Qazhrian

Qazhrian (/kɑːʒriən/ KAHZH-ree-uhn; natively: Qazhrem /ˈqaʒrem/ or hë Lazhrem /hə ˈʟaʒrem/) is a Talmic language spoken in Qazhra (from Thensarian Ȝactrasē), a Talman country. It is descended from Thensarian.

External history

This language was originally called Benocian and was Romance- and Ashkenazi Hebrew-inspired, and it had a strong Portuguese flavor. Recently I decided to rework it, basing the aesthetic more on Albanian and Breton.

Ideas

• Breton-ish but not too gibby. Get more palatal consonants.
• /ts, dz/ from Thensarian /θ ð/
  • or > /š ž/?
  • d and dz both lenite to z
• /q/ lenites intervocallically to /ʟ/
• /m/ does NOT lenite.
• nō = I
• wōr = you (sg)
• tëzh = child
• rront = man
• yënal = water
• wëkj /wəc/ = name
• get initial zh from mutations
• që = in front of

Diachronics

• i ī u ū e o ē ō a ā e ae ao ei eo iu oe ui > i e ou u ë o ō ē a ō ai au e ou u e

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
Nasal		m /m/	n /n/	nj /ɲ/	ng /ŋ/
Plosive	voiceless	p /p/	t /t/, c /ts/	kj /c/	k /k/	q /q/
	voiced	b /b/	d /d/, x /dz/	gj /ɟ/	g /g/
Fricative	voiceless	f /f/	s /s/	sh /ʃ/	c'h /x/	ħ /χ/	h /h/
	voiced	v /v/	z /z/	zh /ʒ/	gh /ɣ/
Liquid			r /ɾ/ rr /r/			l /ɴ̆~ʟ/
Approximant		w /w/		y /j/

p, f are found in loanwords (e.g. from Clofabic and Windermere).

Auslautverhärtung operates for plosives and is reflected in the orthography.

Vowels

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i /i/	u /y/	ou /u/
Close-mid	e /e/	ë /ə/	o /o/
Open-mid	ē /ɛ/		ò /ɔ/
Open		a /a/

Diphthongs: ai au /əe əo/; ië uë ouë /iə yə uə/ from loans

Morphology

Nouns

Qazhrian lost grammatical gender and all nominal inflections except number and construct state.

Article mutation example:

• tëzh 'a child'; hë dëzh 'the child'
• rront 'a man'; hë ront 'the man'

Construct state example:

• tëzhët hë ront 'the man's child'

Verbs

There are finite verbs, but auxiliaries are also important