Moshurian

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Moshurian
uthilikh
Uthilikh-in-alphabet.png
The Moshurian endonym(uthilikh) written in Moshurian script.
Pronunciation[ˈuð.ilix]
Created byJukethatbox
SettingRadael
Native toMoshurian Empire
EthnicityMoshurians
Native speakers410,000,000 (400 UH)
L2: 40,000,000
Yeldhic
  • Paleoyeldhic
    • Tulooric
      • Moshurian
Early forms
Kóftąbriác Yeldha
  • Proto-Tulooric
    • Early Moshurian
      • Ancient Moshurian
        • Middle Moshurian
Standard form
Taráhus Moshurian
Dialects
  • Taráhus dialect(Taráhus gugtui)
    • Oźmaneli dialect(Oźmaneli gugtui)
  • Oalan dialect(Oalan gugtui)
  • Loïha dialect(Loïha gugtui)
  • Odezyë dialect(Odezyë gugtui)
  • Far East dialect(Dmuriékh gugtui)
  • Sépenzg dialect(Sépenzg gugtui)
  • Moshurian alphabet
Official status
Official language in
Moshurian Empire
Iśatúr Confederacy
Recognised minority
language in
Eastern Gegfen Alliance
Regulated byMinistry of Linguistic Regulation
Moshurian-speakers.jpeg
Map of Moshurian speakers. Dark green represents a Moshurian-speaking majority and light green represents a significant minority.
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Moshurian(endonym: uthilikh; Moshurian: [ˈuðˌilix]) is a Tulooric language spoken in mostly Talkoch. It is the most spoken language in Talkoch, and also has significant minority communities on Etzeán Island and the Eastern Gegfen Alliance, also called the Dmuriékh(lit. "far away east"). It is the sole official language of the Moshurian Empire, and is thoroughly used administratively and academically in the Moshurian Empire, no matter what one's mother tongue is.

Philologically, he language is of the Yeldhic language superfamily, which also includes languages like Ilda and Barbuz. Within the superfamily, it is of the Paleoyeldhic branch: a deviation of Proto-Yeldhic spoken by the first Proto-Yeldhic farmers in the fertile Ulmic Crescent and around the rivers of Zád and Pêrush. The Moshurians are of a Paleoyeldhic origin, and are most likely ethnically related to the β-Paleoyeldhics, who advanced south into the wider Tarám River Basin and settled in the temperate Munsanukh Valley and the coast of Tuloor Lake, where the split between the Tulooric branch of languages, of which Moshurian is part of, and the Najmunsaic branch of languages, of which Aquq and Hátuli is part of, occured around 3000 UH.

It is one of the only surviving languages indigenous to the Munsanukh Valley, which is generally considered, alongside Tuloor Lake, to be the birthplace of the Moshurian race, culture and language.

Origin

Ancestors

Comparative morphology

Early Moshurian Old Moshurian Middle Moshurian Modern Moshurian
Word "cow" *mosuk mosuk musuk mosok
"eye" *faleH felekh fale fáli
"grass" *syö siu soi
"emotion" *mḗHwēg[1] meshek màfhek mufhe
"Moshurian" *uðileH uthilikmöim uthilikmui uthilikh/uthilikmë

Iki-Duki's law

In the transistory period between Early and Old Moshurian, the /Hw/ sounds found in Early Moshurian post-alveolised to become /ʃ/ in Old Moshurian and then in /ɸ/ in Middle Moshurian. This sound change, which seems to only have occured in Moshuric and Aquqi derivations, is often known in Radael linguistic areas as Iki-Duki's law, as it was first hypothesised by a Kutic nomadic linguist called Iki-Duki, who studied phonological differences between his native Kutic and Moshurian. Although Iki-Duki's most famous contribution to the linguistics community was his classification of Kutic as part of the at the time still considered areal language family Ebró, his findings later snowballed into further study into other Moshuric languages and his hypothesis.

The law was first attested by Arnic linguist Môhwod ða-Téfir himself, and one of his first of many contributions to the linguistic community.

Early Moshurian

Early Moshurian, also alternatively called Proto-Moshurian, is the earliest form of the Moshurian language, although it is still only hypothesised, as Moshurian was not recorded until Old Moshurian. Most of Early Moshurian's vocabulary is instead comparatively reconstructed from later forms of Moshurian, as well as earlier proto-languages like Proto-Tulooric and sometimes as far back as Proto-Yeldhic.

Old Moshurian

Old Moshurian is the oldest orthographically attested ancestor of Moshurian. Its oldest known written work is the Māgiswāska Kovinās(Old Moshurian: TàGevoch Kominazà; Modern Moshurian: TaMamidakh Kominaz), a document that was originally written in Ilda but translated into Old Moshurian.

Middle Moshurian

Endonym

The Moshurian endonym, uthilikh, is most likely derived from Moshurian mythology, in which the god of creation's daughter, Khaurnán, sent her son, Uthiliran, to lead the Moshurian people. Etymologically, the word is probably derived from the Proto-Yeldhic word *ułiqʷ, which most likely meant "small lake" or "pond", possibly referring to Tuloor Lake, which is deduced to be the Moshurian homeland.

Exonym

Their exonym of Moshurian comes from a nomadic legend of the god of travel and nomads, Dündŵęk, who traveled to Tuloor Lake(the homeland of the Moshurians) in search of an inn to rest. The Moshurians had plenty of inns(möşhüř as they are called in Ancient Yeldha), and Dündŵęk was finally able to rest. After departing, he thanked the Moshurians, and later mentioned them to the other gods as simply möşhüřiànöřmà, or "inn people". This exonym stuck within nomadic circles, who then passed the exonym to the more settled peoples of Talkoch.

Phonology

Orthography

The Moshurian alphabet, with phonemic pronunciation.

Moshurian has its own script that is read right-to-left, top-to-bottom. Each symbol can be easily deciphered by simply looking at how high or low the symbol is. If the symbol goes down below the line on the paper, it is a consonant.

The sound /h/ is represented with the〈kh〉glyph, and the /ɸ/ sound is represented by the 〈fh〉dipthong, transcripted as ⟨fkh⟩.

Abjad form

The Moshurian alphabet can be written in an abjad form, although this is mostly used by Kutic traders who adapted the Moshurian alphabet to a structure similar to their own native Kutic script, which itself is an abjad.

The form mostly follows the rules of the Kutic abjad, such as no inset vowels being represented, although the glyphs for ⟨a⟩ and ⟨á⟩ are used in an onset position.

The Moshurian Empire does not officially recognise the abjad form, and even in traditionally Kutic-dominated territories, such as along east to west trade routes, children are taught the alphabetical form of the script when learning Moshurian.

Origin

The origin of the Moshurian alphabet is heavily debated. According to the Gécheb Bizörith, the Moshurian alphabet was designed by a secret society called Akhakuöm, who took inspiration from the Tiragii military cuneiform. Eventually after the bust of Akhakuöm by the Moshurian state, the script was changed to fit the standard Moshurian dialect and re-issued as the government Moshurian alphabet.

In the Sóvók religion, one of the books in the Idērigidwi claims that a man named Udeldoi presented a script to the king of Moshuria so as to record military victories for propaganda.

Both of these interpretations are considered simply as urban legend, as orthographic analysis of the Izkanà(one of the earliest Moshurian documents) by calligraphers showed that the early Moshurian alphabet had many similarities with the logographic Oalanii[2] script, which may have influenced Munsanukh orthographies as a whole.

The glyphs for /b/ comes from Oalanii *ʕbạn, while the glyph for /d/ comes from Oalanii *dḕmsir.

Consonants

Consonant phonemes
Labial Labiodental Dental Alveolar Post-
alveolar
/
palatal
Retroflex/
velar
Glottal
Nasal m n ŋ
Stop/
Affricate
p b t d t͡ʃ  k ɡ
Fricative ɸ f (θ)[3] ð s z ʃ ʒ x h
Approximant j
Lateral l
Flap ɽ

Vowels

Vowel phonemes
Front Near-
front
Central Back
Close i y u
Near-close ɪ
Close-mid e ø o
Mid ə̃
Open-mid ε
Open a ɑ

Prosody

Stress

Stress in Moshurian is paroxytonic, meaning stress is placed on the penultimate syllable of a word, e.g. zazuŋ, pronounced [ˈzaˌzuŋ], or uthilikh, pronounced [ˈuð.ilix].

Phonotactics

Syllables in Moshurian typically follow the pattern of (C)(C)V(V)(C)(C)[4].

Morphology

See also: Moshurian/Swadesh list.

Verbs

Weak verbs

Weak verbs in Moshurian are inflected with the infinitive suffix -omh, and then it can be further conjugated based on pronoun.

Suffixes
Singular Plural
Infinitive -omh
First person -ék(-ïk) -ékeŋ(-ïkeŋ)
Second person -ot -(o)tuŋ
He -eź -iŋź
She -aş -aŋéş
They -iş -éiméş

Example

Suffixes
Singular Plural
Infinitive dáfhéromh
First person dáfhérék dáfhérékeŋ
Second person dáfhérot dáfhérotuŋ
Third person He dáfhéreź dáfhériŋź
She dáfhéraş dáfhéraŋéş
They dáfhériş dáfhéréiméş


Numerals

Numerals in Moshurian are labelled as cardinal by adding the suffix -i to a number.

Moshurian English
iyg one
oyamö two
tikré three
igoyà four
tikoyam five

Pronouns

Demonstrative

Demonstrative pronouns
English translation Pronoun
this
that gánué
these gáloŋ
those gánuéloŋ

Personal

Personal pronouns in Moshurian are, for the most part, identical to their verb inflections.

Personal pronouns
Singular Plural
First person ék ékeŋ
Second person ot otuŋ
He iŋź
She aŋéş
They éiméş

Possessive

Possessive pronouns in Moshurian are identical to personal pronouns, except that they add the prefix ta- before the personal pronoun.

Possessive pronouns
Singular Plural
First person taék taékeŋ
Second person taot taotuŋ
He taeź taiŋź
She tayaş tayaŋéş
They taiş taéiméş

The exceptions to this rule are the male third person possessive pronoun, where the prefix tay- is used instead because the personal pronouns begin in a-.

Syntax

Constituent order

Moshurian uses an OSV(object-subject-verb) sentence structure.

Cases

Moshurian has three noun cases: the nominative, the accusative and the genitive. The nominative is not indicated, while the accusative is indicated with a -géd/-éd suffix for all nouns but pronouns and the suffix -e for pronouns. The genitive case is indicated with the prefix ta-.

Nominative Accusative Genitive
Noun Consonant-ending/starting - -éd ta-
Vowel-ending/starting -géd
Pronoun -e

Particles

Tense particles

In Moshurian, there are four main tenses- the present, the future, the far future and the simple past. To indicate that a phrase is in a certain tense, a particle is used just before the object, e.g. öş gersetigéd kestolék(I built a house).

Tense particles
Present Future Far Future Past
(uź) ïş ïşé öş

The present tense particle, , is used like a natural in music. By default, no particle is used to indicate the present in a non-contextual sentence, but as particles are continuous, meaning that if a particle is placed then all succeeding sentences will be in the particle's tense until a new particle appears, may be needed to clarify that a sentence does not follow the tense of the previous sentence.
Example: öş abáragéd udubék. budur ibiş. - I went to the park. It was[5] great.
ös abáragéd udubék. budur ibiş. - I went to the park. (The park) is great.

Other particles

  • ché - negative particle, roughly translates to no/not/non- in English.
  • duà - imperative particle, indicates a sentence is imperative. Can also mean the adjective "imperative" in general, though most speakers differentiate the two meanings by using duànaga for the latter meaning.

Noun phrase

Sögéd kél mosok dáfhéréiméş.
grass-ACC PL cow(PL) eat-3PL.
Cows eat grass.

In this sentence, géd is the object, mosok is the subject, and dáfhéréiméş is the verb with inflection. in noun phrases, Moshurian still uses the object-subject-verb structure.

Verb phrase

See also:Verbs.

sögéd duà ché dáfhér!
grass-ACC IMP no eat!
Do not eat the grass!

In imperative verb phrases, the imperative particle, duà, is put before the verb, as ché is still considered, at least grammatically, part of the verb when present. Additionally, verbs take on their root form, as opposed to their infinitive form in said sentence type.

In this sentence, sögéd is the object, and the verb is dáfhér. The subject does not appear and is instead implied to be the recipient of the imperative phrase.

Dialects

Standard dialect

The standard dialect of Moshurian is, according to the Ministry of Linguistic Regulation(MLR), officially the Taráhus dialect spoken in the capital, although Tárahus is so large that several districts have developed their own dialects, many of which who are vastly different from each other, so it is still unclear on which is considered the standard within the family of Taráhus dialects.

Inner Taráhus dialect

The Inner Taráhus dialect is generally considered by Moshurian linguistics to be what the MLR constitution means in the line:

"[...] The dialect spoken around the capitol and the [MLR] shall be considered the dialect to be used for the transmission of necessary information to Moshurian citizens. For non-Moshurian areas of the Empire, the standard [dialect][6] of the most prominent non-Moshurian language shall be used to convey said information."

However, this quote can be considered quite vague, as the MLR and the wider capitol has changed location many times in Taráhus. One year, the MLR headquarters was located in the district of Oźmaneli, where a borderline unintelligible dialect of Moshurian is spoken, and, for that year, the bizarre Oźmaneli dialect was considered the standard, causing great confusion to non-Oźmanelis.

Oźmaneli dialect

The Oźmaneli dialect is a dialect spoken in the inner city district of Oźmaneli. It has garnered much attention from linguists, as its pronunciation is widely different from typical pronunciation.

Additionally, it is the only dialect to utilise the zero copula, an effect where the verb "to be" is not used in a statement, e.g. instead of "I am tired" it would be "I tired".

Phonetic differences

In general, the pattern seems to be that voiceless consonants tend to get voiced, but this is not always the case.

  • /ŋ/ is pronounced [ɳ] or [ɟ][7]
  • /x/ is pronounced [ɣ]
  • /ð/ is pronounced [θ][8]
  • /b/ is sometimes pronounced [ʙ] before a /ɽ/.
  • Speaking of /ɽ/, it is pronounced [ɬ]
Morphological differences
Oźmaneli rhyming slang

Very similar to Cockney rhyming slang in London, Oźmaneli has its own rhyming slang, that often leaves many non-Oźmanelis stringed(confused).

  • abaza(football) rhymes with dzul iz upaza(colour and shape) → dzul
  • zebatalomh(confuse) → usuŋtua sibatal(stringed instrument) → usuŋtua

Oalan dialect

The Oalan dialect is the specific dialect of Moshurian spoken in the city of Oalan and its surrounding suburbs. Although not as dissimilar from the standard as the Oźmaneli dialect, and having relatively few morphological differences, phonologically it differs quite a bit, and is thus often considered by those from Taráhus as an "uneducated" and "rural" dialect, although this interpretation is obviously considered quite offensive by Oalanians, who in return see the Taráhusians as "egotistic bourgeois moral absolutists", or just "rich assholes" for short. Perhaps not so coincidentally, the local branch of the Moshurian Socialist Party often use rich Taráhusians as scapegoats in economic troubles, and are thus quite popular in the region.

Phonological differences

  • Glottal or velar fricatives(/h/ or /x/) surrounded by vowels are either not pronounced or non-syllabic.
    • Middle Moshurian ukhalan[9] → (possibly) Oalan
  • Initial /u/ is pronounced [o] or [ɔ].
    • uthilikh /ˈuð.ilix/ → othilih [ˈoθ.ilih]
  • Final /x/ is pronounced [h] or not at all
    • semikhsemï/semih
  • Final unrounded vowels are rounded.
    • asti /asti/ → astï [asty]
  • Voiced fricatives at the end of syllables, unless velar or glottal and the next phone is a vowel, are unvoiced.
    • eźir /ɛˈʒiɽ/ → eşir [ɛˈʃiɽ]

Loïha dialect

The Loïha dialect is the dialect of Moshurian speakers who reside in the Golden Plain. Loïha is possibly the most distinct but still intelligible dialect of Moshurian. This is because there are very few morphological differences, but quite large sound changes.

Notably, the Loïha dialect can be split into two groups: the Western and Eastern dialects. Western Loïha tends to be a bit more distant from the standard, whereas Eastern is the opposite. However, what is universal across both dialects is that glottal stops are incorporated in everyday speech.

Sound changes

  • From /ð/ → [ð](Western) or [θ](Eastern)
  • From /x/ → [ʁ](Western) or [χ](Eastern)
  • In diphthong C̥V → /ʔV/.

Odezyë dialect

The Odezyë dialect is phonetically not very different from standard Moshurian, but it does have a bizarre mannerism that cannot be found in any other dialect- that being the suffix -áktu. It is placed directly after any sort of proper noun, including names. The origin of this is heavily debated- although the most prominent theory claims that it may come from the Aquq genitive suffix -ḗC̥ə̹.

Far East dialect

The entire existence of the Far East Moshurians(Dmuriékh; Moshurian: [dˈmuɽi̯ˌex]) is shrouded in mystery, but they seem to speak a certain dialect of Moshurian that only slightly varies from the standard Taráhus dialect.

Phonological differences

  • /u/ → [ʊ] or [ɯ] in some cases
  • [VN][10] → [Ṽ].

Sépenzg dialect

Example texts

Seventh Linguifex Relay

This language will be in the Seventh Linguifex Relay. As such, this section will be updated once the relay begins.

Other resources

  1. ^ See Iki-Duki's law.
  2. ^ Oalanii is an archeological term used to describe the Proto-Taskaric inhabitants of what is now the city of Oalan. Although the Oalanii had their own script, no surviving documentation mentions their actual endonym, so they are called the Oalanii after the city where the first archeological remains of ancient Oalan were found.
  3. ^ Only used in certain dialects. Still orthographically represented as 〈th〉.
  4. ^ Velar fricatives(/x/) can not be followed by glides(/j/).
  5. ^ Note the continuous past tense.
  6. ^ The original constitution uses the word "edition"(kuchbarà) to refer to standard dialects of minority languages, which is kind of confusing.
  7. ^ Why /ŋ/ is pronounced [ɟ] is one of the greatest mysteries of Moshurian.
  8. ^ The pronunciation of /ð/ as [θ] is a consistent pattern among most non-standard dialects of Moshurian, although some Oźmanelis pronounced /ð/ as [ɕ].
  9. ^ Often mentioned as a possible etymology for the city of Oalan.
  10. ^ Vowel before nasal consonant. Quite common in the Eastern subgroup of dialects.