Norþimris

Norþimris
Norþimris
Pronunciation	[[Help:IPA|nɔɹˈθɪmɾɪs]]
Created by	Neil Whalley
Native to	Norþimer
Native speakers	13 million (2011)
Language family	Indo-European Germanic West Germanic Anglo-Frisian Anglic Norþimris
Early forms	Old English Early Norþimris
Official status
Official language in	Norþimer

Norþimris [nɔɹˈθɪmrɪs] (also Northimris or Northumbrian in English) is a Germanic language spoken by the people of Norþimer, one of the four states of Great Britain alongside Scotland, England and Wales. Physically situated between Scotland and England, Norþimris shares much in common with Scots and English, all of which descend from Old English, and may be seen as part of a dialect continuum with those two languages. However, unlike its neighbours, Norþimris has very little influence from French and retains a much stronger Anglo-Norse vocabulary.

History

Internal

Norþimris has its origins in the Northumbrian dialect of Old English, once spoken across central Britain between the River Humber and the Firth of Forth. Though already somewhat distinct from the dialects of Old English spoken further south due to the heavy Norse influence and the substantial reduction in inflexions, it would be the political changes of the late 11th century that ensured Norþimer developed as a language different from its neighbours to the north and south. Following the Battle of Hastings in 1066, William the Conqueror (Wilem Bastard) was faced with strong opposition to his rule, not least from the fiercely independent Anglo-Norse nobles of the north. Despite repeated attempts to subdue them William was never able to conquer the north and, as the Normans consolidated their hold over southern England, the old earldom of Northumbria developed into a self-governing rebel state, eventually declaring itself an independent kingdom in AD 1100.

The period c.1100-1600 is called Early Norþimris. At the start of this period the language was really indistinguishable from the Anglian dialects of late Old and early Middle English, but as English (and Scots) became increasingly influenced by French and Medieval Latin the differences increased. During this period, Norþimris lost most of its remaining inflexions and underwent important phonological changes culminating in the Great Vowel Shift. As a language of government, law and literature it became increasingly flexible and sophisticated.

Modern Norþimris is said to begin c.1600 when the Protestant Reformation and the Renaissance encouraged efforts to standardise and describe the language, and simultaneously increased borrowing from Classical and Romance sources. During this period Norþimris became the language of religion alongside government and literature, and from the late 18th century it increasingly became a 'popular' language with written forms more representative of the spoken language. The spelling system of Þoruuff Þorsteynsun, published in 1877, was adopted as the official written form in 1884 and has remained in use ever since.

External

Norþimris is an a posteriori language based on Northumbrian Old English and Northern Middle English and influenced by the various modern dialects of northern England as well as Scots (and to some degree Dutch). It was developed as an answer to the hypothetical question "What would English sound like if William the Conqueror had never conquered the north?". Since French and Latin have so heavily influenced English vocabulary, grammar and orthography, I expected the result to be considerably different from Modern English. However, Modern English has also been heavily influenced by northern forms with many of the innovations of Middle and Early Modern English originating in the north (e.g. spread of plural -s, spread of 3rd person verb -s, use of they, them, their', use of hers, yours etc.).

Phonology

Dialects

There is a great deal of dialect variation across Norþimer, but there are generally considered to be four main dialects:

• Southern, which is the closest to a 'standard' dialect, found in Yorucscir
• Northern, extending north from Weer Ei (River Wear) to the Scottish border
• Western, the dialect west of the moors
• South-western, the dialect of the Þreiplands, sometimes called Þreiplandris

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio-dental	Dental	Alveolar	Post-alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m			n			ŋ
Plosive	p     b		t     d				k     g
Fricative		f     v	θ     ð	s     z	ʃ			h
Affricate					t͡ʃ     d͡ʒ
Approximant	ʍ     w			ɹ		j
Flap or tap				ɾ
Lateral app.				l

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	iː		uː
Near-close	ɪ		ʊ
Close-mid	eː		oː
Mid		ə
Open-mid	ɛ
Near-open	æː
Open	a		ɒ

Stress

Primary stress is usually on the first syllable of a word (e.g. ápel, átermot, héfenlie). The prefixes a-, be- and fer- do not usually bear stress, so the following element takes it (e.g. ahínt, fersétand).

Orthography

Norþimris is written with a Latin alphabet consisting of the following letters:

a b c d ð e f g h i l m n o p r s t þ u w x y z

The letters j, k, q and v do not occur, except in unassimilated borrowings. The letters ð (called eð) and þ (þorn) are retained from the runic alphabet.

The orthography is almost entirely phonemic, except notably in the case of s, the pronunciation of which is not always predictable in final position. The following table gives all the relevant values of the letters and digraphs.

Graph	IPA	Comments
a	/a/
au	/oː/
	/a/	before word-final h
b	/b/
c	/k/
ch	/t͡ʃ/
cg	/d͡ʒ/	traditionally not permitted to occur word initially, but now used in borrowings such as cgin 'engine'
d	/d/	word-final nd tends to become /nt/ or /nː/ (e.g. Ingland /ɪŋlənː/)
ð	/ð/
e	/ɛ/
ea	/eə/
	/ja/	often word initially or after initial /h/ (e.g. ean 'one' /jan/, heam /hjam/)
ee	/iə/
ei	/ij/
eu	/iə/	/ɪu̯/ in areas bordering Scotland
ey	/ei̯/
f	/f/	initially or before a voiceless plosive
	/v/	medially and finally
ff	/f/
g	/g/
h	/h/	initially
	/f/	finally following u
i	/ɪ/
ie	/ɪ/	word-finally in unstressed syllables, notably the endings -ie, -lie (e.g. nouhtie 'poor').
iy	/æː/
l	/l/
m	/m/
n	/n/
ng	/ŋ/
o	/ɒ/
oo	/oː/
ou	/ɔu̯/
	/ʊ/	before word-final h
p	/p/
r	/ɾ/	before a vowel
	/ɹ/	before a consonant
s	/s/	initially, adjacent to a voiceless consonant and sometimes finally after a vowel
	/z/	between vowels or adjacent to a voiced sound, sometimes finally after a vowel
sc	/sk/
sch	/ʃ/
ss	/s/	only occurs following short vowels
t	/t/
þ	/θ/
u	/ʊ/
	/ə/	in final, unstressed syllables
uu	/ʊw/
w	/w/
hw	/ʍ/	in some dialects, tending to become /h/ before round vowels and /w/ elsewhere
x	/ks/
z	/t͡s/	rare, used mostly in borrowed words

Notes:

• the pronunciation of <s> is not always predictable from its environment. In this article, voiceless /s/ will be written <ṡ> where confusion may arise (e.g. huyṡ 'house', riyṡ 'rice').

Grammar

Articles

The indefinite article is identical to English: a before a consonant and an before a vowel (e.g. a man, an apel).

The definite article is 't in all cases (e.g. 't man, 't apel).

Nouns

Nouns have no grammatical gender and case is limited to the genitive.

Plurals

The plural of most nouns ends in -s, or -is after a sibilant (e.g. apels, huysis).

A few nouns have a rare plural in -(e)n or -er:

• ein 'eyes', ousen 'oxen', sceun 'shoes'
• lamer 'lambs', caufer 'calves' (sg. cauff), souter 'sheep', childer 'children' (no sg.).

There is also a small number of nouns with a change of vowel in the plural:

• man 'man' → men, wiman 'woman' → wimen, hand 'hand' → hend
• teuþ 'tooth' → teiþ, feut 'foot' → feit, geuṡ 'goose' → geiṡ
• muyṡ 'mouse' → miys, cuy 'cow' → ciy, luyṡ 'louse' → liyṡ.

Genitive

The genitive has two forms:

• the dependent genitive is used directly before a noun or noun phrase and is unmarked (e.g. 't man huyṡ 'the man's house', his faðer sun 'his father's son').
• the independent genitive usually occurs as the complement in a copular construction and is marked with -s (-is after a sibilant; e.g. 't huyṡ is Cetels 'the house is Cetel's', ðat 's his faðers 'that's his fathers').

Adjectives

Adjectives precede the noun they qualify and are generally immutable, regardless of number or case (e.g. a micel hund 'a big dog', 't hwiyt deors 'the white doors').

All regular adjectives may form a comparative with the addition of -er and a superlative with -est (e.g. aud 'old' → auder, audest, healie 'holy' → healier, healiest).

	Positive	Comparative	Superlative
bad	il	wer, werṡ	werst
good	geud, weel	beter	best
large	micel	mear, mea	meast
small	litel, liyl	less	leest.
near	nar	narmer	narmest

The alternative endings -mer and -mest are also sometimes added colloquially to other adjectives, creating forms such as betermer, betermest.

The comparative adjective is frequently used with an 'than' (e.g. Cetel 's greeter an Micel 'Cetel's bigger than Michael'). An equative structure can be created with the adverbs auṡ ... auṡ or swea ... auṡ and the positive adjective (e.g. auṡ hwiyt auṡ snea 'as white as snow', swea stil auṡ a muyṡ 'as quiet as mouse').

Numerals

	Cardinal	Ordinal
1	ean	first
2	twea	anar
3	þrei	þird
4	four	ferd
5	fiyf	fift
6	sex	sext
7	sefen	sefend
8	auht	auhted
9	niyn	niynd
10	tein	tend
11	elefen	eleft
12	twelf	twelft
13	þretein	þreteind
14	fourtein	fourteind
15	fiftein	fifteind
20	twentie	twentiand
21	ean an twentie	ean an twentiand
30	þritie	þritiand
40	fourtie	fourtiand
50	fiftie	fiftiand
100	hunreþ	hunreþt
1000	þuysan	þuysand
1,000,000	milyoon	milyoond

Pronouns

Personal

	Subject		Object
	Unstressed	Stressed	Unstressed	Stressed
1sg	i	ic	mi	mei
2sg	ðu, -tu	ðuy	ði	ðei
3sg m.	hi	hei	him
3sg f.	su	scheu	her
3sg n.	hit
1pl	wi	wei	us	uys
2pl	yi	yei	yu	yuy
3pl	ðey		ðam

Several of the personal pronouns have different stressed and unstressed forms. The stressed forms are only used in speech and writing when particular emphasis is put on the pronoun, such as when they occur independently (e.g. ic leuf him 'I love him', hwea didd ðat? Yuy 'who did that? You') . Elsewhere, the unstressed forms are used (e.g. hi wuns in Yoruc 'he lives in York').

Notes:

• the 2nd person singular -tu is an enclitic form used with interrogative verbs (e.g. censtu Cetel? 'do you know Cetel?').
• the 3rd person singular forms him, her and hit are pronounced without the h in unstressed position, but this is not expressed in writing.
• as in English, hi/hei are used for male humans, su/scheu for females and hit for inanimate objects.
• Norþimris maintains a T/V distinction, in which 2nd person plural yei etc. can be used as formal 'you' when addressing a single person. Its use is generally more restricted than in many European languages, only used in particularly formal situations and not necessarily expected when speaking to elders or strangers.
• there is an informal use of us/uus in place of mi/mie (e.g. gie us hit 'give me it').

The genitive pronouns have dependent and independent forms, used like the nominal equivalents.

	Dependent	Independent
1sg	miy(n)	miyn
2sg	ðiy(n)	ðiyn
3sg m.	his
3sg f.	her	hers
3sg n.	his
1pl	uyr	uyrs
2pl	your	yours
3pl	ðer	ðers

There is no independent form for the 3rd person neuter.

Reflexive pronouns are formed with -(s)seln, irregularly pronounced /sɛl/ or /sɛn/ according to dialect, which is added to the object pronouns (e.g. misseln 'myself', herṡeln 'herself'). These pronouns are more emphatic than their English counterparts and the object pronouns are preferred when the sense of reflexiveness is already implied (e.g. i sau mi in 't schewer 'I saw myself in the mirror').

Demonstrative

The demonstrative pronouns are:

• ðiss 'this' and ðir 'these', used for objects close at hand or abstracts metaphorically so;
• ðat 'that' and ðea 'those', used for objects or abstracts at a distance or out of sight;
• yon 'that, those', used only for objects in sight but at a distance.

These may be employed as demonstrative adjectives, preceding the noun (e.g. ðat wiyff 'that woman', yon fel 'that mountain').

Interrogative

The interrogatives are:

• pronouns: hwea 'who', hwat 'what', hwilc 'which', referring to things already mentioned or implied, hweðer 'which of two';
• adjectives: hwilc 'what, which', hweaṡ 'whose';
• adverbs: hwiy 'why', huy 'how', hwear 'where', hwan 'when'.

Verbs

Regular Verbs

Norþimris has only two conjugated tenses: the present and the past. Beyond this, a number of moods, tenses and voices are created using auxiliary verbs and modals.

Present Tense

All regular verbs follow the same pattern in the present tense, given below with leof 'love':

	Sg	Pl
1	leof	leof
2	leofs
3

Whenever the present tense verb is separated from its pronoun or is used with a noun, the -s form is used throughout (e.g. ic, your cining, beeds yu 'I, your king, command you', 't men sings 'the men sing').

Past Tense

In the past tense, regular verbs may be divided into strong and weak conjugations, the former conjugating by a vowel change, the latter by the addition of a suffix. There are no distinctions of person in the past tense.

Following the typical Germanic classification, there are 7 classes of strong verb, each with different changes in the past tense and the past participle:

Class	Present	Past	Past Participle
1	biyt	beat	biten
2	beed	bead	boden
3a	cerf	carf	corfen
3b	sing	sang	sungen
4	beir	bar	boren
5	eit	eat	eten
6	fear	feor	faren
7	mau	miw	maun
	grou	griw	groun
	faud	feld	fauden

Weak verbs form their past tense with a dental suffix, the form of which depends on the stem:

• stems ending in -l, -m, -n, -nd or a voiceless consonant take -t (e.g. smelt 'smelled', fiyct 'fidgetted', lamt 'beat');
• stems ending in -d or -t take -it (e.g. liltit 'hummed', bratit 'curdled, breidit 'stretched');
• other stems take -d (e.g. bleðerd 'talked loudly', ligd 'lay', hiysd 'hoisted').

A number of verbs in <ee> may undergo shortening in the past (e.g. bleed → bledd, meet → mett, sleep → slept/sleept). A number of other verbs have a past tense ending in -ht (e.g. seec → souht, wurc → wrouht, lach 'catch' → lauht).

Imperative

The imperative of regular verbs is identical to the stem (e.g. leof mi 'love me', eit ðiy meit 'eat your food').

Participles

The present participle of all verbs is formed with -and (e.g. leofand 'loving', singand 'singing').

The past participle of most weak verbs is identical to the past tense form (e.g. leofd 'loved', ligd 'layed'). The strong verbs form a past participle with -(e)n and a change of vowel, as shown in the table above but a number of weak verbs ending in -d, -t also form their past participle in -en (e.g. breiden 'stretched', leaden 'loaded').

Irregular Verbs

A number of irregular verbs occur in Norþimris, the most important of which is bie 'be':

	Sg	Pl	Participle
Present	is, 's	ar, 'r	bieand
Past	wer		bien
Imperative	bie

The contracted forms 's and 'r are very common in all but the most formal writing and stand alone in the sentence (e.g. 't man 's singand 'the man's singing').

Other irregular verbs are:

	Present	Past	Present Ptc	Past Ptc
do	deo	didd	deond	deon
have	hea, has	hadd	heand	hadd
go	gang/gea	gangd	gangand	gean
	gan	gand	ganand
give	gie	gaf	giend	gien
make	mac	mead	macand	mead
take	tac	teac	tacand	tean

Each of the present forms takes -s in the 2nd and 3rd person singular, but hea has the separate form has.

Periphrastic Tenses

The majority of tenses in Norþimris are form periphrastically.

Tense	Structure	Example
Present Continuous	present of bie + present participle	i 's singand	I am singing
Past Continuous	past of bie + present participle	i wer singand	I was singing
Perfect	present of hea + past participle	i hea sungen	I have sung
	present of bie + past participle	i 's faun	I have fallen
Pluperfect	past of hea + past particple	i hadd sungen	I had sung
	past of bie + past participle	i wer faun	I had fallen
Future	auxiliary sal + stem	i sal sing	I will sing

In the perfect and pluperfect, bie is used with unaccusative verbs, i.e. verbs in which the subject is not the agent but the patient of the verb (e.g. 't snea 's mouten 'the snow has melted').

Derivation

Prefixes

Prefix	Use	Example
au-	all-, pan-, omni-	augeod 'omnibenevolent'
be-	makes intrans. verbs trans.	beþink 'consider'
ean-	one, mono-, uni-, sole, only	eanreid 'unanimous, resolute'
ed-	re-, again,	edgrou 'regrow'
eir-	early, ancient, primary	eirdey 'ancient times'
em-	even, equal, co-	emlang 'of equal length'
feor-	fore-, before, pro-, pre-	feorgang 'precede'
forþ-, for-	forward, pro-	forgang 'proceed, progress'
heid-	head, chief, main	heidcirc 'cathedral'
heih-	high, arch-, main	heihstreet 'highstreet, main road'
leis-	false, pseudo-	leisneam 'pseudonym'
miṡ-	bad, wrong, fault	misdeo 'do wrongly'
un-	un-, in-	uncuuþ 'unknown'

Suffixes

Suffix	Use	Example
Adjectives & Adverbs
-en	made of, like a material	gouden 'golden', eacen 'oaken'
-ffast	stuck, firm, secure	cragffast 'stuck on a crag'
-ffaud	multiplicative	þreeffaud 'threefold', menieffaud 'numerous'
-ffuu	full of	sacffuu 'quarrelsome', earffuu 'compassionate'
-ie	general adj. ending	dewie 'dewy', pretie 'cunning, sly'
-iṡ	of, pertaining to (particularly with countries etc.)	Skotis 'Scottish', foucis 'popular'
-leṡ	deprivative	neamleṡ 'nameless', freendleṡ 'friendless'
-lie	like, pertaining to	hefenlie 'heavenly', sumerlie 'summerlike'
-ṡum	characterised by, having; -able	angṡum 'irritating', leofṡum 'lovable'
-wiyṡ	like in manner	reehtwiyṡ 'just', needwiyṡ 'necessary'
Nouns
-craft	skill, occupation	develcraft 'Satanism', taucraft 'arithmetic'
-dem	i. domain, jurisdiction ii. condition, state	ciningdem 'kingdom' wisdem 'wisdom'
-en	feminine	giden 'goddess', fixen 'vixen'
-er	i. male agent ii. instrument iii. inhabitant of	leofer 'lover' scewer 'mirror' Yorucer 'inhabitant of York'
-ffuu	measurement of	handfuu 'handful'
-head	abstract, condition, quality; office, rank	preesthead 'priesthood', woruldhead 'secular world'
-ing	verbal nouns	geting 'conception'
-iṡ	languages	Engliṡ 'English', Ebriṡ 'Hebrew'
-leyc	condition, state	reifleyc 'robbery'
-ling	diminutive (often pejorative), also man'	recling 'runt', manling 'little man'
-man	agent, person	freeman, pleohman 'ploughman'
-neṡ	abstract state, quality	geodneṡ 'goodness', micelneṡ 'largeness, abundance'
-reden	condition, state	sibreden 'relationship', cinreden 'kin'
-ric	office, dominion	cinric 'kingdom', biscopric 'bishopric'
-scip	condition, state	manscip 'humanity'
-ster	female agent	spinster 'spinner'
-ṡum	a group of	sexṡum 'group of six'
-uc	diminutive	paduc 'toad'
-wiyff	female agent, woman	huuṡwiyff 'housewife'
Verbs
-el	frequentative	hancel 'tangle'
-en	causative, to make or become	hwiyten 'make white'

Syntax

The basic word order of Norþimris is Subject-Verb-Object:

• i leof ði 'I love you'
• Cetel sang 't sang 'Cetel sang the song
• Maria leirs Frencis 'Maria teaches French'

Unlike some other Germanic languages, Norþimris prefers to keep auxiliary and lexical verbs together:

• Cetel 's singand 't sang 'Cetel is singing the song'
• ðu hadd seen him 'you had seen him'

A direct object follows an indirect object, unless both are personal pronouns, in which case the direct object comes first:

• hi gaf Askil 't beoc 'he gave Askil the book'
• hi gaf hit him 'he gave it to him'

Adverbial expressions are not in a fixed position and generally come at the beginning or end of the sentence:

• yestren, gangd i til 't seekhuuṡ 'yesterday, I went to the hospital'
• i gangd til 't seekhuuṡ yestren 'I went to the hospital yesterday'

Adverbs of manner are placed close to the words to which they relate:

• scu leyct wel 't geamen / scu leyct 't geamen wel 'she played the game well'
• wi ran snel heam / wi ran heam snel 'we ran home fast'

When an adverbial or other element is placed before the verb, the subject is moved to come after the auxiliary verb:

• in a circ wer ðey wedit 'in a church they were married'
• tomorn, sal i gang til 't skeol 'tomorrow I will go to school'

The relative pronoun is at:

• 't wiyff at i leof 'the woman who I love'
• a barn at cens au 'a child that knows everything'

Sample Texts

Norþimris	English
Þt Dreet Beid Uur Faðer at is in hefen Halud siy ðiy neam Ðiy cinric becum Ðiy wil wurð deon On erd auṡ in hefen Gie uss uur deylie leaff todey An fergie uss uur scilds Auṡ wie fergie uur scildiers Leid not uss til costing Auh free uss frea il Þiyn is 't cinric an 't meyn an 't wuuder, for-ea Amen	Our father who is in heaven Hallowed be thy name Thy kingdom come Thy will be done On earth as it is in heaven Give us this day our daily bread And forgive us our sins As we forgive those who sin against us Lead us not into temptation But deliver us from evil Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever Amen