Katäfalsen: Difference between revisions

Analysing the name ''Katäfalsen'' already shows many of the language's features and offers therefore an appropriate introduction. Possible English translations are "the water language", "the water languages", "(a) water language" and "water languages" as neither number nor definiteness must be expressed explicitely. The word ''fales'' means "tongue" as a body part and is converted into the abstract noun "language" by the suffix ''-n''. Its main function is forming feminine nouns but can also yield abstacta. Here, it triggers metathesis, i.e. alternation of the order of phonemes, and produces the word ''falsen'' "tongue". The word for "water" is ''kat'', which has the stem ''kata''. Since "water language" specifies a certain type of "language", the component "water" is considered to be subordinate and takes a subordinate suffix which lengthens the final vowel in ''kata'' to ''katä''. Finally, the two words ''katä'' and ''falsen'' form the compound ''Katäfalsen''. An acceptable glossing would consequently be: