Middle Pelhaforan

Middle Pelhaforan was a stage of the Pelhaforan language after Old Pelhaforan (OP).

Affricates
/ts/ (z), /tʃ/ (ch)

Vowels
Long vowels are expressed by double vowels (i.e. a: -> 'aa').

Unstressed /e/ is realized as [ə]; unstressed /i/ can be realized as [ɪ].

Diphthongs
/ai/ /au/ /ei/ /oi/

Phonotactics
(C₁(C₂))V₁(V₂)(C₃)

is the Pelhaforan syllable structure, where:


 * C₁ is an optional consonant onset;


 * C₂ is a optional medial consonant which is either /j/ or /w/;


 * V₁(V₂) is either the monopthong or diphthong nuclei, or lengthened vowel;


 * and C₃ is the optional consonant coda, which can be /n/, /t/, /k/, and /ɾ/.

Sound Changes From Old Pelhaforan
The symbols used follow the convention of Index Diachronica.
 * Vs -> V:∅ / _%
 * h -> ∅ / V_V
 * u -> w / _V ! uu
 * i -> j / _V ! ii
 * e -> j / _B
 * e -> e: / _E
 * B -> u / a_
 * a{e, i] -> ai
 * oB -> o:
 * o -> w / _E ! _i
 * d z -> z r / V_V
 * z -> ts
 * o -> ɔ
 * sj si -> ʃ ʃi
 * tj ti -> tʃ tʃi
 * m -> ∅ / _w
 * b -> ʋ / _B
 * nj -> ɲ
 * g -> ∅ / _w
 * e -> i / #_

Nouns
Pelhaforan nouns are not marked for grammatical gender, number, or articles. Pelhaforan has a possession marker, “ki” (also the conjunction for comparisons), which is placed after the possessor and before the possessed object. Unlike in Old Pelhaforan, ki is almost never omitted in formal writing, although dialectally it may be dropped in cases of inalienable possession.

Personal pronouns
Personal pronouns are marked by person and number. An intensive pronoun can be expressed with the suffix “-sur” placed after the personal pronoun. Placed alone after the verb, sur may also express the reflexive.

1zoo derives from OP pronoun zos meaning "this person." It is more colloquial and less formal than het.

2 tee (from OP tes meaning "that person"), kor (from OP goza, "woman"), and kaa (from OP kas, third-person singular pronoun) are masculine, feminine, and neuter respectively.

Classifiers
Noun classifiers are necessary when counting nouns. They classify the noun according to its type. As in OP, the format is numeral-classifier-noun. The noun may be omitted when it is clear from context, as the classifier will give a vague notion of what the noun is. A standalone classifier without the numeral is used before a noun to express indefiniteness.

Common classifiers:
 * "ii" - for humans
 * "ne" - for inanimate objects
 * "shu" - for animals
 * "ben" - 'piece of', 'lump of'
 * "bar" - 'cup of'
 * "tar" - 'line of', 'row of'

Table of Correlatives
Pelhaforan makes a two-way distinction for demonstratives. The proximal demonstrative (‘this’) is “zo”; the distal demonstrative (‘that’) is “te.” The demonstrative adjective is placed before the noun as a regular adjective. No distinction is made between interrogative and indefinite (“any”) pro-forms.

1Shortened from OP yora.

2These pronouns would have been zoo (OP: zos) and tee (OP: tes), but those became personal pronouns. This caused new demonstrative pronouns to be created with the help of ii, the noun classifier for humans.

3 /h/ -> /w/ resolved the conflicting sound changes Vs -> V:∅ / _% and h -> ∅ / V_V.

Another notable determiner is "yo", derived from OP yora, meaning "an unspecified amount or quantity of; some." In this way, the determiner acts similar to a plural marker. It may be used with other determiners, as in "nya yo" ('which ones?') or "zo yo" ('these").

Syntax
The basic word order is subject-verb-object.

Topic-Comment
Pelhaforan is a topic-prominent language. Oftentimes, the topic-comment structure is used in lieu of the normal SVO structure. This is done using "da" as the topic marker, placed after the noun. For example, te dayo, tee sotator means "The man is drunk," or literally "That man, he is drunk."

Copula
The main copula of Pelhaforan is "za" ('to be'). Because of the stative verb nature of Pelhaforan adjectives, za is used only for noun complements. Most standard za sentences utilize an SOV, topic-comment sentence structure. For example, zoo da ii dayo za means "I am a man." This sentence uses da as the topic marker for zoo ('I, me') and places the copula za at the end of the sentence.

Another verb, "rut" ('to be in, to be at'), is used to indicate location. This verb is used alongside adpositional phrases. The verb rut is another verb that uses an SOV sentence form. For example, gare da chiro-zok rut, meaning "they are on the water." However, unlike za, the verb rut may also be used with a normal SVO form, as in gare rut chiro-zok.