Hontor

Hontor is an agglutinative language spoken on the planet Urpaxta (whose name is derived from the related Granapta language) by the Y'qo, the survivors of alien abductions from Earth during the twentieth and twenty first centuries.

Classification and Dialects
Hontor has three dialects: Cedba, Orocty'pe and Upkel.

Orocty'pe is the standard form of the language, and the dialect used in this article when describing Hontor grammar and phonology.

Cedba is spoken in the equatorial regions of Urpaxta. It differs from standard Hontor in its nasalisation of voiced fricatives and aproximates, its use of the particle /ʢː/ before phrases (which is often mistaken for a grunt by speakers of other dialects), and its unique vowel phonology. The Orocty'pe vowels /a/, /ə/, /e/, /ʉ/ and /u/ are replaced by /ʌe/, /ɯ/, /ɤɨ/, /y/ and /o/ respectively in Cedba, and are centralised to /ɜɘ/, /ɨ/, /ɘɨ/, /ʉ/ and /ɵ/ between palatal and velar consonants, such as in the word yac (/ʝɜɘx/). Cedba also uses /k/ and /g/ in place of the standard /q/ and /ɢ/, and palatalises all nasals.

Upkel is spoken on the island of Aronak in the Sea of Obtokra. Unlike other Hontor dialects, Upkel is fully isolating. All affixes have become particles with the exception of simulfixes, which have been dropped altogether. The only other differences between Upkel and Orocty'pe are its use of /χ/ instead of /h/, and its use of syllabic fricatives instead of vowels. /vʲ/ is used instead of /a/, /ʕ/ instead of /ə/, /ʎ̝/ instead of /e/ and /ʒʷ/ instead of /u/.

Phonotactics
All Hontor syllables are made up of a neucleus with an optional onset and rime. All rimes are made up of only one consonant (excepting that of the prefix hact-), while onsets can be made of one or two consanants, the first allways a  /ʍ/. The following consonant must then either be a tap, trill or approximate.

Neuclei may be made up of either diphthongs, monophthongs, or syllabic sonorants. All sonorants can be either syllabic or non syllabic, the former indicated in the orthography by a following apostrophe, eg:

W'ta (courage) = /u˔ta/

/u˔/ does not contrast with /u/, yet its replacement by /u/ is random, and neither behave like traditional allophones. For this reason, they are represented in the orthography using different letters.

/h/ is only permitted as an onset.

Stress is allways placed on the first syllable of words in Hontor, unless they are affected by a suprafix.

The number of syllables in a Hontor word never exceeds five.

Diphongs permissible in Hontor are /ɔʉ/, /əe/, /aɔ/ and /ɚɪ˞ /. The phonemes /ɚ/ and /ɪ˞ / are not permitted as monophthongs.

Word final /ɢ/ becomes /ʁ˕/ in Hontor, and front vowels are rounded before bilabial or labiovelar consonants. These allophones are not represented in the orthography.

Nouns and Pronouns
All nouns are naturally neuter. To express them as feminine, the prefix hact- is placed before them. Aditionallly, if a neuter noun contains a velar or uvular consonant, this must be substituted for a bilabial, and vice versa, eg:

ekpox (bear (neuter))→hactepkov (bear (feminine))

iwpu (cow (neuter))→hactiwku (cow (feminine))

Labiovelars are unaffected by this process.

If a noun contains the phoneme /ʉ/, changing it to /ɚɪ˞ / and adding the suffix -är renders it as masculine, eg:

inke (mouse (neuter))→i'nkeär (mouse (masculine))

All nouns that don't contain /ʉ/ are rendered as masculine by the prefix ulaet-, eg:

unaot (kestrel (neuter))→ulaetunaot (kestrel (masculine))

A noun's gender can also become the object of a sentence with the noun itself acting as the object if the particle qao is placed after it, eg:

ud (wheel (neuter))→ud qao (the wheel is neuter)

This constitutes a complete sentence in Hontor.

There are three pronouns in Hontor: rx'd (first person), kup (seccond person), and qäe (third person). Like nouns, pronouns can be given gender, which can be made demonstrative by the particle qao.

All nouns and pronouns can be pluralised by placing the particle gw'rqa before them. This particle can also be used to intensify adjectives, eg:

germukta (large)→gw'rqa germukta (very large)

Verbs
All Hontor verbs can be either transitive or intransitive. Intransitive verbs are placed before the noun they relate to, while transitive verbs are placed at the end of a sentence after the object. Aside from this, there is no distinction between transitive and intransitive verbs.

All verbs are naturally in the present tense, and can be expressed in the past tense by placing the particle qur after them. To express a verb in the future tense, they are given a disfix by either removing the final consonant (if there is one), or else the final syllable, eg:

enras (to grow)→enra (will grow)

orbo (to rise)→or (will rise)

Syntax
Hontor sentences use the SOV word order (unless using a single noun and the particle qao (see Nouns and Pronouns)), with adjectives given suprafixes to determine which word they relate to. Stress is placed on the first syllable of an adjective to show it relates to the subject, on the seccond syllable to show it relates to the object, and on the third syllable to show it relates to the verb. The stressed neuclei of adjectives are given accute accents in Hontor orthography, despite the stressed syllables of other Hontor words having no visual representation.

Phrases are expressed as incomplete sentences (ie: using a transitive verb and either only a subject or only an object), and must include a verb. Wanqo tunrä (old man wishbone) is therefore not a possible phrase in Hontor. Phrases may be used as the subjects or objects of sentences, but must be bordered on either side by the particle qu, eg:

Fwqaomin qu nawe vi qur qu gektä.

Translation:

A cat ate a dead rat it hadn't killed itself.

Literally:

Cat (phrase border) rat kill (past tense marker) (phrase border) eat.

Sample Lexicon
Aken           n. skull

Anruk           v. to escape

-Är                suffix. added to nouns containing the phoneme /ʉ/ to render them masculine

Bejtura        adj. tall

Cuqm'          n. tree

Ekpox          n. bear

Enras           v. to grow

Erw'm          n. eye

Fwqaomin    n. cat

Fwrap          n. the star the planet Urpaxta orbits around

Gekt'ä           v. to eat

Geqcoi         n. adolescent

Gequndä     adj. removable

Germukta   adj. large

Gw'rqa        particle. placed before nouns to pluralise them and before adjectives to intensify them

Hact-           prefix. used to express a noun as feminine

Horam         n. adult

Icto              v. to move

Inke              n. mouse

Irmakä          adj. impossible

Iwpu             n. cow

Jupi              n. greeting; welcome; acceptance; respect

Jy'm             v. to row (a boat)

Kaoql'           n. death

Kedrop         n. the planet Urpaxta

Kup              seccond person pronoun

Kur               n. responsibility

Nawe           n. rat

N'qe             v. to occupy

Orbo            v. to rise

Puztx'mä      adj. thisly

Qäe              third person pronoun

Qao              particle. used to render the gender of the preceding noun as the subject of a sentence

Qotn'            v. to break; to ruin; to shatter

Qu                particle. placed on either side of phrases to distinguish them from the surrounding parts of a sentence

Qur               particle. placed after verbs to mark the past tense

R'päen          v. to laugh

Rx'd              first person pronoun

Tunrä            n. wishbone

Ud                 n. wheel

Ulaet-            prefix. placed before nouns that don't contain the phoneme /ʉ/ to render them masculine

Unaot            n. kestrel

Vi                  v. to kill

Wanqo          n. old man

W'ta              n. courage

Xorom           n. world

Yac              v. to resist

Example text
Anruk kaoql' 'í'rmakä xorom n'qe puzt'x́mä.

Translation:

There was no way to escape death in a world like this.

Literally:

Escape death impossible (nominative) world occupy thisly (accusative).