Tlu

Tlu is an ancient Mustlup language inspired by my oldest draft of Proto-Talmic.

Phonology

Consonants

/m n ɳ ɲ ŋ p t tɬ ʈ c k q ʔ b d dɮ ɖ ɟ g f s̠ ɬ x h z̠ ɮ ʋ l ɭ j/ ⟨m n ṇ ñ ŋ p t ƛ ṭ ť k q ʔ b d λ ḍ ď g f s σ ch h z ʒ v l ḷ j⟩

Vowels

/i iː u uː ə əː a aː ai au ei ou ie uo/ ⟨i ī u ū ə ə̄ a ā ai au ei ou ie uo⟩

Prosody

Stress

Stress falls on the first heavy (CV̄, CVV or CVC) syllable, if it is not the final syllable. If no syllables are long, the first syllable is stressed.

Morphology

Pronouns

• 1sg, 2sg, 3sg, 1pl, 2pl, 3pl: sƛī, ŋə̄, līb, zad, chau, ləlīb

Nouns

Nouns are reduplicated for plural, and take possessive prefixes. However, when nouns are preceded by a determiner or an adjective, they (even if plural) do not take a plural form.

mich sud sə·tāňi

DEF-ACC man 3SG-house

the man's house

Adjectives

Adjectives precede nouns and inflect for gender, number and case. Demonstratives and determiners also inflect as adjectives.

zviṭəʔ 'big' (masculine)
State	Singular	Plural
Nominative	zviṭəʔ	zviṭuo
Oblique	zviṭuch	zviṭəŋ

zviṭəʔ 'big' (feminine)
State	Singular	Plural
Nominative	zviṭə̄	zviṭə̄v
Oblique	zviṭə̄ʔ	zviṭə̄st

Numerals

Base-12.

• 1: seiďu /ˈseiɟu/
• 2: bli /bli/
• 3: sqā /sqaː/
• 4: māvuo /ˈmaːʋuo/
• 5: paiku /ˈpaiku/
• 6: ə̄ƛich /ˈəːtɬix/
• 7: zətə̄ /ˈzətəː/
• 8: baŋud /ˈbaŋud/
• 9: ďavuň /ˈɟaʋuɲ/
• 10: fqāchṭī /ˈfqaːxʈiː/
• 11: bə̄zie /ˈbəːzie/
• 12: zie /zie/