Medoim

Medoim (pronounced /medwam/) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family, of the Ibero-Romance group of languages, which has about 25 million native speakers in the region of the Iberian Peninsula located in western France and northern Spain.

It evolved from various dialects of Vulgar Latin and loans from Classical, with great Germanic influence, so it has a high degree of difference from Latin, like French, and is one of its closest relatives.

1. Consonants
The following is the complete chart of consonantical sound: These correspond to the letter with which they're represented; however, the following must be noted: "1ck can be pronounced as one k or as a double k sound.""2ç can't be used with before the vowels e and i.""3tch and h is considered a rare sound.""4g /g/ + a, o, u; gu /g/ + e, i, that is, gue, gui; g /ʒ/ + e, i. There is historically two ways to write the sounds /ʒa, ʒo, ʒu/. It must be learnt by heart which one is used in a word: ge + vowel and the letter ġ.""5At the end of a word or next to a consonant, ġ makes the sound /ʃ/.""6z /z/, unless it's before another consonant, then it'll sound /s/."Moreover, t and d at the end tend to be left out of the pronunciation, but are important for word differentiation in written language.

1.1 Letters N and R
R is pronounced as a tap, as in Spanish, when following a consonant or between vowels; otherwise, the standard pronunciation is as in French. Parts of the country closer to Spain dialectically tend to pronounce it with a trill instead, as in Spanish, although it is proven that fluidity is slowed down.

It is standard that n and r makes the following consonant geminated or longer. It is written like this and not as a double consonant because many dialects still pronounce it as two separate consonants.

Examples:


 * defranç /'defɾas:/ or dialectically /'defɾans/ (difference);
 * farne /'fan.nə/ or dialectically /'faʁnə/ (flour).

2. Vowels
The following is the complete chart of vocalic sounds: 1The vowel e at the end of a word is pronounced /ə/.

2The vowel u is considered rare by itself and common in diphthongs, The only word which is pronounced /u:/ is the singular first person, ew ("I"). Û tends to double the following consonant, although this is dialectical.

It must be noted that: 1The diphtong au and the vowel o make the same sound /o/. A word is written with one or the other for historical reasons: The former used to be pronounced /ɔ/, but they merged over time, although some regions still make a strong difference.

2The diphthong ei is pronounced the same as ee, /e:/. A word is written with one or the other for historical reasons: The former used to be pronounced /ej/, but they merged over time.

3The diphthong eu and the vowel ø are pronounced in the same way, /ø/. A word is written with one or the other for historical reasons: The former used to be pronounced /œ/, but they merged over time, although some regions still make a strong difference. When it is followed by a vowel or at the end of a word, eu becomes ew, i.e., pewen (to put).

Special cases:


 * At the end of a word, -en and -er are pronounced -ən and -ər.
 * Consonant + el/le is pronounced the same, consonant + -əl.

1. Gender
It determines the agreement with articles, quantifiers and adjectives or participles. Adjectives agree in gender (masculine or feminine) and number with the noun, whether they are modifiers (1, 3) or as predicative (2, 4), for example:


 * 1) La bichingue mie, the small table.
 * 2) Ich est mogh cempaitegue, she's very pretty.
 * 3) Ast swint gattel, this second chapter.
 * 4) Les livers fønt les sois, the books were his.

Gender is useful to differentiate the sex of nouns that refer to living beings, i.e., gued (m.), guede (f.), cat; otherwise, it's just an inherent property of nouns with no connection to the sex. Many female nouns end in -e and masculine nouns in a consonant, although this could not always be the case.

l' is used if the next word starts with a vowel, i.e., l'au, the water.

If a feminine word starts with a vowel, on is used, i.e., on aif, a bird, is actually a feminine word. The same applies to the surrounding adjectives.

2. Plural
Nouns and adjectives can change number from singular to plural:


 * By adding -s at the end of the word;
 * By adding -es if the word ends in /ʃ/, /t̠ʃ/, /ʒ/ and /d̠ʒ/;
 * None if the word ends in /s/ or /z/. Plural is only discernable through the agreement.

Examples: kee (house) - kees (houses); ach (act) - aches (acts); defranç (difference) - defranç (differences).

3. Adjectives
Adjectives are written in behind the noun, as in English, and can change from masculine to feminine and from singular to plural.


 * Plural is done in the same way as nouns (explained above).
 * Gender is changed by adding -e/-i at the end of a word. Note the following orthographic/phonetic changes:
 * The accent remains in the same syllable as the base form.
 * If the next word is feminine and starts with a vowel, the adjective takes the male form.

Vocabulary 1Irregular feminine.

4. Pronouns
Personal pronouns are used to refer to people. Object pronouns are used for objects. Demonstrative Adjectives

5. Verbs
All verbs in infinitives end in -en, in past participle (souven) in -t (it's not often pronounced in irregular participles) and in present participle (chront) in -ent. For example: choinen, choint, choinent (to walk).

Verbs conjugate by cutting out the infinitive suffix, leaving only the root of the word, and adding the correct ending according to person, tense and number. The indicative and subjunctive moods behaves in the same way as in Spanish.


 * Present/Past: Root + endings. The conjugation for the singular first person in present consists only of the root, often with vocalic/consonantic changes.


 * Future/Conditional: Infinitive + endings or root + endings with r instead of the n of the infinitive, it depends on the last letter of the root. Future is mostly used in written language; in spoken language, future is replaced by aven + infinitive. There's also the future with vaten + infinitive, equivalent to the future with going to.


 * Present perfect: The present perfect is used for past actions in specific points in time; the past simple is used for habitual actions in the past. For example: Ew y ġout che mo bren. (I played with my cousin, I've played with my cousin). Ew ġouait che mo bren. (I used to played with my cousin).


 * Present subjunctive: Generally, the form of the singular first person of the present indicative is used as the root, then the endings are added. It tends to correspond to the present indicative.


 * Past subjunctive: If the past participle is irregular, it is used as the root (without the last t) and then the same endings as the past indicative are used; otherwise, the past subjunctive endings are used.


 * Example: pewen (to put).

Irregular conjugations

Phrasal verbs

In medoim there are also phrasal verbs (chepewts verbs), in which a preposition or prefix joins a verb and changes its meaning. For example:


 * Vatten: To go.
 * Svatten: To go out.
 * Vatten in: To enter.
 * Sorvatten: To step.

Sometimes a base verb (one without prefix/preposition) has disappeared, but the phrasal has remained, for example, picen isn't a word, but picen in means to start, to begin.

Vocabulary

1Archaic, replaced by cønen.

2Archaic, replaced by neuzen.

6. Accent

The prosodic accent falls generally on the second syllable and tends to stay like that within derived words. However, some suffixes, mostly adjectival, will attract it, for example, the suffix -ieç in tigrieç.

Example text
A una amiga del alma

Querida Bea: Perdona que no te haya escrito tan pronto como te prometí, pero créeme que esto del Erasmus es como una montaña rusa: desde que llegué no he parado de dar vueltas, arriba y abajo, de día y de noche, en una especie de baile que nunca acaba. El día lo paso en la facultad sin parar de coger apuntes, asistir a tutorías, empollar en la mediateca y hablar con gente de un montón de países, tratando de entender todo lo que oigo en una lengua que todavía no domino del todo, aunque estoy progresando muchísimo. Y por la noche, aunque acabo molida, siempre tenemos fiesta en casa, pues a la que comparto con otros cuatro erasmus de nacionalidades diferentes vienen amigos y amigas de unos u otros y no veas lo bien que nos lo pasamos.

Bra one megue de l'amme

''Caire Bea: Scoz mig ver n'aven dig denn teud scred, vil ew y dig as vermist, me creid at mig, qu'ast de l'Ermouç vil one rouce montang est: Die d'as qu'ew y chigt, n'y ew bart de berchoinen, ver tots les laits, au daie et ai nøgh, in one speiç de danç, que ne ġamie fint. Au daie main ew au faccout før baren de newes gaben, d'alles totres seden, d'au mittieg coven et de falen che ġant de moghs paies, at drattent de chebrinten tot, as qu'ew at one linwe scogh, qu'ew ne tobbe dø tot deun, hoin qu'ew moghoin vergrie feg. Au nøgh, hoin qu'ew choste fin, avens neus todde feide au kee, pewt qu'at ase, qu'ew che d'eurs gar ermouç de defrantes nachnits chebart, veinnent megs et megues d'ons et d'eurs et do ne sas cant ben le peens neus.''