Lalakhmet

General Information
Lalakhmet (also known as Proto-Lalakhi) is an a priori, proto- lang. Its descendents will speak in (constate for Nomidian) where Nomidian is spoken.

Consonants
Vowel
 * The lenis voiced plosives are voiced before liquids
 * /*ʀ/ is pronounced [ʁ̥~ʀ̥]
 * /*q/ is pronounced [ɢ̥~ɢ]
 * /*ł/ is pronounced [ɬ]

Phonotactics
C(L)V(C)(C) C - consonant | V - vowel | L - liquid
 * Nasals and glottals cannot be in a cluster
 * [s] cannot follow another consonant
 * [j] and [w] cannot come before another consonant
 * Liquids cannot follow consonants at the end of a syllable
 * Two alveolar consonants cannot be in a cluster

Verb
Verbs are the most complicated aspect of Lalakhmet conjugating to voice, aspect, tense, and mood (and person/number in the passive). Verbs are split into 5 morphological categories, sometimes referred to in Lalakhi grammar as  grammatical form , dependent on their stem (some verbs may not have some forms because of their lexical definition): dynamic, static, reflexive, deponent, and metamorphive.

Voice


 * This section might change

There are two voices: active and passive. All verbs must be at least transitive taking an object. The passive voice therefore makes a pseudo-ergative-absolutive statement: the object, which will have been elevated to the nominative, becomes absolutive, the subject and object; and the previous nominative will have been deleted, but the verb will still be conjugated to it, i.e. remaining the agent but not the subject, replacing the possible "by" statement.

Tense/Aspect

Tense and aspect are profoundly related. For each temporal stage (present, past, future), there are usually three aspects: perfect, progressive, relative. Perfect refers to the action being over and done by the time of being mentioned; progressive refers to the action still occuring or happening by the time of mentioning; and relative is a tense only allowed in a dependent clause where the action is in a time before/after relative to the main clause's verb's tense. Diagram: Timeline of Events Start <––––––––––––––––––|–––––––––––––––|-|––––––––––––|-|––––––––––––––––––––>                   Perfect           Present            Future Imperfect-->|           Future Progressive> Pluperfect|<-|-->|Past Perfect Future Anterior|<---|--->|Far Future There is also a habitual particle, cam.

Mood

Moods are productive and can be used to have meaning. The negation of each mood does not negate the fact but reverses the mood's definition (as in, negative indicative = untrue statement, lie; negative optative = wish not to, desire not to).
 * Indicative: facts and statements
 * Optative: desire or wish
 * Potential: can or able to
 * Imperitive: demand that or require that

Conjugation

 * *cym- : (dyn) to be eating ; (sta) to eat [in general] ; (ref) to eat oneself ; (dep) ~ ; (met) to begin eating

Conjugation tables are split up twice. The first is the grammatical form and the second is the mood. Within each, the paradigm is split into tense and aspect on the side and the top into person and number. Person and number is almost always shown through the nominative in the active. The third person is split into the animate and inanimate genders in that order.

Dynamic
Dynamic verbs define action or physical verbs. In English, these include verbs are frequently in the progressive, be eating, be running, be swimming. Such verbs can only be in a progressive tense. –– –– ––

Noun
Nouns are made up of two parts: the root and the grammatical suffix. Each noun declines in one of the four paradigms; one for each gender.

Gender

There are four genders: masculine, feminine, abstract, and inanimate. Masculine and feminine pertain to an animate creature's (i.e. people and animals) biological gender. The abstract gender is put on anything that is "abstract" in nature (such as ideas, theories, philosophies, etc). The last gender, inanimate, is applied to, as the name of the gender, inanimate objects such as rocks, furniture, and water.

The respective genders have these theme vowels: In pronouns, these four genders are simplified to two: animate and inanimate. This is especially important in verbs (see, Voice and Conjugation).
 * Masculine: *o
 * Feminine: *y
 * Abstract: *oi
 * Inanimate: *ei

Plurality There are three levels of the plural: the singular, the plural, and the partitive. The singular and plural function as in English. The partitive, however, has two parts: one is like that of French where the object being referred to is a part, hence part-itive, of the whole noun which is also achieved in English with the adjective some (i.e. some of the soup, some cake, some coffee). The second aspect is like a paucal where there is a small group of a greater noun (for example: "Can you pass me some of those water glasses" . "We went to see some of those houses down the road" . In both examples, the referred noun is a group of a larger group).

Adjective
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Ideas:
 * Adjectives with degrees of connotativeness (heinous, bad, neutral, good, glorious) and voice (positive/negative, active/passive) with comparativeness made with another specifically declining adjective
 * Roots be at the base with verbs, noun, and adjectives being formed therefrom
 * Strong emphasis on reflexive/passive
 * Ergative-absolutive descendents