Maghrebi Azalic

In Irta, Maghrebi Azalic is a North African Azalic language. It is inspired by Vietnamese, Maghrebi Arabic, and Yiddish. (should rename)

Its main post-proto-Azalic loan sources are Greek, Knench, English and Arabic.

Todo

• eh2, eh3 -> əu(creaky)
  • Nguyễn /ŋwḭə̯n/: a unisex given name, result of syncope from PAzal *ŋəw̃iən 'renowned, honored' < PIE *ǵnoh₃-ey-mnos 'made known'

Phonology

as in Vietnamese; note: r /ɹ/, d /z/, j /ʒ/, g is always /ɣ/, x /s/, s /ʃ/, đr = /ɖ~ɭ/

m n l can be syllabic

Maghrebi Azalic is tonal. A stressed syllable may have either modal or creaky tone.

Orthography

Maghrebi Azalic is natively written in either the Knench alphabet or Latin orthography based on the in-universe Old English orthography.

Morphology

Spoken Riphean is analytic, like Colloquial Welsh. Literary Riphean is practically a Literary Knench or Biblical Hebrew relex (as close as you can get from Proto-Azalic).

Pronouns

• conj. i, du/u, khê, si, it, gia, dul/ul, doi/oi
• disj. mi, du, khim, kher, it, eox, dul, dam
• poss. mơ, ur, khex, kher, itx, eor, dux, dar

inflected prepositions

Nouns

Two cases (nominative and genitive), no gender

• Genitive singular is always -x or -ơx
• Plural is almost always nom. -i, gen. -xi

The definite article is invariably dơ. There is no indefinite article.

Umlaut, known in-universe as affection, is used for some plurals: for example,

• mon 'man', mơn (gen. mơnxi) 'men'.

Verbs

Only the imperative/infinitive survives in lexical verbs. There is also a passive participle in -ơd (only used as an adjective).

Maghrebi Azalic uses a Biblical Hebrew-like tense system, under older Knench influence:

• Proto-Azalic sigmatic, ekh + sigmatic = yiqṭol, wayyiqṭol
• Proto-Azalic stative, ekh + stative = qåṭal, wăqåṭal
• imperative

The particle ekh, which is analogous to the Hebrew waw-consecutive, derives from PIE *h₁esti-kʷe; it was first used with the sigmatic to disambiguate the past meaning of the sigmatic from the subjunctive meaning, and was extended to the stative by analogy.

Auxiliaries

Colloquial Maghrebi Azalic has an auxiliary verb system similar to Colloquial Welsh. In addition, there is a T-V distinction: the 2nd person plural is also used as a polite pronoun.

Sample text

From "The Nightingale and the Rose" (Oscar Wilde)

Dơ Noitingươl đu dơ Vard

"Ted si gêu ter si pho khơrđi gim vưt ter i pho ơdvơr vardơx radơx đor," biêc dơ Mathit dưng; "ơlt nis vard rad in ol mơ buxtn."

Phar kher nert on dơ đriêu kholm-uôc khar dơ Noitingươl khim, đu otơc si eot thơr dơ lavơx, đu pharơcs si.

"Nis vard rad in ol mơ buxtn!" biêc khê, đu phêl khis êux phormuôs gi đơr. "Ôi, on khot thengơx lihtl tis dơ phơlíxơđê ot dơpén! Im pho cri ol thengơx tis dơ sajơx pho scriv, đu sêu ol misriơx philóxophi mơ dal, ơlt on devit vard rad tis mơ loiv pho khoel bilihtơd."

The Nightingale and the Rose

'She said that she would dance with me if I brought her red roses,' cried the young Student; 'but in all my garden there is no red rose.'

From her nest in the holm-oak tree the Nightingale heard him, and she looked out through the leaves, and wondered.

'No red rose in all my garden!' he cried, and his beautiful eyes filled with tears. 'Ah, on what little things does happiness depend! I have read all that the wise men have written, and all the secrets of philosophy are mine, yet for want of a red rose is my life made wretched.'