Einodo

Einodo is a highly agglutinative, nominative-accusative language. For a full lexicon, view the article "Einodo Lexicon."

Phonology
The phonology of Einodo is extremely regular. Each grapheme in the alphabet refers to exactly one phoneme. There are also no multigraphs (i.e. digraphs and trigraphs). Einodo consists of 24 phonemes—nine vowels and fifteen consonants—two of which (one vowel and one consonant) do not have a grapheme, being instead optionally represented by an apostrophe as it is epenthesized according to certain rules.

° The glottal plosive is not represented by a grapheme (except an optional apostophe). See the section on epenthesis.

The Einodo alphabet, or "leremeo," is: L, R, M, N, V, S, Ŧ, Đ, P, B, T, D, K, G, I, E, A, Ä, O, Ö, U, Y.

Primary syllable stress is always placed on the first syllable. In words of three syllables or less there is no secondary stress. In longer words, the penultimate syllable receives secondary stress. In extremely long words every odd syllable receives secondary stress. If the stress in such a long word would fall on the antepenultimate syllable, it is shifted right to the penultimate syllable.

Vowel Harmony
Einodo employs a vowel harmony system based upon frontness. There are three classes of vowels: back /ä o u/, neutral /e i/, and front /æ ø y/. When a word contains a back vowel, all vowels in that word will be back, and if it contains a front vowel, all vowels in that word will be front. Neutral vowels do not change, and are transparent, meaning that they do not affect any of the other vowels in any way. If the root of a word contains only neutral vowels, it is treated as though it were a back-vowel word. Compound words are not subject to vowel harmony, though each word within the compound word is. Each back vowel is paired with a front vowel. A is with ä, o is with ö, and u is with y.

Epenthesis
Due to the phonological constraints of the Einodo language, consonant clusters and double vowels are illegal. In other words, no two consonants can be next to each other and no two identical vowels can be next to each other. Consonant clusters never occur due to the structure of the language, but doubled vowels are possible due to inflection, declension, and derivation. When this happens, a morphophonological change called epenthesis takes place. When two identical vowels occur proximally, a glottal stop /ʔ/ is inserted between them. This epenthesized phoneme is not represented with a grapheme, but it can be optionally represented by an apostrophe for ease of pronunciation.

There is also epenthesis which occurs when adapting foreign words (especially names) to the Einodo language. Because consonant clusters cannot occur, either the addition of a vowel (usually "e") between the consonants occurs or the deletion of one or more consonants. When the foreign word contains phonemes which do not exist in the Einodo language, either an existing phoneme is substituted or the letter is deleted. Additionally, because words must end in their specific part of speech and because uninflected words cannot end with any consonant and even inflected words cannot end in any non-nasal or non-frictive consonant, a paragogic vowel is added to the end of the word such that it will match the correct part of speech. An example of this is the adaption of the name August Schleicher, the author of Schleicher's Fable, to Auguseto Selaikero.

Orthography
The Einodo orthography is a cursive script, both in printed and written forms. Each phoneme has four graphemes: an initial, medial, final, and isolated form. Einodo is written from left to right, top to bottom. The script is a semi-featural abugida, which means that only consonants are written,followed by the inherent vowel "e" /e/, and any vowel other than that (including the absence of a vowel) is marked with a diacritic. The script is semi-featural in that voiced consonants use the same grapheme as their unvoiced counterparts with the addition of a diacritic.

Phonotactics and Morphology
= Zero or one occurrence of the enclosed item.

{ } = Zero or more occurrences of the enclosed item.

[ ] = One or more occurrences of the enclosed item.


 * = “or”

/ = one of the items on either side are used, depending on the vowel harmony of the word

V = any vowel, subject to vowel harmony = i|e|a|o|u|ä|ö|y

C = any consonant = l|r|m|n|p|b|t|d|k|g|ŧ|đ|s|v

C1 = terminating consonant = l|r|m|n|v|s|ŧ|đ

syllable = (C) V (C1)


 * this means that the language's phonetics contains no diphthongs and that each vowel receives its own syllable

phonological constraints = (C) [V] (C) [V] (C)...[V] (C1)

pos = part of speech marker

in = inflection affix

pr = personal affix

de = declension affix

pl = plurality affix

po = polarity affix

co = comparative affix

pre = derivational prefix

suf = derivational suffix

word = verb|noun|pronoun|adjective|adverb|preposition|conjunction|interjection

verb = po {pre} root {suf} pos in pr

noun = {pre} root {suf} pos pl de

adjective = {pre} root {suf} pos co pl de

adverb = {pre} root {suf} pos co

pronoun = root pos (pl) de


 * the plural suffix is only used when the pronoun is possessive

Grammar
Einoda has extremely regular and very specific grammar rules for the inflection, declension, and derivation of words. Also, each part of speech has a specific vowel associated with it. This vowel will always be at the end of an uninflected or undeclined word of that part of speech.

Verbs
Uninflected verbs will always end with -a/ä. Verbs are inflected by affixing agglutinated phonemes to the end of the word. Verbs are inflected for voice, tense, aspect, mood, and person. There are three persons, each of which have a singular, dual, and plural form. Additionally, the first person dual and plural have a differentiation of being inclusive or exclusive.

Inflectional Affixes
The active present imperfect indicative inflection, being the standard form, drops all agglutinated inflectional affixes, having only the personal affix.

The imperative mood can only be in the present tense and only in the 1st person inclusive and exclusive dual and plural and all 2nd persons.

To negate a verb, affix the prefix ku/ky- to the beginning of the verb.

There are thus exactly 3,425 hypothetically possible inflected verb forms, though not all of them are used.

Example Verb Inflections

 * a – to be

an – I am

as – you are

ai – we (ex pl) are

alovon – I would be

alivum – he/she were

alada'as – you (du) will have been

alodoin – we (in pl) would have been

alokai – we (ex pl) are being


 * mylä – to house (i.e. to give shelter)

mylän – I gay

myläs – you house

myläi – we (ex pl) house

mylälövön – I would house

mylänidän – I had been housed

mylänäkäis – you (pl) will be being housed

mylärövä'ä – we (ex du) housed

mylänöŧäin – we (in pl) are housed (habitually)

Nouns
Undeclined nouns will always end with -o/ö. Nouns are declined by affixing agglutinated phonemes to the end of the word. Nouns are declined into twenty cases as well as three different numbers, singular, dual, and plural.

Declensional Affixes
There are exactly 63 possible declined noun forms.

Example Noun Declensions

 * alo – knowledge

alon

alos

aloim

aloavim

aloidem

alomen

aloapan

aloken


 * mylö – house

mylön

mylöv

mylöäs

mylöben

mylöigän

mylönem

mylöädäm

mylöivem

Adjectives
Adjectives are declined in the same fashion as nouns and must agree in both number and case with the noun being modified. Adjectives have the added declension of comparison.

Adverbs
Adverbs are declined to show comparison in the same way that adjectives are.

Pronouns
Pronouns are declined in exactly the same way as nouns for case.

Personal Pronouns
Although pronouns are declined for case, to form a possessive prefix the personal pronoun to the beginning of the word being possessed.

Reciprocal Pronouns
Reciprocal pronouns refer to a reciprocal relationship. Example: They love each other.

Reflexive Pronouns
Reflexive pronouns are used when an agent acts upon itself. Example: He hurt himself.

Demonstrative Pronouns
Demonstrative pronouns distinguish the specific referents from other possible candidates. Example: I ate those.

Indefinite Pronouns
Indefinite pronouns refer to one or more unspecified beings, objects, or places. Example: Anyone can do that.

Relative Pronouns
Relative pronouns refer back to people or things previously mentioned.

Restrictive relative pronouns restrict the reference of its antecedent. ''Example: The builder who erects very fine houses will make a large profit. (It is restrictive in the sense that it is restricting the definition from 'any builder' to 'builders who erect very fine houses'.)''

Non-restrictive relative pronouns do not restrict the reference of its antecedent. ''Example: The builder, who erects very fine houses, will make a large profit. (It is non-restrictive in the sense that it is assumed that it is already understood which builder is being described, and the relative clause is simply describing the builder in more detail.)''

Indefinite relative pronouns refer back as though it were a definite relative pronoun, but the referent has not been previously explicitly named. Example: I know what I like.

Interrogative Pronouns
Interrogative pronouns ask which person or thing is meant. Example: Who did that? Interrogative pro-adverbs are created by declining the interrogative pronouns to oblique cases. Examples are given below.

Determiners
Demonstratives are noun-modifiers that express the reference of a noun or noun-phrase. Determiners end with the part of speech affix -e. Determiners follow the noun which they modify.

Demonstrative Determiners
Demonstrative determiners distinguish the specific referents from other possible candidates. Example: I ate those eggs.

Indefinite Determiners
Indefinite determiners refer to general categories of people or things. Example: Any person can do that.

Negative determiners indicate the non-existence of people or things. Example: No person can do that.

Distributive determiners refer to members of a group individually, rather than collectively. Example: We gave one to each person.

Interrogative Determiners
Interrogative pronouns ask which person or thing is meant. Example: Which person did that?

Conjunctions
A conjunction is an invariable particle which connects two words, phrases, or clauses.

Numerals
The Einodo number system is a duodecimal system based around the number twelve.

Cardinal
To form a number in the teens (between 12 and 24), affix the comitative suffix -gan to the root for twelve without '-so' and add the root for the smaller digit. If the smaller digit begins with a consonant, omit the n at the end of the suffix -gan. To form a number in the twenties (between 24 and 36) add the root for the number two without '-so' to the beginning of the root for twelve. Larger numbers are treated similarly.

iso - zero

aso - one

oso - two

uso - three

eso - four

kiso - five

vaso - six

liso - seven

eiso - eight

euso - nine

aiso - ten

tiso - eleven

nueso - twelve (one dozen)

nueganaso - thirteen (one dozen and one)

nueganoso - fourteen (one dozen and two)

nueganeiso - twenty (one dozen and eight)

onueso - twenty-four (two dozen)

onuegavaso - thirty (two dozen and six)

unueso - thirty-six (three dozen)

unueganeso - forty (three dozen and four)

enueso - forty-eight (four dozen)

enueganoso - fifty (four dozen and two)

kinueso - sixty (five dozen)

eanueganeso - one hundred (eight dozen and four)

miso - one hundred forty-four (one gross)

omiso - two hundred eighty-eight (two gross)

vamigan tinueganeso - one thousand (six gross, eleven dozen and four)

eimigan enuegavaso - one thousand two hundred and six (eight gross, four dozen and six)

kuiso - one thousand seven hundred and twenty-eight (one great gross)

Ordinal
Replace final o with i.

Derivation
Derivation in Einodo is done by the addition of derivational affixes to either the beginning or end of words. More than one affix can be added for further derivation, as long as the derivation makes sense. The affixes are parsed in order from left to right. Not all derivations are plausible.

Prefixes
Prefixes are affixed to the beginning of a word.

Suffixes
Derivational suffixes replace the part of speech affix. The first vowel must match the part of speech of the word which is being modified (thus it is easy to double check if a derivation is even possible) and the last vowel becomes the new part of speech affix. Therefore, suffixes which do not change the part of speech will begin and end with the same vowel. –oŧio/öŧiö

Word Order
The word order in Einodo is very free due to the high amount of inflection. The most neutral word order is VSO (verb-subject-object). All other word orders imply emphasis. There are certain words which must be placed in order, however. Modifiers tend to be placed directly following their heads and adpositions are prepositional. Along these same lines, genitive cases must immediately follow the head to which it is being related.

Sample Translations
For a full lexicon, view the article "Einodo Lexicon."

Schleicher's Fable

 * Schleicher's Fable by August Schleicher
 * Easanalovo Selaikerom Augusetoben Selaikeroben

English: On a hill, a sheep that had no wool saw horses, one of them pulling a heavy wagon, one carrying a big load, and one carrying a man quickly. The sheep said to the horses: "My heart pains me, seeing a man driving horses". The horses said: "Listen, sheep, our hearts pain us when we see this: a man, the master, makes the wool of the sheep into a warm garment for himself. And the sheep has no wool". Having heard this, the sheep fled into the plain.

Einodo: Đeanovotam deodalivam öniön öniömömen iloas, konasalikam ason moam gädös ybis, ybätälikäm ason ybätös obis, nin ybätälikäm tisu ason nasuanos. Easalivam öniön iloav: "Gotanam noŧiuson nos, deodakil ianalokam suanon iloas". Easalivam iloan: "Pialoves, öniö, gotana'am noaŧiusoan noas moikomin deoda'an sikos: suanon, tomon, votam öniömös öniöm nädömökis reogikis evopan. Nen vytäm öniön kye öniömös". Bododadil sivos, ŧomalivam öniön manodis.

The North Wind and the Sun

 * The North Wind and the Sun by Aesop
 * Uko Veo nen Pulo Isopoben

English: The North Wind and the Sun were disputing which was the stronger, when a traveler came along wrapped in a warm cloak. They agreed that the one who first succeeded in making the traveler take his cloak off should be considered stronger than the other. Then the North Wind blew as hard as he could, but the more he blew the more closely did the traveler fold his cloak around him; and at last the North Wind gave up the attempt. Then the Sun shined out warmly, and immediately the traveler took off his cloak. And so the North Wind was obliged to confess that the Sun was the stronger of the two.

Einodo: Älyälitä'äm Ukon Veon nen Pulon alivam moivon muos tuios, moikomin resialivam baravon ykäir ievodim reogidim. Dualiva'am ves palalivum asim mon oivon es däsä ves ŧätälivym baravon moievo ököäräväm tuios kum ralos.