladí ba Gécir
A Blackbird sings	Tengecwârh ôsha,	Gécir di ba édhí
To me of my youth,	dulh su gwe su n'ashâ,	del di me pél adhí
For my loaf of bread.	pen legw du nanâr.	pon di ba tenira.
It is a song of youth	Te ât ashâ ngecwâr.	Té ítibh cu éndhí ba gécira,
Of flowing white rivers	Negw fêrâr cwâ lanàr,	Cór nég bérad lenár,
Of high, dark caverns	Pel lelycw cwâ c’hylàr,	Cór níl pél nilár.
So long as the harp sings	Tengecwâr ôsha ô ôrhôdon,	In gécir tol ítibh me aradon,
I shant forget these things	o afongâm du en c’hon.	Tel calím me di ce én chon.

Background

Cwengâr represents a contemporary sibling language to Fén Ghír. As Fén Ghír draws heavily of Irish Gaelic influence for spelling, phonetics and to some degree grammar, Cwengâr serves as a Bythronic equivalent, drawing heavily on Welsh and Breton. Root words are unique and Grammar is fairly simple sharing much still with Fén Ghír. However, words are slight more prone to mutation and grammatical compounding in Cwengâr.

Vocabularly is largely similar, though words have different connotations. For example, Cún [Fén: Law, Promise, Vow] has become Cwŷn and now mostly fills the Bér in Fén as a general Superlative like "Good". Cún in the sense of Promise has become Cwŷn C'hâr[af] or "Just Word[s]". Per which is [Cognate to Bér] is basically reduced to meaning "Bright" GCengâr.

This is my first project for creating a related language and in general, I hope that it surpasses the original to some degree.

Phonology

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio-dental	Dental	Alveolar	Post-alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyngeal	Epiglottal	Glottal
Nasal	m			n				ŋ
Plosive	b/p			t/d					q/ɢ
Fricative		f/v			ʃ/ʒ				x/ɣ
Affricate
Approximant												h
Trill				r					ʀ
Flap or tap
Lateral fric.				l					ʎ
Lateral app.
Lateral flap

Vowels

	Front	Near-front	Central	Near-back	Back
Close	y
Near-close		Y
Close-mid	e				ɤ
Mid			ə
Open-mid	ɛ				ʌ
Near-open
Open	a		ä		ɑ

Phonotactics

Cwengâr avoids vowel and consonant clusters as a general rule. Consonant clusters are resolved by dropping the first consonant while the latter is lenitioned. Vowel clusters are usually separate words.

Orthography

Cwengâr spelling corresponds to IPA with these exceptions;

• ŋ is spelt ng as in English.
• q is spelt cw, ɢ is spelt gw. This is convention based off the Breton, if a Cwengâr script is invented, they will not be diaphongs.
• f is spelt ff, v is spelt f, inspired by Welsh.
• ʃ is spelt sh, ʒ is spelt s, based off the above relation. It's tempting to use "ss" but "sh" is more conventional.
• x is spelt c'h, ɣ is spelt g'h, inspired by Breton.
• ʀ is spelt rh at the beginning of the word, rr elsewhere for aesthetic reasons. Rh at all points is acceptable but looks off to me personally.
• ʎ is spelt lh, inspired by Breton.

• y is spelt ŷ
• Y is spelt y
• e is spelt â
• ə is spelt à or a.
• ɛ is spelt e
• a is spelt a
• ɤ is spelt ê
• ʌ is spelt u
• ä is spelt ô
• ɑ is spelt o

Grammar

Pronouns

• 1S: Du, Ty
• 2S: Rhà, Ra
• 3S: Lho, Le
• 1P: Ês, Ŷsh
• 2P: Ôrhaf, Yraf
• 3P: Ulhaf, Âlaf

Genders

Cwengâr bases masculine/feminine distinctions on the first vowel in a word, which modifies the preceding consonant of the word [if any] and the final consonant of the word preceding it.

Masc	Fem.
ê	ŷ
u	â
ô	y
o	e
à	a

a is usually feminine, but is prone to exceptions, particularly when it is representing the ə/à sound.

If the vowel is masculine, the preceding consonant is unvoiced. If Feminine, the consonant is voiced. r and l also agree with feminine vowels, while rh and lh agree with masculine ones. Nasal consonants are wholly neutral.

The primary relevance of this is in personal names and occaisionally in assigning genders to titles and animals, where the first vowel is changed to the corresponding letter on the table above.

The use for titles is generally rare and will occur mostly etymologically rather than grammatically, "Cwŷsyn" [King] for example is technically a feminine term, but relates to law and legitimacy over the land which is traditionally feminine. Cwŷson is a variation which occurs when the last syllable is made masculine but Cwŷsyn presedes the discintion and is usually left alone unless relevant.

For animals, the distinction usually defaults towards feminine or the roots of the term but when an animal's gender is relevant, the first letter will be changed; merygw "Sheep" becomes "morygw" or "ram".

To emphasize gender in a noun which defaults to the gender, a suffix if added; Female is usually signaled with an addition at the end or "-ŷn" or "-yn". "-ul" may be used at times to emphasize age. Male in turn is signified with "-on" or "-àn". "-àl" is a paternal counterpart to "-ul" but is used more rarely usually only for people seen actively serving as guardians.

Mutations

A "Hard" Mutation occurs in either verbs which are modifed by auxilaries or else a possessed object which are possessed.

A "Soft" Mutation occurs in direct objects or in a noun following a preposition.

Unmutated	Soft	Hard
m	f/ff
p	ff	m
b	f	m
ff	'	b
f	'	p
n	sh/s
t	sh	n
d	s	n
sh	h	t
s	h	d
ng	c'h/g'h
cw	c'h	ng
gw	g'h	ng
c'h	h	cw
g'h	h	gw

Verbs

• Te*-Present Progressive/Past
• Lô-Will
• Cwyy- Should
• Ma- Want
• A-Negative

• Te on its own usually implies an action that has taken place consistantly over time. If it is a thing that happened but is not happening currently, a time is specificed after, or else "gwô 'ogw" [at another time] is used.

-->

Branching

Cwengar is mostly head last language;

Verb

  |      \

Verb Subject

  |             |         \

Verb Subject Object

|             |              |              \

Verb Subject D Obj. Ind. Obj.

Verb

|        \

Adj. Verb | | \ Adv. Aux. Verb.

Ind. Obj. | | \ \ Adj. Num. Prp. Obj.

D Obj.- Direct Object Ind. Obj- Indirect Object Adj- Adjective Adv- Adverb Aux- Auxiliary/Conjugation Prp- Preposition.

Prepositions

Masc width="30%"|Fem	English	Ngo	Nge	Against
Dulh	Tyl	From
Dô	Ta	To
Dôf	Taff	Towards
Rhôlh	Ral	Than
Êrô	Âra	Like
Rhàlh	Rŷ	By
fà	ffa	With
Gwu	Cwy	Under
Gwê	Cwe	Over
Gwô	Cwâ	In[to]
Lhurod	Lârot	Around
Nŷrh	Nŷr	Near
Erac'hôn	Erac'hôn	Opposite
Gwu	Cwâ	Before
Gwo	Cwe	After
Gwô	Cwa	Until
Gwê	Cwŷ	At/During
Bon	Pen	For/Because of
Gwulh	Cwâl	According

These are written as separate words, but grammatically often act almost as cases for the words after them and most speakers blur the distinction of words. Words which begin with vowels following these are often pronounced with with a "h" sound preceding them or "n" in the case of possessives. Only the "n" is written however.

Possessive

Possessive causes a hard mutation in the possessed word;

He walked to your house.

Tenôlh lho dô rhà melem.

Relative Clauses

In Cwengâr relative clauses are rather common and often mark another action within the sentance. These begin with a relative determiner, however there are no strict rules on there ending.

I shouted at the woman who took my bread.

Terhôlhôt du tyl alyn et tengŷcw dy nânar cwê 'ocwâ. .

These relative clauses can sometimes be worked into the shorter form of dependant clauses to express cause which is something rare in English, the result is something like this;

We went to the store to get fishing supplies.

Would said in Cwengâr as;

Telô dy lhotenan pen ed lhôtan ŷs gwânan c'honaf.

Although, it could also be expressed with depedant coupla dividing it into two sentances;

Tengâb du gwânan c'honaf o telô dy lhotenan.

This would translate as something closer to:

We needed fishing supplies so we went to the store.

It is also important to note that these relatively clauses may build on top of eachother, perhaps more often than in English;

I went to the man who sold the boat to the guy who talked to me yesterday.

Telô dy ôlon et telhotan ât cwerêl ta ed tengâr lho ta ny cwê fon gâl..