Tigol/Proto-Tigol

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Tigol/Proto-Tigol
gávthȁ themsármā
Type
Fusional
Alignment
Nominative-accusative
Head direction
Initial Mixed Final
Primary word order
Verb-subject-object
Tonal
Yes
Declensions
Yes
Conjugations
Yes
Genders
2
Nouns decline according to...
Case Number
Definiteness Gender
Verbs conjugate according to...
Voice Mood
Person Number
Tense Aspect

Background

The Themsaran language constitutes a separate branch of the Zachydic language family, along with other para-Themsaran languages. Themsaran is a typological and lexical outlier in its family due to its long period of isolation and substrate influence. The language possesses strongly head-initial syntax, head-marking in both clauses and possessive NPs, mixed fusional and agglutinative inflection, and nominative-accusative morphosyntax. This article describes Classical Themsaran.

Phonology

Consonants

Bilabial Labio-dental Dental Alveolar Post-alveolar Palatal Dorsal Radical Glottal
Nasal m n ŋ
Plosive p b t d k g (ʡ) (ʔ)
Fricative f v θ ⟨th⟩ s z ʃ ⟨š⟩ ʒ ⟨ž⟩ x ⟨ch⟩ ħ~ʜ~ʢ ⟨ħ⟩ h~ɦ ⟨h⟩
Affricate tʃ ⟨ť⟩
Approximant (ʋ) j
Trill r
Lateral app. l ʎ ⟨ļ⟩

[ʔ] may occur only in morpheme boundaries.

Conditioned allophony

Phoneme Allophone Condition(s)
/ħ/ [ħ~ʜ] #_, C[+voiceless]_
[ʡ~ʢ] V_V, C[+voiced]_
/h/ [ɦ] V_V, C[+voiced]_
C[+obstruent, ±voiced] C[+obstruent, ∓voiced] _C[+obstruent, -guttural, ∓voiced]

Vowels

Themaran has six vowels, short and long. Short vowels have one mora, and long vowels have two morae.

Front Central Back
Close i ⟨i⟩ iː ⟨ī⟩ ʉ ⟨y⟩ ʉː ⟨ȳ⟩ u ⟨u⟩ uː ⟨ū⟩
Mid e ⟨e⟩ eː ⟨ē⟩ o ⟨o⟩ oː ⟨ō⟩
Open a ⟨a⟩ aː ⟨ā⟩

The following are the diphthongs, all falling: /ai au ei ie~ia uo~ua/ ⟨ai au ei ie ua⟩. All diphthongs are bimoraic.

Pitch accent

Pitch accent, or tone, is phonemic in Themsaran. The following is the notation for tones:

Short Long Diphthong
Unmarked a ā ai
High á ái
Low à ȁ ài
Falling - â âi
Rising - ǎ ǎi

The pitch accent of a word (of more than one mora) consists of two components: the lexical tone, and the position of the downstep (the latter is confined to appear after the 3rd-to-last mora). A high-tone word is consistently high until the downstep, whereafter the pitch drops sharply. A low-tone word starts low and has the highest pitch at the tonic mora, which is immediately before the downstep.

The following are the rules governing the marking Themsaran pitch accent:

  1. High lexical tone is marked in the initial syllable; low tone is not marked, unless necessitated by rule 2.
  2. The tonic syllable is always marked:
    1. If the downstep occurs after a long syllable (syllable with a long vowel or diphthong), the syllable is rising in a low-tone word, and high in a high-tone word.
    2. If the downstep occurs between the two morae of a long syllable, the syllable has falling tone.
  3. If the first syllable has high tone and precedes a downstep, the second syllable is marked as low.

If the downstep occurred word-finally, the first syllable of a following high tone word would have slightly lower pitch. In pausa, a word final high short syllable is realized as a falling, short vowel.

Orthography

Grammar

NB.' In structural glosses, a, b, c... are coreference indices, and i, j, k... are agreement indices.

Nouns

Nouns and adjectives have a rich morphology, albeit less ornate than verbs. They inflect for number, definiteness and possessedness, but not for case. Nouns have two genders, masculine and feminine. In third-person possessed forms, Themsaran makes a distinction, realized tonally, between the absolute possessed form, which indicates a noun possessed by a pronoun, and the conjunct possessed form, used to indicate a possessive relationship between two nouns and agreeing with the gender of the possessor.

First declension

The first declension consists primarily of masculine nouns.

First declension
Singular Plural
Indefinite Definite Indefinite Definite
Unpossessed -ach
1sg -n
2sg.m
2sg.f
3sg.m -u
3sg.f -i
4sg.m -thu
4sg.f -thi
1ex
1in
2pl.m
2pl.f
3pl.m -ech
3pl.f -er
4pl.m -thech
4pl.f -ther

Second declension

The second declension consists primarily of feminine nouns.

Second declension
Singular Plural
Indefinite Definite Indefinite Definite
Unpossessed -e -ir -enā
1sg -an
2sg.m
2sg.f
3sg.m -au
3sg.f -ai
4sg.m -ath
4sg.f -eth
1ex
1in
2pl.m
2pl.f
3pl.m -āch
3pl.f
4pl.m
4pl.f

Third declension

The third declension consists mainly of mass, collective and abstract nouns of both genders.

Third declension
Singular Plural
Indefinite Definite Indefinite Definite
Unpossessed
1sg
2sg.m
2sg.f
3sg.m
3sg.f
4sg.m
4sg.f
1ex
1in
2pl.m
2pl.f
3pl.m
3pl.f
4pl.m
4pl.f

Tonal patterns of nominals

Every noun falls under one of three tonal paradigms.

Irregular nouns

Adjectives

Adjectives agree in not only number, definiteness and gender with their heads, but also in possessedness. Adjectival declension disagrees with nouns in that absolute possessive form of adjectives modifies the conjunct possessive of nouns. Adjectives also take degree inflection (positive, "less/least", "more/most", elative, "X enough", "too X"). Adjectives exhibit tonal ablaut like those of nouns.

Declension

Degree

Adjectives with degree inflections may be nominalized to derive, for example, meanings such as "supreme strength" from "the very strongest".

Irregular adjectives

Pronouns

Personal

Personal pronouns
Singular Plural
1.ex

na̋

châm

1.in

táŋên

2.m

zéi

srâs

2.f

véi

srâth

3.m

žá

žû

3.f

žî

žân

4.m

ťá

ťû

4.f

ťî

ťân

Demonstrative

The demonstratives have identical endings to personal pronouns in feminine singular and the plural. The adnominal demonstratives are (near speaker), ħé (near hearer), and ťá (distal; identical to 4th person pronoun), and the pronominal demonstratives are ím(e), íž(a), and íť(a).

When a demonstrative modifies a noun phrase, the noun and adjective modified take the indefinite form if unpossessed, and the definite form if possessed.

Reflexive

Reciprocal

The reciprocal pronoun, "each other", is nadnék. It originated from an adverb that was later reanalyzed as a pronoun.

Table of correlatives

Interrogative Near speaker Near hearer Distal Existential Negational Elective Collective Distributive

Verbs

Finite verbs are marked for TAM, degree (positive, "more/most"), voice (active and mediopassive), the subject's person, number, and gender and, if the direct object is definite, is obligatorily marked with the (usually direct) object's person, number, and gender in most TAMs, except in the imperative. The verb may agree with an indirect object (which is typically animate) instead of with the direct object. Verbs also have several non-finite forms, used with various subordinating conjunctions and relative clauses.

Tense-aspect-mood

Imperative

The imperative is used to issue positive, direct orders.

Jussive

The jussive bears a wide range of uses:

  • optatives (wishes), polite requests and hortatives (urging);
  • prohibitions, with the prohibitive marker (Don't walk!);
  • imperatives in indirect speech, with a complementizer ("He ordered me to go back");
  • purpose clauses, as relative clauses or as subordinated or coordinated clauses; ("the word to say").
Non-finite forms

The non-finite forms are participles and two infinitives.

The participle, which is available for all verbal categories, is used to construct VOS clauses, where O and S are full noun phrases, or O is a noun and S is a third- or fourth-person pronoun. VOS sentences lend more emphasis to the predicate than the neutral VSO.

The possessor of the first infinitive represents the verb's object.

The possessor of the second infinitive represents the verb's subject.

Conjugation of the active

The active voice is the default voice, used when the subject is the agent of the verb.

The three conjugations of Themsaran verbs are demonstrated below respectively with the verbs mól - 'thank', chrīgá - 'walk backwards', ga̋le - 'sing'. The first conjugation subsumes ħ-stem verbs, where the ħ assimilates into any consonant that begins an ending, and h-stem verbs, for which only fricative-beginning endings are so geminated, and for other consonants, undergoes compensatory lengthening of the vowel preceding the ending.

Subject affixes
Imperative
Singular Plural
1.in

-

mólèns!
chrǐgans!
ga̋lêns!

2.m

mól!
chrǐga!
ga̋le!

mólèls!
chrǐgals!
ga̋lêls!

2.f

mólt!
chrǐgat!
ga̋lét!

mólèrs!
chrǐgars!
ga̋lêrs!


Present
Singular Plural
1.ex

mólȉ
chrǐgai
ga̋lei

mól
chrǐgama
ga̋lêma

1.in

mólènse
chrǐganse
ga̋lênse

2.m

mólèr
chrǐgar
ga̋lêr

mólèlse
chrǐgalse
ga̋lêlse

2.f

mólȅ
chrǐgā
ga̋lîe

mólèrse
chrǐgarse
ga̋lêrse

3.m

mólè
chrǐgà
ga̋lê

mól
chrǐgavi
ga̋lévi

3.f

mólìs
chrǐgàis
ga̋lìes

mól
chrǐgati
ga̋léti


Jussive
Singular Plural
1.ex
1.in
2.m
2.f
3.m
3.f
Non-finite forms

The non-finite forms are participles and two infinitives.

The participle is formed by infixing ⟨an⟩ before the nucleus of the first syllable of the stem.

The first infinitive is formed by suffixing -s to the 2nd person masculine singular imperative.

Conjugation of the mediopassive

The mediopassive marks the subject as a patient of the verb. Apart from passivity, mediopassives may have a derivational function; they may indicate reflexive action or change of state. As such there are quite a few deponent verbs, verbs that are inherently mediopassive, and also mediopassive counterparts of active intransitive verbs.

Subject affixes
Imperative
Singular Plural
1.in
2.m 2.f


Present
Singular Plural
1.ex
1.in
2.m
2.f
3.m
3.f


Jussive
Singular Plural
1.ex
1.in
2.m
2.f
3.m
3.f

Object affixes

The object affixes combine at the end of the verb, sometimes in less predictable ways, to agree with the direct object.

Object affixes
1sg 2sg.m 2sg.f 3sg.m 3sg.f 4sg.m 4sg.f 1ex 1in 2pl.m 2pl.f 3pl.m 3pl.f 4pl.m 4pl.f
-(e)n -ze -ve -(j)u -(j)i -thu -thi -am -(e)nt -sŋa -sŋe -(e)ch -(e)r -thech -ther

Non-finite forms

Tonal patterns

Applicative

The applicative suffix, placed after the masculine singular imperative, is -t.

Prepositions

Numerals

Cardinal Ordinal Multiple Distributive Fractional

Syntax

The default constituent order is verb-subject-pronominal oblique object-direct object. The subject or the direct object can be topicalized or focalized by being placed in front of the verb.

Noun phrases

Numerals precede nouns; possessors follow their possessa; demonstratives occur after attributive adjectives, which follow nouns. Whether a quantifier precedes or follows the noun depends on the specific quantifier. Within these boundaries there is a lot of leeway; an attributive adjective or a demonstrative can occupy any position between its head and the relative clause.

Distributive possession

To express the meaning of "our/your/their respective NP", the last noun of the NP is reduplicated in absolute possessed forms. The plural persons are decomposed as follows:

  • 1ex.m: noun-1sgsg noun-3sg.msg or noun-3sg.msg noun-1sgsg
  • 1ex.f: noun-1sgsg noun-3sg.fsg or noun-3sg.fsg noun-1sgsg
  • 1in.m: noun-2sg.msg noun-1sgsg or noun-1sgsg noun-2sg.msg
  • 1in.f: noun-2sg.fsg noun-1sgsg or noun-1sgsg noun-2sg.fsg
  • 2pl.m: noun-2sg.msg noun-2sg.msg
  • 2pl.f: noun-2sg.fsg noun-2sg.fsg
  • 3pl.m: noun-3sg.msg noun-3sg.msg
  • 3pl.f: noun-3sg.fsg noun-3sg.fsg
  • 4pl.m: noun-4sg.msg noun-4sg.msg
  • 4pl.f: noun-4sg.fsg noun-4sg.fsg


These exact forms are always used disregarding the finer aspects of gender composition in the group. Thus, for example, if the only male in a group speaks of "our (exclusive) respective villages", he will still say "my village his village".

Equational sentences

The copula vák is rarely used in the present tense. Instead, a 3rd- or a 4th-person pronoun (cliticized and therefore toneless) agreeing with the subject may be used anywhere in the sentence, or omitted. Both subject-predicate and predicate-subject orders may be found. The predicate-subject order tends to indicate a more permanent state of being, while the subject-predicate order denotes a more temporary state. When the subject is a pronoun, the uncliticized pronoun is used.

Coreferentiality

There are several situations where the strictly head-marking language tracks coreferentiality, or which agreeing noun a verb or pronoun taking a given agreement refers to, with fourth person pronouns or by other means.

Across clauses

Content questions

The fourth person object suffix is used on the verb, not the third person, when the interrogative word is the direct object.

Jé henesanú?
/jéꜜ hènesanuꜜ/
jé ⟨he⟩nesa⟨n⟩-u
who ⟨PAST.PFV⟩kill.animate.subject⟨PAST.PFV.3SG.M.NOM⟩-3SG.M.OBJ

Who killed him?
Jé henesanthú?
/jéꜜ hènesanθuꜜ/
jé ⟨he⟩nesa⟨n⟩-thu
who ⟨PAST.PFV⟩kill.animate.subject⟨PAST.PFV.3SG.M.NOM⟩-4SG.M.OBJ

Whom did he kill?/Who is it he killed?

Polar questions and focus

Possessives

If an absolute possessed noun has a possessor who is the subject of the clause it is in, the third person is used. All other possessors of the same gender and number are in the fourth person.

Relative clauses

Any pronoun which corefers with the head of the relative clause is in the fourth person. The non-resumptive third-person pronouns are all ordinary third person.

Indirect speech

If the complement clause's subject corefers with the subject of the main clause, it is left unstated in the complement clause. Otherwise the third- or fourth-person pronoun is used as the subject as appropriate.

"Impersonal" sentences

There exists impersonal pronouns (identical to the interrogative "who"/"what", and distinguished by not being fronted), but it is only used as an intransitive subject. In other cases, the verb is put into the mediopassive (or mediopassive of causative or applicative, as appropriate).

Derivational morphology