Naeng/Literature

This article describes Classical Windermere. See Windermere/Modern for Modern Windermere.

Windermere/Lexicon
Windermere/Swadesh list
Windermere/Names
Windermere/Diachronics

Classical Naeng/Literature
չէıɱ Ғ·ɟ˫ƍ brits Dămea
Created by	IlL, Praimhín
Setting	Verse:Tricin
Language family	Lakovic Ashanic Classical Naeng/Literature

Classical Windermere (native name: brits Dămea /brits dəˈmeə/; Skellan: a brits Dymée Yvẃr /ə prits təˈmɛi əˈvur/ 'Noble Windermere') was a standardized variety of Windermere spoken in the Imperial Windermere territories (Wen Dămea), based on the language of Windermere texts from ca. fT 900-1100. A classical language of Talma, it lent many words to other Talman languages. A related language Tergetian was used in other parts of the Windermere Empire, and as a result Windermere borrowed many Tergetian words.

Introduction

Windermere is a conlang based on similarities between Hebrew and Mon-Khmer languages, such as final stress, minor syllables and overall head-initial syntax. It was originally created by Praimhín for the Fifth Linguifex Relay. It is currently being revived and adapted for Verse:Tricin as a classical language of Talma. This version will also be more synthetic than was originally envisioned. Aesthetically it's also inspired by Romanian and Tíogall, one of my old Talmic sketches.

Todo

• Skellan-ish grammar but more synthetic
• Chhange e from breathy a to ä

Neutral:

Meac id-imstief leth tsip ăłüth no-bătseal.

sleeping DIR PL-idea green without color ADV-fury

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.

Focused:

Id-imstief leth tsip ăłüth mo-meac no-bătseal.

DIR=PL-idea green without color REL=sleep ADV=fury

It is the colorless green ideas that sleep furiously.

Süeth id-păchnay.

naked DIR-king

The king is naked.

Phonology

Orthography

Consonants

• Ϫϫ Շչ Ɑᶑ Ѡϙ Ғғ Ѵѵ Ƌժ Ƨƨ ſʗ = p b f t d th c g ch
• Ɨɟ ʢє Ϯ₼ = m n ng
• Ϟɥ Ɔɔ Պɱ Պ̃ɱ̃ Ʌʎ = s ł ts tł ș
• Էէ Ӿӿ Գƪ Քƍ Ֆⱷ Пп = r w y h l ʔ

Vowels

The vowel signs are placed to the right of the consonant letter.

• · : ; ı › ˫/⸗ƍ ⸗ = ă u ü i o e a; :ƍ ;ƍ ıƍ ›ƍ ˫ƍ = ua üe ie oa ea

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Lateral	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal		m /m/	n /n/			ng /ŋ/
Plosive	voiced	b /b/	d /d/			g /g/
	voiceless	p /p/	t /t/			c /k/	' /ʔ/
Affricate			ts /ts̻/	tł /tɬ/
Fricative	spirant	f /f~v/	th /θ~ð/			ch /x/
	nonspirant		s /s̻/	ł /ɬ/	ș /s̺~ʃ/		h /h/
Resonant		w /w/	r /r/	l /l~ɫ/	y /j/

The glottal stop is not transcribed word-initially.

Vowels

These are the realization of vowels in Classical Windermere:

Monophthongs

	Front		Central	Back
	unrounded	rounded
Close	i /i/	ü /y/		u /u/
Mid	e, ä /e/		ă /ə/	o /o/
Open			a /a/

Diphthongs

	Front		Central	Back
	unrounded	rounded
Close	ie /iə/	üe /yə/		ua /uə/
Mid	ea /eə/			oa /oə/

Notes

• /ə/ occurs only in unstressed syllables.

Old Windermere had breathy voiced vowels ah eh ih oh uh üh /aʱ eʱ iʱ oʱ uʱ yʱ/ which became ä ea ie oa ua üe in Classical Winderemre.

Stress

Stress is on the last syllable that does not have /ə/ as the vowel.

Phonotactics

Zero and C are the only permitted word-final codas.

Morphology

Windermere morphology predominantly uses prefixes, infixes, and reduplication.

Old Windermere

Sandhi

Old Windermere had a complex sandhi system (somewhere between Biblical Hebrew and Sanskrit) which was no longer productive in Classical Windermere.

• th + fric -> fric + t
  • ths -> st, as in sehf (go) -> *thsehf -> stehf (to drive) (Modern binsteaf (energy), sămteaf (to energize))
  • thf -> thb, e.g. tăfi (laugh) -> *tithfi -> tithbi (mock) (Classical and Modern Wdm. dăfi, dithbi)

Grassmann's law was productive in Old Windermere. When there were two spirant consonants before a stressed vowel in a word, the first was despirantized. e.g. *chăfol > căfol

Some prefixes

Old Windermere had the following prefixes:

• th- (causative; denominal verbs)
• p- (agentive; triggers voicing of voiceless stops p t c to b d g)
  • da (know) -> păda (master; pda in Modern Windermere)
  • tüth (to grasp) -> pădüth (meaning, intention)
• ha- (passive)

Old Windermere also used breathy voice ablaut to denote tools: snar (capture) -> snahr (trap, snare) which survives in Modern Windermere as snär.

Nouns

im- is used as the plural prefix.

The case markers are the following:

• id: nominative
• u: accusative
• mi-: locative
• ya-: comitative
• șa-: allative
• faC-: from
• tsip : without
• fe: by (passive)

Pronouns

	I	thou (m.)	thou (f.)	he	she	we (exc.)	we (inc.)	you (pl.)	they (an.)
Nominative	rie	łen	łes	in	is	tsa	bang	ngea	ănam
Accusative	crie	căłen	căłes	cin	cis	cătsa	căbang	căngea	cănam

Inanimates use demonstratives.

After a preposition, nominative forms are used.

Demonstratives

• this: __ se (adnominal); sed (pronominal)
• that: __ fi (adnominal); fid (pronominal)
• here: rădun se, dunse (casual)
• there: rădun fi, dumfi (casual)
• who: ășak ra, ășra (casual)
• what: ra (in the sense of which), mül ra (in the sense of which thing)
• where: rădun ra, dura (casual)
• when sngith ra, sngithra (casual)
• how li-tănsü ra; litra in casual speech
• all tsor (preposed)
• many mea (preposed)
• some tăchung (preposed)
• few łüp (preposed)
• other nătha

Verbs

Classical Windermere verbs inflect for mood, aspect, and voice, but not for tense.

In the imperative, the subject is omitted. The cohortative ('let's VERB') uses the syntax VERB ya-tsa, lit. 'VERB with us (exc)'.

Verbs and adjectives are actually predicate nouns, so a patient trigger verb can be used as a patient noun just by placing a case marker in front of it.

Aspect

Aspect inflection uses a combination of prefixes and reduplication.

Reduplicant uses 1st consonant (F) or last consonant (L)

• imperfective/stative = unmarked
• perfective = unmarked for some verbs but marked with em- for others
• prospective = hef- (closest equivalent of future tense)
• momentane = bla-
• progressive = ăL-
• gnomic = FăL-
• frequentative = eNFă-
• inchoative/inceptive = oLă-
• graduative = tăFa-

Intensive

• thu- = intensive prefix

Voice affixes

Voice affixes are obsolete in Modern Windermere.

• ‹ăc› = Dynamic passive
• ‹ră›, ‹wă› = Stative passive
• ‹ăb› = Reflexive

Adjectives

Adjectives are stative verbs: they behave almost identically to verbs but they cannot take the imperative by themselves.

Derivational morphology

• ‹i› = nominalizer for underived verbs
• bin- = nominalizer for derived verbs
• hăl- = nominalizer for adjectives
• sa- = nominalizer
• di- = negation
• ing- = verbalizer
• lă = verbalizer (how productive?)
• yă- = adjectivizer
• nu- = agentive (Classical Windermere; and productive to an extent in Modern Windermere)
• pa- = patientive (from Old Windermere *p + *ha)
• bo- = adjectivizer for verbs

TODO: verbalizers, "adjectivizers" ("X-like", "characterized by X")

• Head-initial concatenation. Common concatenated morphemes:
  • hălwier = '-logy' (lit. 'beauty of')
  • wang = 'matter, affairs'
  • ngoth = 'manner, way'
  • ăma = 'proto, ur-' (lit. 'mother of')

"Trigger" verb affixes

These were originally trigger affixes but had become derivational affixes to derive verbs by Classical Windermere times.

• ‹ăn/ăng› = Applicative trigger
• ‹ith› = Locative trigger
• ‹ăw› = Instrumental trigger
• ‹ăfong› = Destination trigger
  • răfongüe 'to endow' < rüe 'to give'
• ‹ălis› = Comitative trigger
• ‹ăm› = Source/cause trigger
• ‹ăchem› = Benefactive/purpose trigger
• ‹ărea› = Malefactive trigger

Syntax

Constituent order

The basic word order of Windermere is VSO.

The question particle is lea, which is preposed before the sentence.

Verb phrase

There is a preverbal negative particle die.

Time clauses

For a non-finite time clause, mi- + verbal noun may be used.

Relative clauses

mo- = relativizer

• often combined with the complementizer: mong

Complement clauses

nga = complementizer

Example texts

"The Round Table", from the Imthumăytil

Doan ngith, dur id tach chäth mi mogor lăytheath. Enwiets Păda Brăwied: "Mea ra łănam runse?"

one time, sit NOM six child in circle VN.discuss. PFV-ask Master B.: "many what 2PL here?"

Once, six children were in a round table. Master Brăwied asked them: "How many of you are here?"

Roac ăngnung imchäth nătha, emcă'aw doan: "Müeșrüch te-stiw: tsin tach mognas, șrüch te-stiw thräf, șrüch te-chloas chustiw..."

when PROG-count PL-child other answer one: 63 because six individual, 15 pair, 20 group_of_3

While the others were still counting, one child replied: "Sixty-three: 6 individuals, 15 teams of two, 20 teams of 3, ..."

Łop enwiets Păda Brăwied: "Ǎna mea ra moach, srüe hădean do croth nătha?"

then PFV-ask Master B.: "then many what be_at, if enter one person other"

Now Master Brăwied asked: "Well then, how many people will be there if another person enters?"

Emcă'aw id ceth ăbay, "Op călu ho-bang tsor dăy'uag paleac, sach făbeang imdăy'uag nătha ya-croth mălem fi!"

PFV-answer NOM child just "here, here to-us all team previous, as_well_as <REFL>form PL-team other with-person new that"

The child nonchalantly responded: "Well, we have all of the old teams, as well as another set of teams with the new person!"