User:Ceige/Something Germanic

Grammar

Nouns

Gender

There are 3 genders, which are applied with semantic intent:

• Male:

Male-gendered animals, things being emphasised in a masculine way*, and technically the -er suffix.

e.g. ram, soldier

• Female

Female-gendered animal, things being emphasised in a feminine way*, romanticised concepts and abstractions, most derivational suffixes

e.g. ewe, valkyrie

• Neuter

Animals (in a collective or non-individualistic sense), vehicles (but personified vehicles are typically female), machines (see prev., female gender can act as a respectful familiar diminutive), diminutives suffixes, etc.

e.g. sheep, land

*The use of emphasis is determined by the speaker's intent and background.

Number

Nouns form the plural with:

• -er if they end in a consonant, are unaffixed, and are male,
• -en if they end in a consonant or suffix, and are female,
• and -s if they end in a (phonemic) vowel.

These affixes also have secondary and tertiary partitive and derivational meanings.

Neuter nouns do not need to mark for plurality, but often employ umlauting, sometimes with a final dummy vowel (-e).