Ælis

Preliminary Remarks
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General information
hAnWnArAsAiA2tE (Welcome!)

k1lISK  [Ælis] is a constructed a priori language with a very particular approach on grammar. As such, it might be very interesting for aficionados of theoretical linguistics to use Ælis as a tool to start philosophizing about and exploring the boundaries of human grammar. Ælis has no nouns, adjectives, verbs or adverbs in a grammatical sense; verb conjugations, inflections, declensions, tenses, moods or voices; (hardly any) stress in words which is relevant; no tones, no fixed word order, (hardly any) punctuation, and no spaces to divide words or sentences from one another. Nonetheless, Ælis has a solid, very consistent and unambiguous grammar. Apart from the philosophical aspect, the language aims to be an artlang, aesthetically appealing both to the ear and the eye; as well as an auxlang, equally easy to learn for speakers with a variety of native backgrounds.

Phonemes
Bold-faced phonemes represent the preferred pronunciation (IPA), phonemes in brackets are allowed variations that will not cause ambiguity.

Alphabet
The alphabet has 21 letters, of which 5 vowels, 15 consonants and 1 diphthong which is regarded as a vowel. It is written with proper symbols:

Syllabic writing
The two bottom rows of the foregoing alphabetic table represent the so called primary and secondary case. Ælis is written in an alternation of these two cases in order for the different root words (which in Ælis equal syllables) to be visually distinguishable. The writing style follows this pattern: the first phoneme of every root word is written in the primary case, every other letter is written in the secondary case. They have been designed so that the secondary case letters appear to the top-right of the primary case letters. For example:


 * aM = [am]
 * mA = [ma]

Phonemic root word structure
Apart from proper names and loaned words, only certain root word patterns are admissible:

Two letter root words: Three letter root words:
 * CV:  tW  [tæ] (colour)
 * VC:  aR  [ar] (reason, causality)
 * VV:  uA  [ua] (centre, half)
 * CVC:  lIS  [lis] (concept, notion)
 * CVV:  rEA  [rea] (name)

Morphological word structure
Words are constructed with one simple but fundamental guideline: the head of the root word cluster has a nominal value; the tail of the root word cluster is dependent, adjectival or adverbial. An example:  tE [te] means 'human/person'. uBlE [uble] means 'strong'. Words that are conceptually related will mostly be lexically similar too. Some examples of words that are lexically and semantically related:
 * tEuBlE [te-uble] means 'a strong person'
 * uBlEtE [uble-te] means 'human strength'

tEnAlE [tenale] ==> person-quality-much --> friend

mAnAlE  [manale] ==> male-quality-much --> a male friend

nInAlE [ninale] ==> female-quality-much --> a female friend

nInAiO  [ninaio] ==> female-quality-little --> a female enemy

mAnAiO  [manaio] ==> male-quality-little --> a male enemy

tEnAiO  [tenaio] ==> person-quality-little --> an enemy

iItEnAlE  [iitenale] ==> target-person-quality-much --> to become friends with

lItEnAlE  [litenale] ==> origin-person-quality-much --> to stop being friends with

etc.

Number concepts
Along with the 21 common letters of the alphabet, Ælis uses a set of ten additional symbols called number concepts. They could be considered to be digits or ciphers, but they only appear within certain words. They number concepts all have a numeric value:

Counting
One of the primary uses of number concepts is proper numbers. The numbers from 0 to 9 are formed by prefixing the a number concept to the number morpheme qA [qa].

Accordingly, the first ten numbers are:

Personal pronouns
Personal pronouns exist in 6 grammatical persons and three genders. The undefined pronouns are only used if a speaker is unaware of the gender, doesn't wish to specify, or, in plurals, for referring to a group where both sexes are represented. Furthermore, personal pronouns are only used for arguments that can be interpreted as having a character: people, or sometimes animals, anthropomorphized objects (in literature),...

Topicalization
Ælis grammar does not have grammatical functions such as subject, verb and object; nor does it have word types. Instead, there is a very big emphasis on the semantical functions that different words have within a sentence. Topicalization, or function marking, covers both the aspects of word type and grammatical function in one blow. Every word in a sentence must be preceded a certain root word that denotes its specific function in the sentence. It is noteworthy that none of these semantical functions must be obligatorily present in a sentence for it to be grammatically correct (unlike is often the case with grammatical functions S-V-O), nor is any of the functions restricted to only one use per sentence.

Primary functions
Primary functions divide sentences into the equivalent of constituents (noun phrase, verb phrase, adverbial phrase, etc.). Since Ælis doesn't use spaces, the primary functions serve as a means of delineating different words within a sentence. There are 4 primary functions.

Topic

 * → Corresponding morpheme: hA [ha].

The topic describes an action or state. In full sentences, it will often be translated with a verb, though the topic itself has no form of conjugation, tense or mood. The topic is always essive, which means that it should be interpreted as a noun phrase that starts with 'there is', 'there are'.

E.g.: hA dOE [ ha doe]
 * => to burn / there is (a) fire.

Patient

 * → Corresponding morpheme: iA [ia].

The patient is the syntactical object that is affected by the topic. It has no active participation in the process expressed by the topic. It will generally translate to an (in)direct object or prepositional object whenever the topic expresses an action, or the subject if the topic describes a (passive) state.

E.g.: iA aNoWsIhAdOE [ ia 'anoæsi hadoe]
 * => the house burns / the house is on fire.

Agent

 * → Corresponding morpheme: lA [la].

The agent is the syntactical object that initiates the topic. The appearance of an agent can turn a sentence into a (transitive) action.

E.g.: lA 1mAiAaNoWsIhAdOE [ la æma ia'anoæsi hadoe]
 * => I set fire to the house.

Modifier

 * → Corresponding morpheme: iR [ir].

A modifier adds information to a sentence which cannot be covered by one of the previous functions. Generally, the modifier corresponds to a variety of adverbial constituents: time, place, manner, cause, etc. Modifiers also harbour the key to expressing time tenses.

E.g.: iR aSdAlElA1mAiAaNoWsIhAdOE [ ir asdale laæma ia'anoæsi hadoe]
 * => I will set fire to the house.

Subordinate functions
Subordinate functions are functions that can only appear in combination with one of the primary functions. Thus, they are strongly tied to one specific argument of the sentence.

Characteristic

 * → Corresponding morpheme: eM [em].

A characteristic gives you additional information of a specific syntactical argument. The information is always considered to be either inherent to the respective argument, or of predictable nature. It will mostly translate to an adjectival description of age, size, shape, colour, etc.

E.g.: iRaSdAlElA1mAiAaNoWsI iAeM vErAhAdOE [irasdale laæma ia'anoæsi iaem vera hadoe]
 * => I will set fire to the precious house.

Referent

 * → Corresponding morpheme: vW [væ].

The referent is a syntactical element that places an argument in a semantical relation to something else. The referent may therefore correspond to the use of a comparative or superlative structure (e.g.: I am bigger than you), to a relative indication in time or space (e.g.: in front of me), but also simply to a possessive pronoun. The referent can be analytically translated as a relative clause that starts with 'when compared to...': when compared to you, I am bigger / when compared to me, in the front.

E.g.: iRaSdAlElA1mAiAaNoWsIiAeMvErA iAvW 2mAhAdOE [irasdale laæma ia'anoæsi iaemvera iavæ ema hadoe]
 * => I will set fire to that precious house of yours.

Free functions
The free functions are functions that do not take part in the hieratic relationship that the primary and subordinate functions have to each other.

Sentence bracket

 * → Corresponding morpheme: lW [læ] + iW [iæ].

The sentence bracket is a set of two morphemes that allow subordinate clauses to be constructed within the main clause. The opening bracket 'læ' is comparable to the relative pronouns 'that' and 'which', and the closing bracket 'iæ' is used to mark the end of the subclause. The entire sentence bracket will be subordinate to the root word to which it is suffixed, and will probably in turn feature primary and subordinate functions itself.

E.g.: iRaSdAlElA1mA iAlW iAaNoWsIlA2mAhAeLeAnArA iW iAeMvErAiAvW2mA [irasdale laæma ialæ ia'anoæsi la'ema haeleanara iæ iaemvera iavæ'ema]
 * => I will set fire to the precious house of yours that you care for so deeply.

Sentence breaker

 * → Corresponding morpheme: tA [ta].

The sentence breaker is a morpheme placed in between two sentences to separate them. Without the sentence breaker, arguments with the same function are considered to be enumerations. E.g.:

lA1mAhAeRlAksEMKhAeN [laæma haer laSem haen] (meAGENT visionTOPIC SamAGENT hearingTOPIC)
 * => Sam and I are looking and listening.

lA1mAhAeR tA lAksEMKhAeN [laæma haer ta laSem haen] (meAGENT visionTOPIC -(sent.br.)- SamAGENT hearingTOPIC)
 * => I am looking and Sam is listening.

Example text


The Lord's Prayer