Proto-Rathmosian

Phonology and Orthography

Consonants

Consonant Inventory

	Bilabial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m		n
Plosive	p	b	t	d			k	g
Fricative	ɸ		s				x
Affricate			ts
Trill				r
Approximant		w				j
Lateral app.				l

Vowels

	Front	Near- front	Central	Near- back	Back
Close	i u e ə a
Near-close
Close-mid
Mid
Open-mid
Near-open
Open

Orthography

Proto-Rathmosian is written with the Roman alphabet using the following graphs.

a b d e f g h i k l m n p r s t ts u w y ə

The following table shows the sound to spelling correspondences:

graph	a	aa	b	d	e	ee	f	g	h	i	ii	k	l	m	n	p	r	s	t	ts	u	uu	w	y	ə
IPA	a	aː	b	d	e	eː	ɸ	g	x	i	iː	k	l	m	n	p	r	s	t	ts	u	uː	w	j	ə

Phonotactics

The basic building block of most Proto-Rathmosian words is the primary root, a simple morpheme which cannot be broken down further. Most primary roots are verbal stems though some nominal elements such as body parts, landscape and family terms are primary.

Primary roots may be formed into other words by (a) the direct addition of derivational and morphological affixes; (b) internal changes within the root to create a secondary or derived root; (c) a combination of both.

A number of grammatical words or particles are not considered roots and do not follow the rules set out below.

Primary Roots

Primary roots are monosyllabic and must have the minimal form VC, in which V represents a single primary vowel (a, e, i or u) and C any consonant. Most roots will also have an initial consonant (vowel-initial roots are relatively rare and may have developed from the loss of an initial /h/ or glottal stop /ʔ/, e.g. */had, ʔad/ > ad-).

Consonant clusters within roots are limited to CL in onset position, in which L represents a liquid (l or r). The initial consonant in these clusters cannot be l, r, w or y. In coda position the only consonant cluster permitted is GC, in which G represents a glide (w or y).

The vowels of primary roots are always short. Diphthongs are not considered to occur and in the combination of vowel + w or y the second element is analysed as a consonant.

Primary roots may take one of the following forms:

• CVC, e.g. ret- "go, move", ker- "rule"
• CLVC, in which L represents a liquid (l or r), e.g. glis- "live, stay", mlak- "be dead"
• CVGC , in which G represents a glide (w or y), e.g. tiyk- "touch, feel", reyk- "love"
• CLVGC, e.g. trayh- "strangle, choke", sluyn- "seep, ooze".
• VC, e.g.
• VGC, e.g.

Secondary Roots

Secondary roots are derived from primary ones by one of three clearly defined and mostly predictable phonological processes:

• Vowel Lengthening doubles the vowel of the primary root, e.g. ret- > reet-, tiyk- > tiiyk.
• Vowel deletion removes the primary vowel enitrely, e.g. ker- > Vkr-, hed- > Vhd-. Where this creates an impossible consonant cluster, the reduced vowel ə /ə/ is inserted (its position depends on the order of the consonants), e.g. mlak- > Vməlk-, dreh- > Vdərh-. Where a glide w or y remains after the deletion of a vowel, it becomes vocalic u or i, e.g. reyk- > Vrik-, trayh- > Vtrih.
• Reduplication involves the addition of the first consonant plus the reduced vowel ə to the beginning of a word, e.g. ret- > rəret-, sluyn- > səsluyn-.

Affixes

Affixes may take any of the forms: V, VC, C, CV, CVC. They may also be combined into more complex structures. The addition of affixes sometimes requires the insertion of the reduced vowel ə between consonants, or of a linking glide w or y between vowels.

The following processes of assimilation occur when certain sounds come into contact across syllables:

• voiced plosives /b, d, g/ are devoiced before voiceless plosives or fricatives /p, t, k, ɸ, s, x/.
• voiceless plosives /p, t, k/ are voiced before voiced plosives and nasals /b, d, g, n, m/.
• /t/ and /d/ assimilate to any following plosive or /n/
• /n/ assimilates to a following liquid /l, r/.

Morphology

Nouns

Nouns belong to one of three classes and are declined into eight cases and three numbers.

Noun Classes

Nouns are divided into two main classes: animate and inanimate. The fundamental distinction between these two classes is that animate nouns may be the agent of a verb, i.e. they may actively carry out the action of a verb, whilst inanimate nouns may not. Animate nouns therefore include all humans, deities and spirits, animals and certain celestial bodies such as belan "the sun". Inanimate nouns include all other common objects, plants and abstracts.

The class of animate nouns is further divided into masculine and common nouns. The distinction is based on natural gender, so that all male humans, deities and spirits are masculine, as are male animals where the sex is known. All other animate nouns are common. Masculine nouns are generally marked forms, with a base form usually ending in l or k. Thus, ker means "ruler; queen" and is common, but keril means "lord, king" and is masculine.

Summary of Noun Classes

Animate	Common	Female humans, deities and spirits; female animals and those with unspecified gender
Masculine	Male humans, deities and spirits; specifically male animals
Inanimate	All plants and non-living objects; abstracts

Case

Nouns are declined according to eight cases:

• Absolutive denotes the subject of an intransitive verb and the object of a transitive verb.
• Ergative denotes the subject of a transitive verb.
• Dative denotes the indirect object of a verb and describes motion towards.
• Genitive denotes the possessor of an object.
• Ablative denotes motion away from.
• Instrumental denotes use of.
• Locative denotes location in, at or on.
• Comitative denotes location with or beside.

Number

There are three numbers: singular, plural and collective, the last of which may denote a discrete group of objects or a class as a whole.

Inflexion

Animate Common: vocalic stem (negu "woman")

	Singular	Plural
Absolutive	-	negu	-wa	neguwa
Ergative	-s	negus	-ns	neguns
Dative	-yep	neguyep	-nep	negunep
Genitive	-y	neguy	-ni	neguni
Ablative	-ta	neguta	-nta	negunta
Instrumental	-ra	negura	-rra	negurra
Locative	-yen	neguyen	-nen	negunen
Comitative	-kun	negukun	-nkun	negunkun

Animate Common: consonantal stem (ker "ruler")

	Singular	Plural
Absolutive	-	ker	-wa	kerwa
Ergative	-s	kers	-ns	kerəns
Dative	-ep	kerep	-nep	kernep
Genitive	-i	keri	-ni	kerni
Ablative	-ta	kerta	-nta	kerənta
Instrumental	-ra	kerra	-rra	kerərra
Locative	-en	keren	-nen	kernen
Comitative	-kun	kerkun	-nkun	kerənkun

Animate Masculine (keril "lord, king")

	Singular	Plural
Absolutive	-	keril	-wa	kerilwa
Ergative	-s	kerils	-ns	keriləns
Dative	-ep	kerilep	-nep	kerilnep
Genitive	-i	kerili	-ni	kerilni
Ablative	-ta	kerilta	-nta	kerilənta
Instrumental	-ra	kerilra	-rra	kerilərra
Locative	-en	kerilen	-nen	kerilnen
Comitative	-kun	kerilkun	-nkun	kerilənkun

Inanimate: vocalic stem (keril "lord, king")

	Singular	Plural
Absolutive	-	keril	-wa	kerilwa
Ergative	-s	kerils	-ns	keriləns
Dative	-ep	kerilep	-nep	kerilnep
Genitive	-i	kerili	-ni	kerilni
Ablative	-ta	kerilta	-nta	kerilənta
Instrumental	-ra	kerilra	-rra	kerilərra
Locative	-en	kerilen	-nen	kerilnen
Comitative	-kun	kerilkun	-nkun	kerilənkun

Verbs

Verbal conjugation is agglutinative and verbs may be marked for aspect (imperfective, perfective), valency (transitive, intransitive, medial, causative, reflexive, ...), and argument (absolutive, ergative).

Verbal Classes

Rathmosian verb roots are divided into five classes (I-V) according to whether they are active or stative, and how much agency the subject has. These classes affect the way in which the aspect and voice markers are used.

• Class I verbs are intransitives in which the subject of the verb is not the agent, and which describe fixed or ongoing states, usually translated into English with 'be' and an adjective, e.g. dreh- "be red", rin- "be alive, live".
• Class II verbs are intransitives in which the subject is not the agent and which describe a change of state, e.g. mlak- "die", tum- "fall".
• Class III verbs are intransitives in which the subject is not the agent, and which describe a temporary state or an uncontrolled action, e.g. fal- "sleep", kled- "stand".
• Class IV verbs are intransitives in which the subject is the active agent of the verb, e.g. yur- "run", met- "speak".
• Class V verbs are transitives.

Some roots may belong to more than one class with a change of meaning, e.g. yur- "run" may be Class IV when the subject is an animate noun and the sense is "propel oneself quickly" but is Class III when the subject is inanimate and the sense is "flow, move quickly".

Aspect

Verbal aspect is marked by altering the form of the root itself or by adding suffixes to the primary root:

• The primary root is considered to be generic or gnomic in aspect, describing states or actions without regard to their state of completeness, e.g. ker- "rule", mlak- "be dead"
• The lengthened root is imperfective, describing ongoing actions, e.g. keer- "rules, ruling".
• The reduplicated root is perfective, describing completed actions, e.g. keker- "ruled"
• The addition of -n- to the root creates the inchoative aspect, describing the beginning of actions or 'becoming' a state, e.g. kern- "begin to rule", mlagn- "die"
• The addition of -tsat- to the root creates the frequentative aspect, describing repetitive events or habitual states, e.g. kertsat- "rules (often)", kuktsat- "eats often, grazes", plustsat- "often be sick".
• The addition of -t- to the root creates the intensitive aspect, describing more severe forms of the action or state, the latter equivalent to "very ...", e.g. kert- "tyrannise, subjugate", plust- "be very sick".

Voice

Voice markers function in different ways for different verbs. They are distinguished primarily for the ways in which they focus the subject or object of the verb.

• Patient focus is marked with -a- and is mainly used with intransitive verbs in which the subject is the patient of the verb (i.e. Classes I-III), e.g. dreha- "be red", tuma- "fall". Used with semantically transitive verbs of Class V, it is effectively a passive marker e.g. keyka- "is seen". The subject of patient focus verb is in the Abs. case and there can be no direct object.
• Dual focus is marked with -i- and is used only with Class V (transitive) verbs in which both the subject and direct object are stated, e.g. keri- "rule". The subject of the verb is in the ergative case and the direct object in the absolutive.
• Agent focus verbs are marked with -u- and are used with Class IV and V verbs, where the subject is the agent of the verb, but where no direct object is stated e.g. kuku- "eat", yuru- "run". The subject is in the ergative case for both transitive and intransitive verbs.
• Medial verbs are marked with -e- and are used with Class V transitive verbs when the agent and the patient refer to the same entity, creating a reciprocal or reflexive meaning, e.g. sape- "wash oneself". The subject here is in the ergative case.
• Causative verbs are marked with -im-, which is added to intransitive verbs (Class I-IV) to create a transitive, or to transitive (Class V) verbs to make a ditransitive, e.g. mlak- "die" > mlakim- "kill", keyk- "see" > keykim- "show, explain". The subject ('causer') of the verb is always in the ergative. The subject of an originally intransitive verb or the direct object of an originally transitive verb remain in the absolutive case. The subject of an originally transitive verb is demoted to the dative.

* Patient Causative verbs take -am- and are formed from either transitive or intransitive verbs to create an intransitive in which the patient of the original verb

• Autocausative verbs take -em and create a causative in which the agent causes the action to itself, e.g. mlakem- "kill oneself"

Elements of the Verb

Prefixes

Root

Derivation

Aspect Marker

Valency Marker

Absolutive

Ergative

Subject and Object Markers

The absolutive markers agree with the subject of a intransitive verb or the direct object of an transitive verb. The 3rd person may be animate or inanimate.

Absolutive Markers

	Singular	Plural
1	-n	-l
2	-ts	-h
3an	-d	-w
3in	-b	-r

Where the previous element ends in a consonant, the epenthetic vowel ə may be inserted, e.g. mumubneməd "he was saddened",

The ergative markers agree with the subject of a transitive verb. Since inanimate nouns cannot be the agent of a verb, by definintion, there are no inanimate ergative markers.

Ergative Markers

	Singular	Plural
1	-u	-an
2	-isk	-enk
3an	-et	-af

Examples:

• reeykinu "I love you"
• kekeykiran "we saw them"
• faalad "they are sleeping"
• yuyuret "he/she ran"