User:IlL/Spare pages 1/45

Tei/Lexicon

Tei/Swadesh list

IlL/Spare pages 1/45 is one of the major languages of Bjeheond.

ßan, eir, buhz, jåhnß, ßeng, zkühnt, ntöü, nuot, ngiat, zråht [san, eir, ɓuːc, jɔːⁿs, ˈseŋ, ckyːⁿt, ⁿdøy, nuət, ŋiat, crɔːt]

wint = negative

nkelei Pientels tur Boyels. = I speak of love and hate.

Idea

A "Sinospheric Finnish", or "Chinese with cases"

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Medial	Velar	Lab.vel.	Glottal
Nasal		m /m/	n /n/	ń /ɲ/	ng /ŋ/
Plosive	voiceless	p /p/	t /t/	z /c/	k /k/	qu /kʷ/
	prenasalized	mp /ᵐb/	nt /ⁿd/	ńz /ᶮɟ/	nk /ᵑg/	nqu /ᵑgʷ/
	voiced	b /b/	d /d/	ɟ /ɟ/	g /g/
Fricative	plain	f /f~v/	ß /s~z/ þ /θ~ð/	s /ç~ʝ/			h /h/
	prenasalized	mf /ᵐv/	nß /ⁿz/
Liquid			r /r/; l /l/	ŕ /ɹ/
Approximant				j /j/		w /w/

Notes

• Voiceless plosives are not aspirated.
• /ᵐb ⁿd ᶮɟ ᵑg/ devoice to [ᵐp ⁿt ᶮc ᵑk] word-finally.
• The fricatives ß s g are voiced intervocalically.
• Gemination is phonemic.

Vowels

Tei has short and long versions of the following monophthongs (except for /ə/ which only occurs in unstressed syllables). Long vowels are marked with a following h.

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i /i/	ü /y/	u /u/
Close-mid	e /e/	ö /ø/	o /o/
Mid		(e /ə/)
Open-mid	ä /ɛ/		å /ɔ/
Open		a /a/

Diphthongs: ai au ei öü ou ia ie io iu üö uo

Prosody

Stress

Most of the time, the stress falls on the first syllable. Exceptions are verb prefixes and sesquisyllables.

Phonotactics

The syllable structure is (C)(C)V(C)s, where V can be a vowel or a diphthong.

Morphology

Nouns

Nßäht 'tree'

Nominative	Nßäht
Genitive	Nßähtem
Illative	Nßähter
Inessive	Nßähtel
Elative	Nßähtels
Allative/Dative	Nßähtene
Adessive	Nßähten
Ablative	Nßähtens
Instrumental/Comitative	Nßähtemp
Essive	Nßähtezz
Translative	Nßähtenk
Abessive	Nßähtmakk

Plurals are formed with nto-, so: Ntonßäht (trees), Ntonßähtem (of trees), ...

Old Tei used -er as an accusative and -el for both the illative and inessive.

Article

The equivalent of the definite article in Tei is a classifier (as in Hmong), but it's placed after the noun and carries the case marker. The noun before a classifier is prescriptively in the genitive case, but it's often dropped.

• Nßäht koþem (presc. and in older Tei Nßähtem koþem) 'of the tree'
• Nßähtem 'of a tree'

Pronouns

Pronouns
	Singular	Plural
1	nkohz	tahs
2	mei	wäll
3	mpa (animate), mpi (inanimate)

Case suffixes attach to nkuo-, tah-, mei-, and wäh- respectively: nkuom Mpahng = my hand nkuols = from me; about me

Verbs

Subject affixes

Subject affixes
	Singular	Plural
1	nke-	te-
2	en-	le-
3	-

These are really clitic forms of pronouns. So for example "nkelei" has the same connotation as "nkohz lei", but "nkohz nkelei" is emphatic, like saying "Myself, I speak".

Verbs otherwise don't inflect.

Action nouns are formed with the suffix -(e)me, from the genitive clitic followed by an eroded form of ion (to do). For example: Leime = speaking

Syntax

The unmarked word order in Tei is SVO. Due to the influence of Tsjoen, Modern Tei is quite strict about it (though objects could be fronted for emphasis).

Serial verbs are also common in Tei; all verbs but the last in a serial verb chain are in the ablative.

Mpa fiuntens lei = He came and spoke.