Vanadovian

Classification and Dialects
White Ruthenian is an Eastern Germanic language spoken in the White Ruthenian Commonwealth, commonly called White Ruthenia.

Writing System
The White Ruthenian Cyrillic script has a lot of orthographical particularities due to conservative spelling :
 * The letter A is pronounced /a/, if stressed. If unstressed, it becomes reduced to /ɐ/, e.g. : aвга (=eye) /'awgɐ/
 * The letter B is pronounced as /w/, if it is followed by a consonant, e.g. : aв г а (=eye) /'awgɐ/
 * The letter Г is pronounced as /v/ followed by the letter O, e.g. : Григ о ра (=Gregor) /grivɐrɐ/
 * The letters Е and И palatalize "automatically" the preceeding consonant, e.g. хн и го (=book) /xɲivɐ/
 * The letter E is pronounced /i/, if unstressed, e.g. : дяскеў (=teacher) /djasciw/
 * The letter Л is pronounced /w/, it is followed by a consonant or the vowel A, O and У, e.g. : вул ф а (=wolf) /vuwfɐ/
 * The letter O is pronounced /ɐ/, if unstressed, e.g. : хниго (=book) /'xɲivɐ/
 * The letter У is pronounced /ɯ/, if it is in final position, e.g. : хвитрутенску (=White Ruthenian language) /xvjitrutjinskɯ/
 * The letter Ў standing for /w/ is only used for /w/ in final position, e.g. : дяскеў (=teacher) /djasciw/
 * The letter Ъ indicates that the letters Е and И do not palatalize the preceeding consonant, e.g. : объ е цѣнко (=promise) /ɐbitsjɛnkɐ/
 * The letter Ъ may stand for the phoneme /ɐ/, mostly with prefixes ending in the same consonant as the initial word begins, e.g. : с ъ с евѫ (=to see - perfective) /sɐsjɛvɐ/
 * The letter Ь is only used to indicate palatalization with the letter O, e.g. : гасть о (=guest) /gastjɐ/
 * The letter Ѫ stands for the phoneme /ɐ/ and has a purely morphological role (it is an archaism, having been pronounced /ã/), e.g. : съсевѫ (=to see - perfective) /sɐsjɛvɐ/
 * The letter Ѣ stands for the phoneme /jɛ/ and has a purely etymological role (it is an archaism, having been pronounced /æ/), e.g. : объецѣнко (=promise) /ɐbitsjɛnkɐ/

Nouns
Nouns in White Ruthenian are highly inflected. They may be singular or plural, feminine, neuter or masculine. They may be put in cases depending on their function in the sentence, as follows : nominative, vocative, accusative, dative, genitive, partitive and locative.

First Declension -a
The First Declension is inferred through the nominative singular ending -a. All nouns of the First Declension are either masculine or neuter. There is no rule that would help memorizing, which nouns of the First Declension are masculin or neuter. They must be learnt by heart.

Second Declension -o
The Second Declension is typically marked by nouns ending with -o. All nouns of the Second Declension are feminine. * The letter Ѫ cancels the palatalization of the letter T out. The combination ьѫ does not exist.

** The real endig is -ac, but because of the palatalization of the letter T, the letter Я must be applied instead of the letter A.

Third Declension -y
The Third Declension is typically marked with nouns ending in -y or -ў. Nouns ending in -y are neuter, while nouns ending in -ў are masculine.

Fourth Declension -з/-р
Nouns of the Fourth Declension do always end either with -з or -р. They can be masculine or feminine, but there is no rule to predetermine, which noun is masculine or feminine. So here again, the genders must be learnt by heart. The vowel between the stem and the nominative singular ending drops, if the noun gets a case ending.

General use of the case system
The general use of the case system will be explained here, but note that it is an over-simplification of the grammatical reality, because many cases are used in different contexts, which will be explained later on. Due to the syntax of White Ruthenian, being generally SVO, there is a strict rule concerning, which cases come at what place in the sentence : Vocative - Locative - Nominative -  Verb  - Adverb - Dative - Accusative/Partitive ; first, note that the genitive case may be put additionally to any noun in any case, but it will always follow the noun it refers to, and secondly, note that the accusative and the partitive are counterparts of each other.
 * Nominative : expresses the subject of a sentence, e.g. : John eats fish.
 * Vocative : expresses an exclamation, e.g. : John, do you eat fish?
 * Accusative : expresses the direct object, e.g. : John eats fish.
 * Dative : expresses the indirect object, e.g. : John gives the children cookies.
 * Genitive : expresses the possessed object, e.g. : That is John's bag.
 * Partitive : expresses the direct partial object, e.g. : Give me some water.
 * Locative : expresses the location, e.g. : John is now in White Ruthenia.

Defective cases
There are two defective cases : instrumental (indicating the being with or acting with) and ablative (indicating the origin). Those two cases come from Old White Ruthenian and for most nouns, they disapeared in the modern language. But some nouns do still keep their elder forms including the instrumental and/or the ablative case. The endings for each of both cases are the same for every declension. The instrumental endings are : -ом (singular) and -ох (plural); and the ablative endings are : -ей (singular) and -ою (plural). However, those cases nowadays stand for very specific expressions. Nouns retaining the instrumental case are : Nouns retaining the ablative case are : One noun has retained bothe cases :
 * свещар - sister - with my sister(s) - свещром / свещрох
 * мядар - mother - with my mother --> no plural form - мядром
 * сунуз - son - with my sons(s) - суном / сунох
 * фядар - father - with my father --> no plural form - фядром
 * брьодар - brother - with my brother(s) - брьодром / брьодрох
 * духтер - daughter - with my daughter(s) - духтром / духтрох
 * кряфту - force - with effort - кряфтом --> plural form changes meaning : against my will - кряфтох
 * ѓянду - hand - with my hands --> no singular form - ѓяндох
 * ума - intelligence - intelligently --> no plural form - умом
 * White Ruthenian city names, e.g. : Менско - Minsk (capital city) - from Minsk --> no plural form - Менскей
 * ѓуса - house - from my house --> no plural form - ѓусей
 * польо - field - from outside - полей --> plural form changes meaning : from abroad - польою
 * ѓерта - heart - with affection (instrumental) --> no plural form - ѓертом ; - with love (ablative) - ѓертей --> plural form changes meaning : with passion - ѓертою

Remnant of the dual form
White Ruthenian had once a seperate dual form, which disappeared in the modern language. Nonetheless, parts of the body existing in pairs still retain their dual form, parallelly do their plural form. The endings are independent from the respective declension category of the noun. The endings are as follows : Nouns, that retained the dual form, are : In medicine, there are more nouns that are put in the dual form (but those are not known to the broad majority of speakers), e.g. : люня - lung --> люни. However, most people will call the two lungs simply "люня" as a generalization or they may talk of "твей люньо", meaning "two lungs", the noun being in the plural.
 * фотуз - foot --> фоте
 * бъейна - leg --> бъейни
 * арма - arm --> арме
 * ѓянду - hand --> ѓянди
 * ялинбуха - elbow --> ялинбухе
 * хнева - knee --> хневи
 * авга - eye --> авги
 * авска - ear --> авски

Gender marking
Gender marking is always applied to professions. Mostly professions get feminized due to the fact that most professions were occupied by men. There are however some professions that need to be masculinized.

Most masculine professions being part of the First Declension are feminized by the suffix -киньо added to the stem of the noun. That way, the noun passes from the First Declension, including masculine nouns, to the Second Declension, including only feminine nouns, e.g. : инжинер а (=engineer) --> инжинеркиньо. There are however professions (mostly having a Slavic etymology) ending in -ў, which get feminized with -ўчо, e.g. : дяскеў --> дяскеўчо.

Nonetheless, there are professions, which were traditionally excercized only by women and were hence part of the Second Declension. Those nouns become masculinized changing from the Second Declension to the First Declension. Those nouns are few and do not follow a consistant rule, as the previous once :
 * секретаро - secretary --> секретарока
 * сестро - nurse --> сестара
 * касѣро - cashier --> касѣрча
 * служанко - maid --> служанеца
 * амо - midwife --> амча

Definiteness
The definiteness is expressed through suffixal addition. There are three types or forms of definiteness :
 * The neutral definiteness is done by adding -(o)т to the noun, e.g. : инжинерат (=the engineer) - this suffix is derived from the Germanic demonstrative pronoun sa, so, þat meaning " that ".
 * The proximal definiteness (which may also have a laudative connotation in the poetic language) is done by adding -(o)з to the noun, e.g. : инжинераз (=this engineer) - this suffx is derived from the Germanic demonstrative pronoun hiz, hijo, hit meaning " this ".
 * The distal definiteness (which may also have a pejorative connotation in the poetic language) is done by adding -(o)р to the noun, e.g. : инжинерар (=that engineer) - this suffix is derived from the Germanic adverb þar meaning " there ".

Verbs
The verbal system in White Ruthenian is with no doubt the most complicated in the Germanic language family. White Ruthenian verbs may express tense, specificity, perfectivity, telicity, modality etc. ; it is the most complexe and compact structural unit of the language.

Indicative mood
The indicative mood is mostly the mood expressing real facts as told by the speaker. However, the interaction and roles between the different moods will be elucidated later on in detail.