Cumbraek

Cumbraek is a modern reconstruction of the lost medieval language of Cumbric, a Brythonic Celtic tongue once spoken in parts of southern Scotland and northern England.

Phonology and Orthography

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio-dental	Dental	Alveolar	Post-alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m			n			ŋ
Plosive	p    b			t    d			k    g
Fricative		f    v	θ    ð	s    (z)	ʃ		x	h
Affricate					t͡ʃ    d͡ʒ
Approximant	w					j
Trill				r
Flap or tap				ɾ
Lateral app.				l	ɫ

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	iː    y(ː)		u(ː)
Near-close	ɪ
Close-mid	eː		oː
Mid		ə
Open-mid	ɛ		ʌ    ɔ(ː)
Near-open	æː
Open	a(ː)

Vowel Length

Pure vowels have long and short forms, with vowel length being determined by environment:

• Long vowels occur in monosyllables where the syllable ends in a single consonant or no consonant (-VC, -V)
• Short vowels occur in all polysyllables; in monosyllables ending in more than one consonant (-VCC(C)) and in proclitics

Note that the digraphs th, dh and ch are considered to be single letters.

Orthography

Cumbraek is written with the Latin alphabet and uses the following letters.

a b c/k ch d dh e f g gw h hw i j l m n o p r s t th u v w y

The table below shows the correspondences between letters and pronounciation.

Graph	IPA	Comments
a	/a(ː)/
ae, ay	/æː/	takes stress in final syllables
ai	/əɨ̯/
aw	/au̯/
b	/b/
c, k	/k/	c occurs word initially and in the digraph ck, k occurs everywhere else
	/g/	word-finally, before a voiced sound in the next word
ch	/x/
d	/d/
dh	/ð/
e	/eː/	long
	/ɛ/	short
ea, ee	/eː/	takes stress in final syllables
ey	/ɛɨ̯/
ew	/ɛu̯/
f	/f/
g	/g/
gw	/gʷ/
h	/h/	word-initially
	Ø	between vowels
hw	/xw ~ ʍ/	the distinction between /xw/ and /ʍ/ is largely a matter of personal choice
i	/iː/	long
	/ɪ/	short
iw	/ɪu̯/
j	/d͡ʒ/
l	/l/
l	/ɫ/
m	/m/
n	/n/
ng	/ŋ/
o	/oː/	long
	/ɔ ~ ɒ/	short (/ɒ/ is more common in the south)
oa	/ɔː ~ ɒː/	/ɒː/ is more common in the south
oe	/oː/	takes stress in final syllables
oo	/uː/	long
	/u/	short
ou	/yː ~ ʉː/	long; /ʉː/ is the southern form
	/y ~ ʉ/	short; /ʉ/ is the southern form
oy	/ɔɨ̯/
ow	/ɔu̯/
p	/p/	in most environments
	/b/	word-finally, before a voiced initial
r	/r/
rr	/r/
s	/s/	generally written <ss> between vowels
t	/t/	in most environments
	/d/	word finally, before a voiced initial
u	/uː/	long
	/u/	short, in monosyllables
	/ʌ/	in pretonic syllables and proclitics
uw	/uː/
v	/v/	v is a weak consonant, liable to be lost in final position unless a vowel initial follows
w	/w/
y	/j/	before vowels
	/ɪ/	in word-final, unstressed syllables only

Diacritics

Cumbraek makes occasional use of three diacritics:

• the acute accent is used to show an unexpected long vowel (e.g. bónt 'they may be'); when it occurs in the final syllable, it also marks stress (e.g. cantín 'canteen')
• the grave accent is used to show an unexpected stressed syllable (e.g. gràvity 'gravity'); it is also used to mark a short vowel in monosyllables (e.g. bùs 'bus')
• the trema is used to mark diaeresis and is place on the second vowel of a sequence (e.g. troäv 'I turn', troöun 'I was turning')

Grammar

Consonant Mutations

As with all modern Celtic languages, Cumbraek makes extensive use of initial consonant mutations to help signal grammatical and syntactic information. Cumbraek has three main mutations: lenition (mootthei), spirantisation (anadhlolhei) and nasalisation (troonolhei). There is a fourth type of mutation called aspiration (anadhleth) in which word-initial vowels take an h'- before them.

The changes caused by the mutations are summarised in the following table.

Radical	Lenition	Spirantisation	Nasalisation
p	b	f
t	d	th
c	g	ch
b	v		m
d	dh		n
g	h		ng
gw	w		nw
j	y		ny
m	v

For brevity, words routinely causing mutations will be marked with superscript letters in this article: ^L for lenition, ^S for spirantisation, ^N for nasalisation and ^H for aspiration.

Vowel Mutations

Cumbraek also has two vowel mutations, which occur regularly. Feminisation is generally restricted to adjectives and causes an i to become e and a u to become o. Alternation is common in the formation of plurals and in certain verb forms, and causes the following changes:

Radical	Alternate
a	e
e	i
o
ae	ea
ay
oy	oo
a...a	e...e
a...e	e...i
a...o
o...o
a...u

In some cases, these changes work backwards (e.g. gwrek 'woman' has the plural form gwragedh).

Articles

There is no indefinite article in Cumbraek, the noun alone is indefinite (e.g. gur 'man, a man', gwrek 'woman, a woman').

The definite article is er, sometimes reduced to 'r after a preposition ending in a vowel or after the locative verbema (e.g. er gur 'the man', du'r egloos 'to the church').

The definite article causes lenition to feminine nouns (e.g. er wrek 'the woman').

Nouns

Nouns are either masculine or feminine in gender.

Plurals may be formed in one of several ways:

• by adding an ending, most commonly -ow, -yow, -yon, -on, -edh, -et, -ot (e.g. cadow 'battles', dinyon 'people, men', privet 'insects')
• by alternation (e.g. bran 'raven' → bren, oyn 'lamb' → oon)
• by adding an ending plus alternation (e.g. gwrek 'woman' → gwragedh, map 'boy, son' → mebyon)
• irregularly (e.g. ci 'dog' → cun, didh 'day' → diow, ti 'house' → tey, hwair 'sister' → hwioredh, broadur 'brother' → brodir)

A number of words, including many plant and tree names and many animals, have a base form with a collective meaning to which the singulative endings -inn (masc.) or -enn (fem.) are added (e.g. deriw 'oak trees' → derwenn 'oak tree', moch 'pigs' → mochinn 'a pig').

Nouns are not formally marked for case, but the following observations may be noted:

• the genitive of possession is shown by placing the genitive noun after the thing possessed (e.g. ti Neven 'Neven's house', gwrek mu tat 'my father's wife')
• some intransitive verbs such as devot 'come' and munet 'go' permit the indirect object to behave as if it were the direct object of a transitive verb, allowing the preposition to be dropped (e.g. compare mi carav Yowann 'I love John' with mi av Lounnen 'I am going (to) London').
• nouns in the vocative are preceded by the particle a^L (e.g. a Vathow! 'Matthew!'). This particle may be dropped in speech, particularly before a vowel, but lenition is always retained (e.g. oucher da, Vathow 'good evening, Matthew').

Adjectives

Most adjectives follow the noun they qualify and must agree in gender and number with that noun.

A few adjectives are regularly preposed, notably hen^L 'old' and penn^L 'chief'. These adjectives always cause lenition to a following noun (e.g. hen wur 'old man').

Adjectives following feminine singular nouns undergo lentition (e.g. gwrek voar 'large woman'). Where possible they also undergo the change of i → e and u → o (e.g. ci gwinn, cath wenn 'white dog, white cat', gur druk, gwrek dhrok 'bad man, bad woman').

Adjectives may undergo alternation following plural nouns, though this is not always the case (e.g. ti glan 'clean house' → tey glen).

An exclamative adjective can be formed by adding -het to the positive (e.g. gwinnet 'how white!, so white!', glanhet 'how clean!, so clean!'). This may also be used as an equative adjective in phrases like cun winnet a'r err 'as white as the snow'.

The 'comparative' adjective is formed by adding -ach to the positive adjective, and the superlative takes -hav (e.g. gwinnach 'whiter', gwinnav 'whitest', caledach 'harder', calettav' 'hardest').

The following adjectives are compared irregularly:

	Positive	Equative	Comparative	Superlative
near	agos	nesset	nes	nessav
small	bechan	leyhet	ley	leyhav
good	da	custadhul	gwell	gorow
bad	druk	cunruk	goeth	goetthav
old	hen	hinhet	hin	hinhav
large	moar	cumment	moy	moyhav
young	yowank	yohwet	yow	yohwav

Adverbs of quality may be formed by placing en^L before an adjective (e.g. en dha 'well', en gadarn 'strongly').

Pronouns

Personal

	Subject	Object	Possessive	Infixed
1sg.	mi	-m	mu(n)N	'mN
2sg	ti	-thL	deL (jeL)	'thL
3sg m.	ev	-yH, -wH	iL	'yL
3sg f.	hi	-sH	iSH	'ySH
1pl	ni	-nH	anH
2pl	hwi	-ch	ach
3pl	oo	-sH	owNH

The subject pronouns are used:

• before a personal verb to express the subject (e.g. mi carav 'I love')
• as auxiliary pronouns, added to the end of a verb by a hyphen for clarity (e.g. eth welus-ev 'he saw you')
• as auxiliary pronouns, in conjunction with possessive adjectives (e.g. i nen-hi 'her grandmother')
• independently following prepositions and conjunctions (e.g. mi a thi 'me and you')
• as the object of an imperative verb (e.g. ladh oo 'kill them')

The object pronouns must be attached to a preverbal particle or, in extremely colloquial usage, to a subject pronoun preceding the verb (e.g. eth garav or mith garav 'I love you'). 3sg masculine -w is used following the perfective particle ru (e.g. ruw gwelest 'you have seen him').

The possessive pronouns are used:

• as possessive adjectives, before the noun they qualify (e.g. i thi 'her house', ow nwely 'their bed')
• as the object of a verb noun (e.g. de welet 'seeing you', i gano 'singing it')
• with -houn to produce reflexive pronouns (e.g. mu-houn 'myself', an-houn 'ourselves')

NB: mu is used before a consonant and mun before a vowel. The form je is a colloquial spelling of de, representing a more general pronunciation.

The infixed pronouns are contracted forms of the possessive pronouns used following prepositions and conjunctions ending a vowel (e.g. a'm tat 'and my father', o'y wlat 'from his country').

Possessive pronouns proper only exist in the first and second person singular: mow 'mine' and tow 'your'. The so-called 'genitive particle' now is used with the subject pronouns to produce possessive pronouns in the other persons (e.g. now-hi 'hers', now-ni 'ours').

Demonstrative

The demonstrative pronouns display a three-way distinction, with hunn referring to objects close at hand, hunnedh referring to objects out of sight or abstract and hunnunt referring to objects in sight but distant. Each of these has masculine, feminine and plural forms.

	Masc.	Fem.	Plural
this	hunn	honn	hinn
that	hunnedh	honnedh	hinnedh
that yonder	hunnunt	honnunt	hinnunt

The hunn and hunnedh forms may be used as demonstrative adjectives following a definite noun (e.g. er gur hunn 'this man', er cestill hinnedh 'that castle'). Hunnunt is replaced by hunt 'yonder' in this use (e.g. er wragedh hunt 'those women').

Interrogative

what	peth pebeth	pronouns
	peL	adjective
who	puwL
which one(s)	p'oun	singular
	p're	plural
how many	petL
where	p'le
when	p'oar pe brit
how	pe dhel' pe vodh
why	p'rak per
how much	pe vent

Verbal Particles

Verbal particles are key to Cumbraek syntax, indicating subordination, negation, interrogatives and more.

Affirmative
e edh	'dummy' particle at the start of a sentence	E levir Melik Cumbraek 'Melik speaks Cumbraek'
	infixes object pronouns	Es gweles 'I saw her'
	in place of a relative after adverbials	Ar er mor e trigant '[It is] by the sea that they live'
	meaning 'that' before subordinate clauses	Ema govnok warnav ey prenidh 'I hope that you buy it'
aL	the relative pronoun when the subject or object is antecedent	Er din a garav 'The man whom I love'
	the genitive relative	Er verch a dheskidh i that 'The girl whose father you teach'
	follows a focussed subject or object	Ei ath gar 'I love you'
ruSL	used before the preterite to form the perfect tense: at the start of a sentence (spirantising) in place of relative a (leniting)	Ru chuskus-ev er didh oll 'He has slept all day' Er prit r'edes en newidh 'The meal which I have just eaten'
nuwS	affirmative, somewhat emphatic particle	Nuw adwoynav de dat 'Indeed, I know your father'
Negative
neSL ned	used at the start of a sentence (spirantising)	Ne chassa Yowann Maylok 'John doesn't hate Maylok'
	negative relative (leniting)	Er ti ne leskis du'r loar 'The house that did not burn down'
naS	used before subordinate clauses	Mi medhulyav ne do 'I think he won't come'
naS	used in replies	Am ceridh? Na charav 'Do you love me? No'
	negative imperative	Na sill a-vri 'Don't look down'
Interrogative
aL	used at the start of a direct question	A dhowidh amm Dhiw Gwener? 'Are you coming on Friday?'
	introduces indirect questions	Hi erchis a oot lessowur 'She asked if you are a vegetarian'
ay	used at the start of a focussed sentence	Ay Frankek a lavrant? 'Is is French that they speak?'
paneS paned	introduces a direct or indirect question expecting an affirmative answer	Panem credidh? 'Don't you believe me?'

Prepositions

Simple

	A-Stems	I-Stems	O-Stems		Irregular
stem: 1sg 2sg 3sg m 3sg f 1pl 2pl 3pl	amm 'about' amdan- amdanav amdanat amdano amdeni amdanamm amdanawch amdandhou	gant 'with' gan- geniv genit gantho genthi geninn genouch ganthou	heb 'without' heb- hebov hebot hebdho hebdhi hebonn hebowch hebdhou	is 'below' iss- issov issot isto isti issonn issowch istou	du 'to' du- dummy dutty dudho dudhi dunny duwchy dudhou

Other prepositions follow the same patterns:

• A-stems: wodan 'under' (wodan-), a 'of, from' (an-), war 'on' (warn-)
• I-stems: wurth 'against' (wurth-)
• O-stems:
  • like heb: er 'for' (er-), idhir 'between' (idhr-), in 'in' (inn-), rak 'before' (rag-), truw 'through' (truw-)
  • like is: ouch 'above' (ouch-), troas 'across' (tross-)