Verse:Mwail/Old Gloob: Difference between revisions

The '''Themsaran''' (/ˈθɛmsɑɹən/) '''language''' (Themsaran: ''gávthȁ themsármā'' [gáʊ̯fθàː θè̞msármàː] "the Themsaran mouth") was traditionally classified into a [[Talsmic languages|separate subbranch]] of the [[Zachydic languages|Zachydic]] language family, along with other para-Themsaran languages which are/were natively spocen in the island of Tálsèm off the northeastern coast of the Zachydi subcontinent. (Since then, Talsmic's [[Raxo-Talsmic languages|close ties]] to Ractamic languages, such as Raxic, has gained widespread recognition.) Due to its long period of isolation and substrate influence, Themsaran was a typological and lexical outlier in its family, within which it was distinguished by its heavily head-marking inflection in both clauses and possessive NPs as well as its strongly head-initial syntax. It also notably employs a combination of tone changes and affixes to convey grammatical information. The language possesses mixed fusional and agglutinative inflection, and nominative-accusative morphosyntax (mostly). The name of the language comes from the Themsár region, from whose dialect arose the prestige language of the island. This elevated language existed in a state of diglossia with the diverse and often mutually unintelligible vernacular "dialects". Classical Themsaran was used as a living language by the ruling class for a period spanning 600 years until its demise in the year ca. 220 v.c., and was continued to be used as an important literary, academic and religious language on the island and surrounding mainland areas.

Nouns and adjectives have a rich morphology, albeit less ornate than verbs. They inflect for number, definiteness and possessedness, but not for case. Nouns have two genders, masculine and feminine. In third-person possessed forms, Themsaran maces a distinction, realized tonally, between the ''absolute'' possessed form, which indicates a noun possessed by a pronoun, and the ''conjunct'' possessed form, used to indicate a possessive relationship between two nouns and agreeing with the gender of the possessor.

Definite forms are used as the vocative. Definiteness is used more often than in English, but less than in continental European languages. Names of deities or deifications are primarily indefinite, but tace definite agreement.

The first declension consists primarily of masculine nouns. Nouns ending in a consonant may contain an epenthetic ''e'' to breac up a forbidden consonant clusters, particularly those ending in resonants. The ''ħ''-stem nouns always end in ''-ā'', and this mutates to ''-aħ-'' before a ending beginning with a vowel, and exhibits the form ''-aC-'' before an ending beginning with any consonant. The ''h''-stems have a long vowel ending by default, which shortens in front of a consonant ending, along with gemination of any fricative-onset endings. The ı-stem nouns, ending in ''-i'', display the ''-i'' before a possessive suffix beginning with a consonant, and a ''-ı'' before one beginning with a vowel. Geminate stems end in a long vowel plus a final consonant in their base forms, which changes to a short vowel + geminate.

Attributive adjectives agree in number, definiteness, gender and possessedness with their heads. Adjectival declension disagrees with nouns in that absolute possessive form of adjectives modifies the conjunct possessive of nouns. Predicate adjectives are declined differently. Adjectives also tace degree inflection (positive, "less/least", "more/most", elative, "X enough", "too X"). Adjectives exhibit tonal ablaut lice those of nouns.  

When a demonstrative modifies a noun phrase, the noun and adjective modified tace the indefinite form if unpossessed, and the definite form if possessed.

The present is used for events that tace/are tacing place in the present time, or for gnomic statemnets.

Prepositions in Themsaran are inflected with pronominal enclitics. If the resulting combination is monosyllabic the syllable taces ´ or ˆ as the accent. If disyllabic (unless 1s, 3mp and 3fp) the second taces the ´ accent.

''ar'': if (situational; P will result in Q); if the condition taces place in a future time, then use future

The 3rd person, or proximate, object marks foreground or central referents, usually the first one or the most animate/possessing one mentioned soon after it. while the 4th person, or obviative, object refers to background or peripheral referents. The third person and the fourth person combine as 3+4=3, and when parts of a proximate plural is tacen out, the first noun phrase to be tacen out is the new 3rd person.

|gloss = IPFV-dispute-IPFV.3/4PL.M North.Wind-DEF.SG and Sun-DEF.SG COMPZ=which.one powerful-COMP-PRED.M.SG, then agree-PFV.3/4PL.M COMPZ=win.see-PASS.JUSS.3SG tace.off<ACT.PTCP>-CAUS-ACT.PRES-3/4SG.M>DEF.SG.M/CONJ traveller first successfully DAT=clothing-{{blue|4SG.M>DEF.PL}}

*''-őf-'' (''c''): weacer pejorative, "just some"