Proto-Quame

Overview

The Gamedan languages are moderately inflecting languages that use mainly suffixing and infixing morphology.

Phylogeny

Proto-Gamedan	Proto-Talsmic (P F B) Proto-Central Talsmic Noble Themsarian? Qelorian Proto-Peripheral Talsmic Snaħħian Núrian? Proto-Ractamic (P P' Pʰ) Raxic Atzòpic Tizian Proto-Bonzic Dili Upur (an attempt at a language with clitic complexes) Proto-Kʷoiƛoq̓ic Beƛoq̓ic Proto-Wiobic Wiobian

Phonology

Consonants

An inventory of 35 consonants is reconstructed for Proto-Raxo-Talsmic. The Kʷoiƛoq̓ic/Quoytłochic branch preserves the most archaic consonant inventories, whereas the Talsmic branch is the most innovative.

Proto-Raxo-Talsmic reconstructed consonants
		Labial	Denti-alveolar		Palatal	Velar		Uvular		Glottal
			central	lateral		plain	labialized	plain	labialized
Nasal		*m	*n
Plosive	plain	*p	*t			*k	*kʷ	*q	*qʷ	*ʔ
	voiced	*b	*d			*g	*gʷ	*ɢ	*ɢʷ
	ejective	*p̓	*t̓			*k̓	*k̓ʷ	*q̓	*q̓ʷ
Fricative	voiceless		*s	*ł						*h
	voiced		*z	*λ
Affricate	plain		*c	*ƛ
	ejective		*c̓	*ƛ̓
Approximant					*y		*w
Liquid			*r	*l

*m *n *l *r could be syllabic.

Consonant correspondences

PRT	PTal	Rax
*m	*m	m, ~ː
*p	*p	u-, p
*b	*b	b
*p̓	*ɸ	hu-, ph
*n	*n	n, ~ː
*t	*t	t
*d	*d	d
*t̓	*þ	th
*s	*s, *h	z
*z	*z, *r	z
*c	*s (ts)	tz
*c̓	*s (ts)	tzh
*ł	*ł	ł
*λ	*λ	l
*ƛ	*ƛ	tł
*ƛ̓	*ł	tłh
*k	*k	c
*g	*g	g
*k̓	*x	ch, h, (ː)
*kʷ	*k	qu
*gʷ	*g	gu
*k̓ʷ	*x	hu
*q	*q	c
*ɢ	*ʁ	g
*q̓	*χ	ch, h
*qʷ	*q	qu
*ɢʷ	*ʁ	gu
*q̓ʷ	*χ	hu
*l	*l	l
*r	*r	r
*w	*w	u
*y	*j	y
*h	*h	Ø
*ʔ	*ʔ	h

Vowels

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

Pitch

No phonemic pitch or tone existed in PRT.

Phonotactics

Consonant clusters were allowed, but limited.

Grammar

Typology

The basic word order was SOV.

Nominals

Proto-Raxo-Talsmic did not distinguish between nouns and adjectives. They both inflected for:

• 9 cases: nominative, (definite) accusative, genitive, dative, locative, ablative-comitative, allative, instrumental, adverbial
• A noun class system, indicated by different final classifier clitics. Or perhaps an animate-inanimate opposition.
• 3 numbers: Singular, dual, plural

Nouns minimally consisted of a root and an optional infix, case/number endings and a classifier suffix. The classifier suffixes play a role in gender assignment in daughter languages.

Declension

Case suffixes
Nominative	Ø
Accusative	*-z
Genitive	*-ʔ, *-k
Dative	*-ƛ
Locative-Comitative	*-ksi
Ablative	*-hn
Allative	*-cti
Instrumental	*-hli
Adverbial	*-ʔzi

Nominal morphosyntax

The PRT nominative and accusative cases differ from the canonical nominative-accusative system in that the accusative case marks only definite or specific direct objects. The nominative in PRT also stood for both predicative complements of verbs and predicative nouns (regardless of their case-position). The marking of all predicates with the nominative survives in Raxic and Themsarian (although Raxic has extended the accusative to all direct objects). In later Ractamic languages, where the accusative case had long since lost the definite meaning, predicative direct objects are marked with the accusative case.

Verbs

Verbs were conjugated for subject, aspect, mood, evidentiality, and voice.

• Subject agreement: For each pronoun, and 3rd person m/f/n, and perhaps collective
• Aspects: Perfect-imperfect dichotomy. 2 sets of subject markers?
• Evidentiality: direct, hearsay, unclear memory, quotative, inferential
• Moods: {Indicative, desiderative, jussive, optative}, {mirative, subjunctive}, imperative
• Voices: Active, mediopassive, causative

Personal suffixes:

Personal suffixes
	Singular	Dual	Plural
1.ex	-īn		-mēk̓
1.in	-	'	-nci
2	-əz	'	-lci
3.animate	-m		-rih
3.inanimate	-ici

Conjugation

Aspect→ Mood↓	Aorist	Habitual	Progressive
Indicative
Desiderative
Optative
Jussive
Imperative

Derivational morphology

• ⟨*l⟩ verbalizer
• ⟨*r⟩ nominalizer/adjectivalizer