Quame languages

Quame languages/Lexicon

Quame languages/Swadesh list

Quame
Naquo-Talmic
Created by	–
Geographic distribution	Txapoalli, Talma, Etalocin; today worldwide
Linguistic classification	One of Tricin's primary language families
Proto-language	Proto-Quame
Subdivisions	Roshtero-Talmic Naquic Aewedanoan

The Quame languages (Eevo: brits Cłem, from *kʷēm-, the reconstructed word for 1), also known as Naquo-Talmic, are a major language family in Tricin. It is well-established that that Naquic and Talmic form a Naquo-Talmic family; the relationship of other languages to Naquo-Talmic is conjectured by some but not well-established.

The Quame urheimat is surmised to be somewhere in Etalocin (the union of Clofabolocin and Dodellia).

Proto-Quame phonology is inspired by classical IE languages and Tsez.

Family tree

• Quame
  • Talmic
  • Naquian

Phonology

Consonants

The following inventory of consonants is reconstructed for PQ and is now accepted by the majority of Trician scholars.

		Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar		Uvular		Glottal
						plain	labialized	plain	labialized
Nasal		*m	*n
Plosive	plain	*p	*t	*T		*k	*kʷ	*q	*qʷ	*ʔ
	ejective	*pʼ	*tʼ	*Tʼ		*kʼ	*kʷʼ	*qʼ	*qʷʼ
	voiced	*b	*d	*D		*g	*gʷ	*ɢ	*ɢʷ
Fricative			*s							*h
Resonant			*l	*r	*y /j/		*w

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	*i *ī		*u *ū
Mid	*e *ē		*o *ō
Open		*a *ā

Suprasegmentals

Stress was phonemic.

Phonotactics

Rules:

• Grassmann's Law operates in many descendants.

Grammar

Typology

Somewhat like German, Proto-Quame was a fusional language in which nouns, adjectives and articles inflected for four cases, three genders, and two numbers, and definiteness. The basic word order was V2, modifier-modified.

Proto-Quame roots were monosyllabic and obeyed the sonority hierarchy.

Pronouns

TODO: table

Nom/Acc

X = some laryngeal

V = some vowel

• nā = I (Tal./Nqu. nā)
• wey(-r) = thou (Thn. veir, Nqu. uī)
• kā(-mi) = we (exc) (Thn. cām, Nqu. txā)
• gwon(-mi-ti) = we (inc) (Thn. gonti, Nqu. quon)
• sen(-kwi) = blotp (Thn. senci, Nqu. sen)

Genitive

• χ, nχ = my (Thn. -na, -a; Nqu. a; Sjo. kha)
• something with r = thy; (Thn. -r; Nqu. ir)
• smo = our (exc) (Thn.-smo, Nqu. zmo)
• sgwiX = our (inc) (Thn. -swē, Nqu. zquī)
• dkoX = blotp's (Thn. -scō, Nqu. tłō)

Demonstratives

• m- = proximal, this, here
• kw- = distal, that, there
• ta- = what, who
  • t(a)Xs = what (Thn. tās)

Ablaut

Much like PIE, PQ had an ablaut system where roots (usually of 2 or 3 consonants) were inflected in different ablaut grades.

Functions of ablaut

• Noun inflections
• Verb inflections
• Verb voices
• Deriving nouns and verbs

Ablaut grades

• o-grade: present tense
• a-grade: derived nouns
• e-grade: preterite tense
• ∅-grade: derivations
• lengthened grades: various verb aspects/voices

Declension

Nouns, articles and adjectives had:

• three genders: masculine, feminine, neuter
• four cases: nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive
  • Some speculate that Proto-Quame originally had an intransitive-transitive alignment. The nominative and accusative may have originally been intransitive and transitive cases respectively, since stative verbs in the 3rd person singular have nominative endings, while eventive verbs in the 3rd person singular have endings similar to accusative endings.
• two numbers: singular and plural.
  • Some nouns had broken plurals formed by reduplicating of the first syllable or using a different ablaut grade. The broken plural used singular affixes.
• for adjectives: strong and weak declensions, as in Proto-Germanic.

Possible declensions:

• a-stems
• x̌-stems
• i-stems
• u-stems
• consonant stems
• heteroclitic stems: r/s

Definite article *hān~hin-

• nom: sg. hān, honi, hons; pl. nis, nar, non
• acc: sg. nam, nas, hin; pl. nôi, nôd, nôs
• dat: sg. nīd, nea, nis; pl. nôsis, naisis, nôsis
• gen: sg. nī, nea, nā; pl. nôni, naini, nôni

Nouns

Strong declension

(similar but not exactly the same endings as the definite article)

Weak declension

(a lot of redundancy; nom. def. -t > def. -tł in Naquian, const. state *-t in Talmic)

The weak declension was the form used with definite articles.

The construct state (possessed noun in genitive phrases) was indicated by a weak declension noun that was not preceded by the definite article.

• tekts = a child (nom.)
• hans tektat = the child (nom.)
• hī hrondīn tektat or tektat hī hrondīn = the man's child (nom.)

Verbs

Verbs were conjugated for subject, object, aspect, and mood (but not for voice).

• Subject agreement: For each pronoun, and gender in 3rd person
• Aspects: present, preterite, stative
• Moods: indicative, subjunctive, jussive, imperative
• Austronesian alignment, realized with various trigger verb prefixes.

Stative conjugation

-dei, -woi, -pim, -pi, -ps, -me(r), -nte(r), -kʷe(r), -be(r)

Active conjugation

-ni, -ri, -mi, -si, -ø, -mek, -nti, -kʷi, -ti

Participles

• -kʷom = active ptcp.
  • variant -nkʷom, -ikʷoi, -skʷos
• -nom = passive ptcp.

Derivations

• -tl-, -tlom = agent, instrument, participle
• -ā- = verbalizer from nouns
• -ye-, -i- = verbalizer from adjectives and verbs
• -ma- = adjective