Proto-Quame
Proto-Quihum is the reconstructed common ancestor of all Quihum languages. It's inspired by Proto-Indo-European. It's thought to have been spoken 6000 years before present. The main source languages for the reconstruction of PQ are Thensarian, Wibian, and Sjowaazheñ.
Todo
Overview
Urheimat: Txapoalli or Talma?
Phonology
Consonants
The following inventory of consonants is reconstructed for PQ and is now accepted by the majority of Trician scholars.
| Labial | Coronal | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | labialized | plain | labialized | ||||||
| Nasal | *m | *n | |||||||
| Plosive | plain | *p | *t, *c | *k | *kʷ | *q | *qʷ | *ʔ | |
| voiced | *b | *d, *dz | *g | *gʷ | *ɢ | *ɢʷ | |||
| breathy voiced | *bʰ | *dʰ, *dzʰ | *gʰ | *gʷʰ | *ɢʰ | *ɢʷʰ | |||
| Fricative | *s | *x | *xʷ | *x̌ /χ/ | *x̌ʷ /χʷ/ | *h | |||
| Resonant | *l, *r | *y /j/ | *w | ||||||
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | *i ī | *u ū | |
| Mid | *e *ē | *ə | |
| Open | *a *ā |
Suprasegmentals
Stress was phonemic.
Phonotactics
Rules:
- Grassmann's Law operates in many descendants.
Grammar
Typology
The basic word order was V2, modifier-modified (like German).
Ablaut
Much like in 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 "binyanim"
- Deriving nouns and verbs
Ablaut grades
- a-grade: present tense
- e-grade: ?
- i-grade: preterite tense
- ə-grade: bare verbal noun
- u-grade: passive for verbs?
- ∅-grade: derivations
- lengthened grades: various verb aspects/voices
Nominals
Nouns had:
- two genders: animate, inanimate.
- There were also honorific forms which worked like a gender somewhat. The honorific turns into a feminine in Talmic, meanwhile animate and inanimate become masculine and neuter.
- two states: absolute and construct.
- two cases: nominative and genitive.
- two numbers: singular and plural. There was also a third number, the collective, formed by reduplication of the first syllable.
Possible declensions:
- a-stems
- x̌-stems
- i-stems
- u-stems
- consonant stems
- heteroclitic stems: r/s
Animate nouns
a-stems
| Singulative | Plurative | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Absolute | δoerom | ' |
| Construct | δoeroes | δoerot | |
| Genitive | Absolute | ' | δoerōni |
| Construct | '-' | '-' | |
| Accusative | Absolute | '-' | δoerobim |
| Construct | δoeroes | δoerot | |
Consonant stems
| Singulative | Plurative | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Absolute | māram | ' |
| Construct | mārīs | mārae | |
| Genitive | Absolute | ' | mārini |
| Construct | māria | '-' | |
| Accusative | Absolute | māribos | mārebim |
| Construct | mārīs | mārae | |
i-stems
u-stems
x̌-stems (honorific stems)
r/s-stems
Inanimate nouns
Heteroclitic stems
a-stems
| Singulative | Plurative | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | Absolute | δoerom | δeδoerom |
| Construct | δoeroes | δoerot | |
| Genitive | Absolute | δeδoerot | δoerōni |
| Construct | '-' | '-' | |
| Accusative | Absolute | '-' | δoerobim |
| Construct | δoeroes | δoerot | |
Consonant stems
jénəqws 'water'
i-stems
welís 'name'
u-stems
r/s-stems
Verbs
Verbs were conjugated for subject, object, aspect, and mood (but not for voice).
Should be Native American-ish
- Subject agreement: For each pronoun, and gender in 3rd person
- Aspects: present, preterite, stative
- Moods: indicative, subjunctive, jussive, imperative
- Voice in finite verb forms cannot be reconstructed; only voice in participles can.
Personal affixes
Object affixes
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | n- | |
| 1 + 2 | - | |
| 2 | ||
| 3 | bi- |
Some etyma
- wel-í- = name
- Possible ablauted stems: wel-ə́y-/wel-yə́-
- stup- = fire
- wjénəqʷ- = water
- -əx̌- = causative or intensive of a verb
- Verbalizer -ā- in Talmic