Xongeith

Information
'''Made for the August Challenge. I will do this bit later.'''

TODO explain tenses, calendar, conworld, nominalization, pro-forms, registers, participles (adj verb forms), expand lexicon, example texts and writing system.

Consonants
Nasals will always assimilate in place to a following plosive, fricative or trill. The uvular plosive may be pronounced pro-uvular depending on the speaker, but is normally a plain uvular.

Vowels
At the start or ends of words, vowels are automatically surrounded with a glottal stop on their open side: /qa/ would be realized as [qaʔ], and /aq/ would be realized as [ʔaq].

Vowels will assimilate in nasality to a following nasal consonant if it is at the end of a word: /qanan/ would be realized as [qanɑ̃n], and /qa nan/ would be realized as [qaʔ nɑ̃n].

Romanization
Here is a copy and paste friendly version of the romanization: m = m	n = n	ɴ = ng	p = p pʰ = ph	b = b	t = t	tʰ = th d = d	k = k	kʰ = kh	q = q qʰ = qh	ɸ = f	β = v	s = s z = z	ɕ = sh	ʑ = zh	χ = x ʁ = gh	ʜ = h	j = j	r = r ʀ = rr	l = l	a = a	e = e i = i	y = y	o = o	u = u ə = é	ʉ = ú	ɢ = g

Phonotactics
(C)V(V)((f/v)C(f/v)).

The consonant cluster in a coda must follow these rules: It may only have one or two consonants; all the consonants must have the same voice; the f/v may only come before the other consonant if the other consonant is aspirated, and it may only come after the other consonant if that consonant is not aspirated; the syllable with the cluster must be at the end of the word.

Most words have two syllables, but there are some exceptions. The only legal diphthongs are 'ai', 'au', 'ei', and 'ou'. No word roots may end with a trill consonant. For words with two syllables, the stress comes on the first one. With other words the stress is left up to the speaker.

If two vowels find themselves next to eachother, they must be broken up with a ' which represents a glottal stop.

The uvular consonants are the most common in the language.

Example Words
Keikyz = /keikyz/

Ghunúj = /ʁunʉj/

Thúxosf = /tʰʉχosf/

Ghél = /ʁəl/

Kairéfqh = /kairəfqʰ/

Nouns
Nouns are declined according to their gender. The three genders are based upon the three Gods, Tashéth (the God of Water), Néxéx (the God of Land), and Myrref (the God of Sky); therefore, the genders are water, land and sky. Each of the Gods is believed to have created all concepts/objects that have words assigned to them.

There are five different cases: ergative, accusative, absolutive, locative and instrumental. The usage of each will be explained in the syntax section. All of these cases apart from the accusative have singular and plural forms. In the accusative there are singular, plural and dual forms; there used to be dual forms of the other cases in Old-Xongeith, but these fell out of common usage and soon merged with the plural forms. Using the accusative dual is also quite uncommon but it should be used in formal situations.

To decline an noun, one must first apply the case using the following prefixes: (the accusative is the plain form) To create a plural, one must add a bilabial fricative to the end of the last syllable in the word. It must have the same voice as the consonant it is next to (or vowel where it will always be voiced), and if it is next to a aspirated stop it must come before that consonant in order to follow the phonotactics. If the last consonant of the word is already a bilabial fricative, then one must add the vowel '-ú' after that consonant instead of adding another bilabial fricative. Note: in extremely formal, many plurals may be formed by adding '-vu', from which the modern pluralization methods were derived.

Finally, to create the dual accusative, one must add the suffix '-fe' for water and sky nouns, or '-fo' for land nouns.

Here are some examples of declined nouns:

TODO Update these To show indefiniteness a noun may recieve the suffix '-i'. This is not required and only used to solve problems of ambiguity, thus a more correct transliteration for it than the English 'a(n)' would be the word 'another'. This is placed after any plural markers.

Here is a list of the common derivational affixes, applied to the root before any declension. New words may also be created through compounding, however sound change has introduced extra parts between the original words. For example, 'Xongeith' is made from 'Xo' and 'Eith' which means 'person language', but the 'ng' has appeared seemingly without reason.

Adpositional Suffixes
Adpositions are treated as suffixes for nouns and must agree with the gender of the constituent to which they are connected. For example, 'in' in the sentence 'I read the book in the library' could agree with the gender of the words 'book' or 'read', depending on to which it applied. The word 'library' would have the 'in' suffix attached and would be in the accusative case. They also must agree in number with the noun of the prepositional phrase: 'in' would be singular, dual or plural depending on whether 'library' was singular, dual or plural.

Here are the endings for regular adpositions. (Note the many adpositions are irregular and have their forms noted in the lexicon, while the regular ones have their water singular form given only.) Unlike the nouns the dual is still used, even if the noun is actually in the plural.

To clarify: an adpositional suffix must agree with the noun that is part of the PP in number, and the word to which the PP is attached in gender.



In example 1, the PP 'in the library' is attached to the VP with the head 'read', so 'in' would have to agree in gender with 'read'. In example 2, the PP 'in the library' is attached to the NP with the head 'book', so 'in' would have to agree in gender with 'book'. In both examples, 'in' would also have to agree with 'library' in number.

Pronouns
There are four persons, three numbers (singular, dual and plural), four cases and two levels of respect shown in the pronouns. Similar the nouns, the dual forms have started to collapse into the plural, but more forms remain where this has not happened. As far as gender agreement is concerned, all pronouns are land nouns aside from the third person which is explained below.

The first two persons are just like in English (I, me, we, us and you). The third and fourth persons cover the third person in English. The third person is used for an object that has already been written out in full, while the fourth person is used for an object that has not yet been specified. For example, in the sentences "I sleep in my bed. It is very warm." the pronoun 'it' references the bed. However in the sentences "Go to this café. They say it is good." the pronoun 'they' is not shown to reference anything (it doesn't have an antecedent). In the first example, one would use the third person, and in the second example one would use the fourth person. Since one knows the gender of the object being linked to be a third person pronoun, gender agreement may no longer have to assume they are always land nouns. Thus, a third person pronoun's gender is the same as the object's to which it refers.

Here are the respectful forms (used in most situations): Here are the plain forms (used only with close friends); note how the accusative and absolutive have joined together to create a ergative-absolutive morphosyntatic alignment:

Verbs
Verbs fall into five different conjugations of which the first two are most common. There are three tenses: the far past, the close past and the present/future. There are two aspects: the progressive and the aorist. There are several moods, but these are not shown in the morphology.

To negate a verb, one must replace the start of the word with its corresponding negative form. Since verbs must start with an obstruent (i.e. a plosive or fricative) or vowel there are twenty-one ways to negate a verb. If it starts with a vowel, add the prefix 'qh-'; otherwise, use these changes (e.g. f- becomes af-):

Here are some common suffixes for verbs (note the first four can be used as both nouns and adjectives):

Clause Particles
The relative clause particle 'léf' inflects to show in which case the relative argument is in the main clause. The 'that'-clause particle 'dév' inflects to show which argument the 'that'-clause represents in the main clause. The instrumental form has a special meaning, noted in the syntax section.

Adjectives and Adverbs
Adjectives are usually formed out of nouns with the suffix '-o'. This creates a positive adjectives, e.g. 'speed' becomes 'quick' not 'slow'. When they are formed like this they inherit the gender of the noun from which they were made. Here are the endings of adjectives: To create an adverb from any of these forms, just add -f to the end. For example, the word for speed is 'pasúg' so 'quickest' is 'pasúgoza', 'slower' is 'pasúges' and 'as quickly' is 'pasúgiqf'.

Clauses
Clauses usually follow the word VSO. Pronouns and shorter arguments that need to be emphasized are commonly placed before the verb but can be left out if they don't need to be emphasized. For transitive verbs, the actor is placed in the ergative case and the object is put into the accusative case. For intrasitive verbs, the subject takes on the absolutive case. These cases change for negative clauses: see the section on negativity. Here is an example of a transitive clause:

We played a game with the footballs. '''jav dénau dénatú thuthegasf. '1P.ERG play.AOR.PST  game.ACC football.PLU.INS''

Here is a intransitive clause:

The girl is jumping. '''xirat shamarri. 'jump girl.ABS''

If an argument is in the locative case then it becomes the location where the action takes place. If an argument is in the instrumental case then it becomes the instrument used to perform the action but never something/someone with which the action is done in company.

Prepositional Phrases
Prepositional phrases are created by added the preposition suffix to the noun of the PP, and then placing the created word after the head word of the consitituent to which the PP should be attached. The prepositional suffix agrees with the noun it is attached to it number, and in gender to the head argument of the consitituent of which it is a part.

Copulas
To show equality between two objects, a prepositional phrase is used with the other object. The PP is placed directly after the noun, which will be in the accusative case if the sentence does not have anything else to it. Here is an example:

I am a boy. am geqau. 1S.ACC boy.AS.

The irregular preposition 'ou' can also mean 'as'. In a sentence like, 'We must work as a team.", the PP 'as a team' would use the preposition 'ou' and be placed after the word 'we'. Here is the translation:

We must work as a team. '''ngasf vésuau kimú mat. '1P.ABS team.AS.LAND.SING work.ú IMP.''

Stative Verbs
Unlike dynamic verbs, stative verbs are created using the verb 'iri'. The 'state' is placed after 'iri', which may be then followed by adverbs and the clause's arguments. Here is an example:

I love you. '''ir kheqosu am xed. 'do.AOR.PRES love 1S.ERG 2S.ACC''

Negativity
Sentence that have a negative verb take their arguments in different cases. For example, in the negative clause the actor is no longer doing anything; they cannot be put in the ergative case because that is reserved for arguments that are doing something, so they are put into a different case.

Here are the rules:

1. The subject of a negative intransitive verb is put in the accusative.

2. The actor of a negative transitive verb is put in the absolutive.

3. The object of a negative transitive verb is kept in the accusative.

View these example sentences:

The boy loves the girl. '''ir kheqosu sageq marri. 'do.AOR.PRES love boy.ERG girl.ACC''

The girl doesn't like the boy. '''qhir kheqosu shaimarri geq. 'do.NEG.AOR.PRES love girl.ABS boy.ACC''

I jumped. '''xirau ngas. 'jump.PST.AOR 1S.ABS''

I didn't jump. '''ghirrif am. 'jump.PST.AOR.NEG 1S.ACC''

To emphasize the positivity of a clause, reduplication of the first syllable of the verb is used.

I definitely jumped. '''xixirau ngas. 'jump.PST.POS 1S.ABS''

Moods
Moods are always shown by using an auxillary verb. Auxillary verbs come just after the verb they correspond to. The main verb becomes just its root plus the suffix -ú, and the auxillary verb is used to show inflection.

There are six moods: the indicative (to state a fact), the mirative (to show suprise), the imperative (to command someone to do somethine), the cohortative (to encourage an action), the subjunctive (to talk about the concept of an action) and the potential (to show a likely action). Each of these have their own auxillary verb, which can be found in the lexicon.

Here is an example of a mirative sentence.

You didn't jump?!? '''edav xirú sapif. '2P.ABS jump.ú MIR.PST.AOR.NEG''

If the verb is 'iri' plus a state then the mood auxillary is put at the start of the clause.

Let him love her. '''mat irú kheqosu je nét. 'IMP state.ú love 4S.ERG 4S.ACC''

Relative Clauses
Relative clauses are made by putting the relative argument in the subordinate clause (unlike English which leaves it in the main one), preceding the subordinate clause with the particle 'léf' and inserting it into the main clause. The particle 'léf' declines to show what case the noun from the subordinate clause should be in in the main clause. The relative argument is always placed before the verb in the subordinate clause. The verb in the suborinate clause is put into the 'relative form' which uses the suffix '-ev'. Here is an example:

"The girl likes the boy who is romantic."

The main clause is 'The girl likes the boy" and the subordinate clause is '[the boy] is romantic'. There is a link between the object of the first clause and the subject of the second clause. In Xongeith the NP 'the boy' is left in the second clause instead of the first like in English. This is how it is translated:

'''"ir kheqosu samarri léf shaigeq ira'ev lamruta." 'do.AOR.PRES love girl.ERG.SING REL.ACC boy.ABS.SING do.AOR.PRES.REL be_romantic.''

Note that the NP 'the boy' is in the absolutive case (like it would be if the clause 'the boy is romantic' was written out on its own) - not the accusative, and that the particle 'léf' is in the accusative form telling us that the argument to left of the verb in the next clause ('shageq') is also the accusative argument in the main clause.

If only the link between two arguments can be specified (i.e. the actual argument is unknown, but the link is known) then the argument is merely left out in the subordinate clause.

The particle 'léf' may have an prepositional suffix added to it if the relative noun exists in as part of a prepositional phrase in the main clause. The particle 'léf' is always considered singular.

Questions
There are four types of questions. The first is a yes/no question. The second is the same as the first but expects the answer yes; likewise, the third is the same but expects a negative answer. The fourth is used to ask about something in a clause. The first three types of questions are answered with yes ('zú!') or no ('úd!', or more formally 'tara'úd!').

The first type of question is created by making sure the particular part of the clause that needs to be confirmed is at the start of it, something which can only be shown in English by stress. Next, the question particle 'ok' is put at the end of the clause. For example, 'Are you working ?' would be translated as 'kimat edang ok?', while 'Are  you working?' would be translated as 'edang kimat ok?'.

The second and third types of questions are made exactly like the first, but the question particle becomes 'mokh'. If the main verb is positive the answer is usually 'yes', but if the main verb is negative the answer is usually 'no'.

The final type of question is made by writing out the clause with the dummy noun 'korr' which is inflected just like any other water noun in the place where the argument would be and finishing the sentence off with the particle 'ok'. For example, 'Who are you?' is translated as 'xed korrou ok?'

That-Clauses
'That'-clauses are formed just like relative clauses where the linked argument is not specified but using the particle 'dév' and the verb of the 'that'-clause has the 'that'-clause suffix applied to it (-u). Here is an example:

The girls like that the boy works. '''ir kheqosu samarriv dév kima'u shaigeq. 'state.AOR.PRES like girl.ERG.PLU that.ACC work.THAT.AOR.PRES boy.ABS.''

If the 'that'-clause particle 'dév' is in the instrumental form 'dévra' then the clause decribes how the action of the main clause is done, similar to the English preposition 'by', instead of meaning 'with that' (which doesn't make much sense).

Adjectives and Adverbs
Adjective and adverb phrases come directly after the argument that they modify. The phrase starts with the adjective/adverb itself and then may have some PPs. The preposition 'iqhu' is quite common with APs because it can be translated when used in APs to mean 'than' with a comparative, 'as' with a equal comparison or 'for' with a superlative or plain form. Here is an example:

I am eating as quickly as I can. jam jarri léfiqhu pasúgiqf tu'a. 1S.ERG eat.PROG_PRES REL.as.WATER.SING speed.EQU_ADV POT.AOR_PRES.

The adjective may be part of a prepositional phrase itself. This normally occurs with the copula preposition to say things like ' is/are '.

Phrase Order
The order of a noun phrase is this: quantifier (all, some, few, etc.), numerals (3rd, 6, 2, etc.), noun, determiner (this, those, etc.), adjectives (small, purple, clever, etc.), PPs (from the garden, at the shop, etc.).

"All of those five red apples from the garden" would be written in this order: "all of five apples those red garden.from"

Verb phrase order is very simple: arguments, verb, adverbs, arguments,  PPs,  causes/reasons/conditions.

Causes, Reasons and Conditions
To show the cause of an action one must put the causative clause in the cause-form ('-oxis'). This clause is then put in the main clause, usually at the end. The same goes with reasons and conditions with their respective forms. Here are some example:

I jump to get fit. '''ngas xira fysa'ughi. '1S.ABS jump.AOR.PRES get_fit.AOR.PRES.REASON.''

We will work if you two cook the apples. '''ngasf kima khuthú va'oxé xiva nitasf. '1P.ABS work.AOR.PRES cook.ú SUBJ.AOR.PRES.CONDITION 2D.ERG apple.ACC.PLU.''

Note how the tense and mood of a condition can be used to change its meaning to 'when', 'while', 'before', 'after', 'if', etc.

Tenses
Verb are inflected for tense and aspect. The tenses are present, past and far-past. The aspects are progressive and aorist. These do not translate easily into English's system. Here are the approximate translations:

Vocabulary
http://conlang.wikia.com/wiki/Xongeith/Vocabulary

Numbers
Xongeith uses a base eight numeral system. Here are the numbers from zero to seven. To make a number from eight to seventy-seven, one must place these suffixes after one of the words for digits. For larger numbers (which were rarely seen) the digits are just read of in pairs from left to right joined together by '-né'. For examples, the number 1,234,567 is 4,553,207 in octal and is translated as: "zhenépabonévouqemnépa'asau".

Examples
I am a boy. am geqau.

We two are boys. amva geqauve.

We are boys. av geqauf.

Article 1
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

éto e shaixov rraqe'au ym ovau xaki'iqhu ym shinagfiqhif.

make all human.PLU.ABS free.AS.LAND.SING and equal.AS.LAND.SING status.IN.WATER.SING and right.IN.WATER.PLU.

Article 2
Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.