Saanain

Saanain is a Uralic language, specifically a Finnic language, with shared vocabulary between it, Finnish, and Estonian. It is spoken by around 1.5 million people in Saanaimaa, a landlocked country, and is notable for its synthetic grammar and extremely flexible sentence structure.

Classification and Dialects
Saanain is a Uralic language in the Finnic branch of those languages. It is mutually intelligible with Finnish and Estonian in its vocabulary but much less in its syntax and spoken forms.

It is spoken in four main dialects. The first is the Roettul dialect in the northern parts of Saanaimaa. The most spoken is the Saikkul dialect, spoken in the regions surrounding the capital, Saikkul. There are also the Southeastern and Southwestern dialects, each spoken in their respective areas. These dialects differ with the inclusion or deletion of Old Saanain phenomena, as well as the treatment of words and sentence structure. The Roettul dialect, being closer to the country Dora, which speaks the Slavic language Dorian, as well as the Anigarsko language closely related to Dorian, has introduced many Slavic loanwords into its vocabulary, while other dialects remain conservative in their borrowing. It is a fact, however, that all forms of Saanain have borrowed some words from Dorian or other Slavic languages, such as kayt ö  ("like" or "as", related to Dorian kak and related to Bulgarian kakto; vulla ("power", from Dorian vul'a and related to Bulgarian volya); and siemka (either derived from Proto-Finnic *seeme or Dorian syom'ka, "seed").



Nouns
 Nouns in Saanain inflect for case, number, and sometimes for their role in the sentence. There are 25 cases in Saanain, with one case, the supercomparative, generally counted as an extension of the comparative case, and the dative case almost never used. Nouns can be either singular or plural. They are inflected for one of the 25 cases.

For example, the noun  muonn , roof, can be inflected as follows: muonn (nominative), muonnon(accusative), muonnon (genitive), muossa (elative), muonnalta (delative), muosta (ablative), muonnta (exessive), muonntu (inessive), muonnina (superessive), muolla (adessive), muonna (essive), muomaa (illative), muonnata (sublative), muolle (allative), muoksi (translative), muonnse (prolative), muonn (instructive), muonne- (comitative), muottan (distributive), muonnta (partitive), muotta (abessive), muonnuo (comparative), muonnka (superlative), muonnas (lative), muolloin (temporal,  although technically not a correct construction), and the two side cases, muonnuos (supercomparative), muonnod (dative).

In some cases, nouns can be altered to reflect plurality in their stem when bound with a case suffix.

Nouns are also inflected in two numbers, singular and plural. The plural stem is usually (except in the case of the noun case stem)  -t .

<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">For example,  uuvuo , wind, becomes  uuvuo t   in the plural. However, when nouns end in consonants, the ending is changed so that the vowel before the last consonant in the word (the last vowel) is added to the  -t . So,  muonn  becomes  mu o nn o t .

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:12pt0in;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">Since sentences usually follow either an SOV or an SVO order, nouns almost always come first. However, due to the highly versatile orders that sentences can take on,  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;background-image:initial;background-attachment:initial;background-size:initial;background-origin:initial;background-clip:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial;">any sentence structure is (at least in theory) possible. <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">There is a small difference between two types of nouns that alters their case endings slightly in the accusative. These nouns become Accusative I nouns or Accusative II nouns according to their ending, respectively. Accusative I nouns make up the vast majority of nouns in sentences; they are formed by the regular accusative case ending  -(V)n . Accusative II nouns, however, are used when they are one part of a phrasal object, that is, a phrase used as the object of a transitive verb. The last vowel is retained or  -in  becomes the accusative particle. <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height: normal"><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"TimesNewRoman",serif; mso-fareast-font-family:"TimesNewRoman";display:none;mso-hide:all">

Verbs
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:4.8pt0in6pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">Verbs are the most complicated part of Saanain grammar. They are inflected for voice, tense, mood, and connegativity (to four degrees).

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:12pt0in;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">The two voices in Saanain are active and passive. Saanain does not have a "common person" inflection like other Finnic languages. <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">* <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">Passive voice weak affirmative. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">'''

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">Saanain also conjugates for four tenses: present, perfect, imperfect, and pluperfect. <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:6pt0in2.4pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">   <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:6pt0in2.4pt;line-height:15.75pt;">

Moods
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin:4.8pt0in6pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are several moods that are taken into account when inflecting verbs. These include the conditional, potential, optative, eventive, regrettive, casive, and assurative (or affirmative). <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">

Connegativity
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">Saanain connegativity uses four degrees of separation, the strong positive, the weak positive, the weak negative, and the strong negative. The strong forms have mostly fallen out of use, merging with the weak forms, but there was traditionally separation between them. The weak positive is the normal form of the verb, while the strong postive implies that the thing (being) done is or was the only thing done. The weak negative is the normal negative form of the verb, while the strong negative implies that the thing (being) done is or was the only thing not being done. <span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">

Telicity
<p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">Verbs do not have an aspect form, but they do have telicity. Like Finnish, Saanain uses a system wherein the object of a transitive verb is inflected with the accusative case ending for telic verbs and the distributive case ending for atelic verbs (though it is hard to tell how the latter originated). <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

<span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">
<p style="margin:4.8pt0in6pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Imperative and Interrogative
<p style="margin:12pt0in;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are two more forms for verbs, the imperative and interrogative. <p style="margin:4.8pt0in6pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">* The second imperative is frequently used in place of the first. <p style="margin:4.8pt0in6pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Passive Voice
<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">The passive voice is divided into two degrees or "strengths" based on the function of the passive verb in the sentence.

Weak Form
<p style="margin:12pt0in;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">Verbs in the passive voice are always weak. <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:black;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:black;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span 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style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Strong Passive<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">
<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">Strong passive verbs are infinitives and gerunds only. <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">*Infinitives are discussed more in the  Infinitives  section below.

Infinitives
<p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">Infinitives are the final form of verbs. They come in five types, the Type I, Type II, Type III, Type IV, and Type V infinitives.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">Type I infinitives are the same as the English formation "to -". The ending for Type I infinitives is -a.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">tollo- "come" > tolloa "to come"<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">Type II infinitives translate to "while -ing". Their ending is -nu.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">audo- "give" > audonu "while giving"<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">Type III infinitives are the same as English gerunds. Their ending is -ana, with the last consonant of the stem deleted.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">manhaatse- "control" > manhaatsana "controlling"<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">Type IV infinitives are the same as Type III infinitives but are used between different verbs or when combining to verbs. Their ending is -minen<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> . <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">suu- "eat" > suuminen "eating"<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">Type V infinitives translate to "going to -" or "about to -". Their ending is -munnesani.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:15.75pt;">kyvo- "come" > kyvomunnesani "about to come"<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:10pt;line-height:107%;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">  <span style="font-size:11pt;line-height:107%;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;border:1ptnonewindowtext;padding:0in;">

Verbal Subjects
Saanain, being a pro-drop language, uses a system of using verbs and their conjugation as subjects of sentences. This system creates the verbal subject.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

A verb is always conjugated for person, so any verb can carry a pronoun in its conjugation, without a pronoun or otherwise. In case I, the pronoun es is used (unnecessarily) to convey the meaning of he/she/it, so that the sentence translates to he/she/it gives gold. However, in case II, it can be inferred by the conjugation that the giver is he/she/it. This compound forms the verbal subject.

The verbal subject is used as a placeholder for a pronoun and a verb, and using it enables Saanain to form its various sentence orders. There is little difference, however, between the verbal subject and a regular verb. As a rule of thumb, any conjugated verb in a sentence that has undergone pro-drop is a verbal subject.

Syntax
Saanain is usually described as having an SOV or SVO sentence order, but due to its highly flexible morphology, it can take on any sentence order or syntax. This is furthered by its pro-drop characteristics, which (as discussed above) can create verbal subjects.<span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Helvetica,sans-serif;">

Article I of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
"'Kokko misekihat seytssan vataan ja pahdan pöhdisyätä ja ongeten. Ne südene ja ontuunuune audassan ja toumosiatse etkuutu vialmmoherdetu.'"