Old Gaju
| Old Gaju | |
|---|---|
| Gaju | |
| Pronunciation | [[Help:IPA|'gaɟu]] |
| Created by | – |
| Setting | Rttirria |
| Native to | East Rttirria |
Rttirrian
| |
Old Gaju (English: /'gɑːd͡ʒuː/, Old Gaju: ['gaɟu], Rttirri: [ˈkɑcu]) was an old form of the Gaju language, spoken by the Gaju people in eastern Rttirria around the 14th century CE. It was spoken over a much larger area than modern Gaju is: over most of eastern Rttirria. It is a member of the Rttirrian language family, descended from the Proto-South-Rttirrian langauge that is also the ancestor of modern Rttirri, the nation's official language.
Phonology
Consonants
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n/ | ny /ɲ/ | ||
| Plosive | p /p/ b /b/ |
t /t/ d /d/ |
ty /c/ j /ɟ/ |
k /k/ g /g/ |
|
| Fricative | f /f/ v /v/ |
s /s/ sh /ʃ/ |
sy /ç/ | kh /x/ | h /h/ |
| Affricate | ts /t͡s/ ch /t͡ʃ/ |
||||
| Approximant | w /w/ | l /l/ | y /j/ |
In addition, the following consonants were allowed in loanwords: ng /ŋ/, z /z/, th /θ/, dh /ð/, hh /ʔ/.
Vowels
| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| High | i /i/ | u /u/ |
| Mid | e /e/ | o /o/ |
| Low | a /a/ | aa /ɑ/ |
Old Gaju distinguished two tones: high and low. In addition, two contour tones were allowed in loanwords: rising and falling. The high tone was by far the most common, so low tones are distinguished in the Latin script with a grave accent: à àà è ì ò ù. Rising and falling tones are distinguished as follows: â ââ ê î ô û ǎ ǎǎ ě ǐ ǒ ǔ.
Grammar
Verbs
The Old Gaju verb was somewhat agglutinative, but did not have the inflectional complexity that had developed in Classical Rttirri by this point. However, an aspect and politeness system, which have not existed in any form of Rttirri, developed from the Proto-South-Rttirrian evidentiality system. There were four classes of verbs, each of which took different prefixes for the past and future tenses; this system exists in only a very vestigial form in modern Rttirri.
The following slots were allowed for affixes on the verb.
| Verb Slot | Allowable Inputs |
|---|---|
| Aspect/Politeness | na- (perfective) nyev- (polite perfective) shu- (habitual) tya- (polite habitual) |
| Mood | -fta- (adhortative) -nag- (subjunctive) -kanag- (conditional) -khtaa- (imperative) -kamu- (generic) |
| Tense | -bu-/-du-/-do-/-ju- (past) -mi-/-ni-/-ne-/-nyi- (future) |
| Verb Root | any verb |
| Auxiliary Verb | -kàki ("to be able to") -kà ("to need to") -dèka ("to want to") -gùki ("to force to") and others |
Nouns
Nouns could take the following cases:
| Case | Suffix |
|---|---|
| nominative | (none) |
| accusative | (none) |
| dative | -khtya |
| ablative | -da |
| locative | -li |
| comitative | -daa |
| instrumental | -wàtyev |
| vocative | -chastaa |
They were also pluralized with ma, a particle that came after any case suffixes.
Pronouns
The following pronouns were used. They were not affixed to the verb, but stood in the place of other nouns.
| Singular | Plural | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Accusative | Nominative | Accusative | |
| 1st person | na | ni | ma | mi |
| 2nd person | kov | ki | tsa | tsi |
| 3rd person | la | ge | daa | di |
Questions
The following question words were used:
| English | Old Gaju |
|---|---|
| who/whom | ta |
| what | ti |
| when | dìti |
| where | dìtag |
| why | dìtà |
| how | dìtug |
Syntax
Word order was subject-object-verb (SOV), although nouns in one of the cases other than nominative or accusative could be positioned anywhere before the verb. All adjectives came after their pertinent nouns. The question particle was tyi.