Vornian

Pages with the prefix 'Vornian' in the and 'Talk' namespaces:

Vornian

• Vornian/Lexicon

Vornian/Names

Vornian/Swadesh list

Talk:

Vornian
an Snàchamh
Pronunciation	[[Help:IPA|a snʰa:kʰamʰ]]
Created by	IlL, Praimhín
Setting	Verse:Smøøh
Language family	Quihum Talmic Thensaric Tigolic Vornian
Language codes
ISO 639-3	qee

Vanian (native name an Bhànamh /ə va:nəv/, or bò Bhànamh) is a Talmic language closely related to Skellan, spoken on the island nation Snàcha off northern Talma. It's inspired by Irish and German.

Todo

• camhna, sos, car = woman, man, person
• dèic (VN), deàmha (present tense, nonpronominal subject) = eat
• construct state
• get rid of /ŋ/
  • initial ŋ- > g-
  • non-initial single ŋ > n
  • non-initial geminate ŋŋ > ng
• Tigol ae, ao > ao, ò
• hÈarsamha fhìor am ghachan ri haongàlòin = The king approved the composer's work

Morphology

Pronouns

	Singular	Plural
1	nà	àmh
2 (familiar)	hiar	sèid
2 (polite)	Stàna
3 (masculine)	u	àr
3 (feminine)	i
3 (inanimate)	ci

Independent pronouns can be used as topics and direct objects.

As topic:

Nà tiann arainn oitheadh?

1SG why on-1SG suffer.VN

Why must I suffer?

Prepositions

Prepositions are inflected, as in the ancestral Thensarian. The pronoun Sthàna is not fused with the preposition, however.

The sequences le + an and de + an contract to len /lɛn/ and den /dɛn/.

The 1sg and 2sg forms of prepositions are stressed on the last syllable; all other forms have initial stress.

Inflection of prepositions

	me	you (sg.)	him	her	it	us	you (pl.)	them	relative
ar 'on'	arainn	arais	or	ari	arè	arad	arac	arar	aram
de-L, d'- 'in, at'	dèinn	dèis	diù	dì	dè	diad	diac	diar	diam
ful 'around'	fulainn	fulais	fulu	fuili	fulè	fulad	fulac	fular	fulam
geil 'from'	geilinn	geilis	gela	geili	geilè	geilid	geilic	geilir	geilim
go 'with'	guainn	gòis	gù	guì	gè	guad	guac	guar	guam
le 'to'	linn	leis	leo	lèi	lè	liod	lioc	lior	liom
nae 'with (instrumental)'	naìnn	naìs	nae	naì	nè	naed	naec	naer	naem
ri 'of'	rìnn	rìs	riù	rì	rè	rìod	rìoc	rìor	rìom

Nouns

The plural of nouns is almost always -a/-e if the noun ends in a C, or -nn if the noun ends in a V.

• scain 'a friend', scaine 'friends'
• bùta 'a cave', bùtann 'caves'

There are some irregular plurals:

• sos 'a man', sois 'men'

Vanian lost grammatical gender.

The definite article is an for singular nouns and na for plural nouns.

Colloquial Vanian may also drop the plural suffix for definite plural nouns: na scain or na bùta for na scaine or na bùtann is often heard.

The Thensarian relativizer rin turned into a genitive marker: an scain ri Aodhàn (Aodhàn's friend).

Adjectives

Adjectives inflect similarly to nouns.

Attributive adjectives agree in mutation with the noun if the noun is definite. For example: "a black cat" is sàr flumh and "the black cat" is (an) shàr fhlumh.

Copula

Snachian has a copula laidh which inflects as follows:

Present tense: lanna, lair, lù, laì, lac, lamh, laid, lar, laobh -- and laidh for nonpronominal subjects

Past tense: g'lanna, g'lair, g'lù, g'laì, g'lac, g'lamh, g'laid, g'lar, g'laobh -- and g'laidh for nonpronominal subjects

Future tense: lathanna, lathair, ...

Examples: Lanna dùbhòinn (I'm a teacher), Lù ìon (It's blue)

As in Welsh, the copula is also used with progressive verbs:

Dhùbhòin lù d'èinteach. (The teacher is sleeping.)

Lamh de nachtach fhòdhan. (We're hunting the game.)

Verbs

The Snachian verbal system is very different from that of its ancestor Tigol. A modern Snachian verb has only three principal parts: the present analytic, the future analytic, and the verbal noun.

Snachian analogized the analytic forms of verbs to all persons, and fused the personal pronoun with the verb:

molaigh ná -> molanna "I thank"
molaigh fiar -> molair "thou thankest"
molaigh hú -> molù "he thanks"
molaigh hí -> molaì "she thanks"
molaigh cé -> molac "it thanks"
molaigh -> molaigh or mola "... thanks" (with nonpronominal subjects)
molaigh gámh -> molamh "we thank" (both exc. and inc.!)
molaigh séid -> molaid "ye thank"
molaigh hár -> molar "they thank"
molaigh mé -> molam "... who/that thank(s)"
Impersonal: molaobh "one thanks"

The past tense is marked by a séimhiú on the verb as in Irish, except that the suffixes are the same as in the present tense. This comes from a construction that translates to "it was the case that ...". Even non-lenitable consonants get aspirated in casual Snachian, though in the written language a particle is used when the first consonant isn't lenitable.

The future tense is derived from the Old Snachian future tense:

moltanna, moltair, moltù, moltaì, moltac, moltamh, moltaid, moltar, moltam, moltaobh

The verbal noun is extremely irregular in Snachian. One somewhat common way of deriving verbal nouns is with a prefix (ao+N) but other verbal nouns may use the suffixes -ach, -t, -ta/-te, or -st. Verbs loaned from Camalic simply use the stem as the verbal noun. Some verbal nouns are suppletive.

Perfect tenses use the construction tainn ('after', often pronounced tann) followed by the verbal noun.

Verbs are negated with cha or chan, from a Tergetian word meaning "emptiness". In the past tense, cha do-L is used.

The imperative uses the bare present tense stem; imperative sentences are in the form verb + object.

Syntax

Snachian is a head-initial, topic-comment language with V2 order. It is wh-in-situ.

Faulty accusative

The "faulty accusative" (which is also used in Welsh and Modern Standard Arabic) particle is am, which is used for both definite and indefinite nouns. It is inserted before a noun after a head verb when there's a phrase between the head verb and the noun.

For example:

Shos h-aonca tua am u? (The head is h-aonca; am is used because there is a constituent, tua, between h-aonca and u.)

DEF.man PST-feed-NPRO who AM he

Who fed the man?

Compare (with no am):

Shos laidh tua tann aoncach ___ u? (The head is aoncach)

DEF.man COP who after feed-VN he

Who has fed the man?

Shos h-aoncù ___ tua? (The head is h-aoncù)

DEF.man PST-feed-he who

Whom did the man feed?

Topic-prominence

The man thanks the teacher = Shos molù dhùbhòin (lit. the man, he thanks the teacher), or Dhùbhòin mola shos am u (lit. the teacher, the man thanks him)

The teacher thanks the man = Dhùbhòin molù shos (lit. the teacher, he thanks the man), or Shos mola dhùbhòin am u (lit. the man, the teacher thanks him)

Not all sentences have topics.

Relative clauses

Relative clauses work similarly. The resumptive pronoun mi is used to refer back to the head of the relative clause.

Dhùbhòinn ri mhola shos am mi - The teacher who the man thanked (lit: the teacher REL the man thanked RES)

Dhùbhòinn ri mholam shos - The teacher who thanked the man (lit: the teacher REL RES thanked the man)

Shois ri h-aoncam àr - The men who fed them (lit: the men REL RES fed them)

Shois ri h-aoncar mi - The men who they fed (lit: the men REL they fed RES)

To negate relative clauses, rinne is used instead of *ri cha.

The structure of a non-restrictive relative clause is: HEAD (topicalized) + COMMENT, just like an independent clause with a topic, except that the resumptive pronoun is used.

Aofharghal h-aoncam nà, lù tainn rìoladh.

The composer, who fed me, has left.

Complement clauses

The complementizer is mha; complement clauses, by default, are VSO and have no topic.

Linn càid mha dheàmha an saobh ri Praimhìn am an smodh.

I know that Praimhìn's dog ate the bone.

It is not impossible to topicalize in a complement clause however:

Ducnanna mha'n Tìdhseamh lac nòs as Somhàramh lac nuighil.

I think Tizian is easy whereas Sowaár is hard.

One can also use le + subject to introduce a complement clause:

Thobha Aladh liù am crìgh.

Aladh said he had gone.

Vocabulary

Vanian is more purist than Skellan, with fewer Windermere loans. Loans from Talmic languages are generally adapted to Vanian phonology.

• -aim/-im = female suffix

Example texts

The North Wind and the Sun

[to be edited]

Shìomcholl agus hAnn