Nuirn

Alphabet
When written in the Latin alphabet, Nuirn uses the following characters:

a b c d e f g h i (j k) l m n o p q r s t u v (w) x y z þ æ ø

The characters j and w are not frequently used; the vowels i and u, combined with the grave accent, fulfil the function of representing the sounds of English /y/ and /w/ respectively. The letter k is used chiefly as the second element of the digraph ck, and sk,| indicating the English "sh" sound.

Two diacritical marks can appear over vowels. The acute accent:

á é í ó ú ý

originated as an indication of vowel length. In fact, the long vowels differ in articulation as well as in length from their short counterparts.

All vowels can also bear an grave accent:

à è ì ò ù

The grave accent has a variety of functions. Its most basic is as an indication of stress. Most Nuirn words bear the stress on their first syllable. The grave accent is used when the stress occurs elsewhere. The grave accent is used also to indicate falling diphthongs and the use of glides in the syllable onset: uàtn, "water"; iènte, "giant". The grave accent also appears over the vowels of strong roots, about which more below.

The circumflex accent

â ê î ô û

combines these two functions. It is often omitted, because the presence of an acute accent usually indicates that the vowel carrying it also bears stress: iár, also iâr, "year", similar to English "yore:.

2.   Umlaut in vowels and consonants

All Nuirn vowels fall into two umlaut classes. A basic rule of Nuirn phonology is that a root and its inflections must agree in umlaut class. Nuirn also "applies umlaut to consonants": most stops and sonorants have two places of articulation, a palatal and a velar articulation. The quality of the consonant is indicated by the quality of the surrounding vowels, which much match on either side of the consonant. The "high" vowels:

e i y æ ø

indicate a palatal articulation. The low vowels:

a o u

indicate a velar articulation. Changes must occur where a high vowel of a strong inflection is added to a low stem, or where a low vowel is added to a high stem. These changes are umlaut changes, and they also affect the consonant quality.

As such, the Nuirn orthography requires that:

· Any word stem of one syllable contains an inherent umlaut class, high or low; · Any word stem of two or more syllables must be spelled in a manner that indicates the umlaut quality of the vowels and consonants. · Any inflection directly attached to a stem must either match the stem in umlaut quality, or compel changes (such as vowel changes - umlaut proper - or the insertion of weakly pronounced glide vowels) to achieve a match on either side of the consonant.

Inflections that force umlaut changes are "strong" inflections. Inflections that yield to the umlaut class of the root are "weak". The principal strong endings are:

· The -i and -e of the donative and oblique singular cases (the outcome of the old dative case) in the largest noun declension; · The -um of the first person plural verb ending; · The -um shared by the donative and oblique plural cases; and · The -i- or -e- theme vowels of the subjunctive mood in the conjugated verb.

Since almost all nouns will take the donative/oblique cases, and most conjugatable verbs will have subjunctive forms, every root stands to be affected by umlaut changes.

Each low vowel and diphthong has a corresponding high vowel; these are the regular umlaut changes:

a    <>    æ o   <>    ø u   <>    y au    <>    øy ao   <>    ø

High stems typically join with low inflections by adding a low, weak glide vowel and changing consonant qualities.

An inflection added to an open root with no final consonant forces no changes.

The endings in -um also lengthen short low roots in prescriptive Nuirn. So while "I carry" is baraec, "we carry" will be bárum or bárunsai.

Some roots resist vowel umlaut. This is one of the things indicated by the grave accent. When it occurs on a monosyllable, it indicates that the root is a "strong" root. Strong roots decline or conjugate with glides and changes in consonant quality rather than by undergoing regular umlaut changes. The typical strong root has a low vowel. Thus, strong roots like cròc, "hill, knob", and gnòs, "face", form their oblique singulars as cròiche and gnòise, rather than **crøce or **gnøse.

There are a number of exceptions to the rule of vowel harmony. The most conspicuous of these is that it does not apply across the internal boundaries of compound words. Some clitic pronouns are treated as compounding elements.

3. Softening

In certain positions -- especially, in syllable final position after another consonant --- and also between two vowels, some consonants are subject to softening. Typically, consonants are indicated as being softened by addition of 'h' - bh, ch, and so forth.

The consonant 'd' has two softened forms; one is written dd and pronounced like the 'th' of English 'either'. The other is written dh and is silent. The written form th serves as the softened form of both 't' and 'þ'.

Consonants which may be softened

bh           as 'v' ch            pronounced [x]; this is the only way of writing this sound dd           'th' as in English 'either' dh           silent fh           silent gh           variously; either as a voiced ch or as v mh            v ph            f th            silent or 'h'

Using the softening rules allow Nuirn spelling to be more regular than it would be otherwise. Thus the word bórdh, "table", pronounced similar to "boor", becomes bórdas ("boor-dus") in the genitive case; adding a syllable removes the softening effect; a purely phonetic spelling would obscure the fact that the root does in fact contain a 'd'.

Nuirn final consonants are subject to word-final devoicing. This usually only occurs if the preceding vowel belongs to the high umlaut class.