Hivantish

Modern Hivantish (Úruhivantisur tåzvar) is the most widely spoken descendant of Hivantish, and it's inspired by Modern Greek and Icelandic, drawing on phonological, diachronic and grammatical similarities between the two languages.

Modern Hivantish has two registers, a literary one drawing heavily from Ancient Hivantish and making use of mostly native vocabulary (c.f. Háfrónska and Katharevousa), and spoken Hivantish which has lots of loanwords from English, Greek and Irish.

Modern Hivantish derives mostly from the Tremisian dialect of Ancient Hivantish but there is some koineization from northern dialects.

Todo

• Marked nominatives as in Greek and Icelandic

• The case inventory is reduced to nom/acc/dat/gen; definite article (postposed but a separate word)

• Possessive pronouns follow nouns

• Mediopassive

• Retracted /s/; dental fricatives

• Ancient Hivantish y from *ū -> i (spelled y)

• Hivantish can end sentences with prepositions

• æ pronounced /e:/ from *ai?

• in and at should mean the same as in English

• pitch accent lost -- should become stød?

Phonology

a á é i ó u ú y æ ö

ll: lateral fricative

rr: uvular fricative (these can start words)

r: uvular

Some accents of Hivantish have r-vocalization/are nonrhotic - word final R surfaces as compensatory lengthening or offglides.

tķ -> þ

Grammar

Noun genders are significantly leveled (most -ar and -ir nouns are masculine, with the exception of personal names and abstract nouns in -tir)

The demonstrative is innur, cognate with the Proto-Celtic *sindos.

-llu: equivalent of -tion as well as the native tool suffix?

Adjectives

"old"

nom: hinur, hina, hin, pl. hinyr

gen/dat: hinæ, pl. hinyn/hinavur (depending on dialect)

acc: hin, hina, hin, pl. hinyr

Lexicon

• wutra "water"
• úrur "new" (cognate with Albanian ri)
• hynur "son"
• hinur "old"
• jysur "young"
• hama "summer"
• zyma "winter"
• åzur "narrow"
• hyrur "wide" (~ gjerë in Albanian, hir in Welsh)
• tyntur "long" (<- duh2-ntos)
• micur "big"
• lytinur "little, small"
• rruma "stream"
• ösur "horse"
• kúr "cow"
• zwérir "beast"
• zwérinur "wild"
• akir "eye"
• náhur "nose"
• urr "mouth", random conflation of wekwtrom and Heh1s
• zénar "hand" <- g'hesn-
• sirtar "heart"
• astronómur "astronomer"
• apológija "apology"
• musæ "museum"
• fænómen "phenomenon"
• kentru "center"
• vútur "butter"
• lampar "lamp"
• rród "rose"
• læwa "olive"
• informallu "information"
  • informallisur "informative"
• nåwur "(poetic) boat"

Todo: develop Hivantic synonyms

Inuit loans:

• ævir 'walrus' (aiviq)
• avinngar 'lemming'
• uxur 'blubber' (uqsuq)
• kajar 'boat' (doublet of kajak, a reborrowing through English)
• åsivar 'spider' 
• illu 'house' (alternate etymology of English igloo)
• tikir 'finger' (sometimes explained from PIE)

Names

• Hucinur ~ Eugene (m)
• Arþur 'bear' (m)
• Åsivar 'spider' (m) (aasivaq)
• Amarur 'wolf' (m) (amaruq)