Ughonic

Phonology

The phoneme inventory of Ughonic consists of nine vowel monophthongs and 21 consonants. Peculiarities of Ughonic include the numerous central vowel phonemes and the absence of any diphthongs. Occasionally, interjections and recently borrowed loanwords may contain unusual sounds.

Vowels

There are nine vowel phonemes in Ughonic. Unusually, the language contrasts a number of central vowels, ones which are unusual as phonemes. There are three front vowels, two back vowels and four central vowels. The schwa, a severely reduced central vowel /ə/ is a phoneme in its own right, whereas in English it is usually found as an allophone of various vowels in unstressed positions.

Phoneme	Equivalent
/æ/	cat
/ɛ/	set
/i/	eat
/ɞ/	Like the non-rhotic pronunciation of bird said with rounded lips.
/ɨ/	Like bit, just slightly reduced.
/ʉ/	Like book, just slightly reduced.
/ə/	about
/ɒ/	box
/u/	boot

There are no proper diphthongs in Ughonic, however each vowel can be combined with a glide to form what some may consider a diphthong. For example bejkh meaning "horse" is pronounced /bɛjx/.

Consonants

The standard language has 21 consonant phonemes.

	Bilabial	Labio- Dental	Alveolar	Post- Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal	m		n		ɲ
Ploisive	p b		t d			k g
Fricative		f v	s z	ʃ ʒ		x ɣ
Affricate			ts	tʃ
Tap			ɾ
Lateral			l

The consonant inventory is fairly regular, and similar to that of many other languages. Only three sounds appear in Ughonic that do not appear in English. These are /ɲ/, /x/ and /ɣ/. /ɲ/ is like the sound in onion before a /j/ sound. /x/ is the sound in the scottish pronunciation of loch, and /ɣ/ is the voiced counterpart of this sound.

Orthography

The alphabet is completely standard, following a one-to-one correspondence between phonemes and letters.

Letter	Phoneme	English Pronunciation	Notes
A a	/æ/	axe
 â	/ɨ/	roses	Similar to the pronunciation of unstressed 'i' in English.
B b	/b/	boy
C c	/ts/	mats
Ç ç	/tʃ/	chalk	Can be represented by the digraph 'ch' in systems where putting in 'ç' could be difficult.
D d	/d/	door
E e	/ɛ/	egg
Ë ë	/ə/	taken
F f	/f/	foot
G g	/g/	gate
GH Gh gh	/ɣ/	Like the pronunciation of Scottish 'loch' with voice.
H h	-	-	The phoneme /h/ is not native to Ughonic, so the letter <h> is found only in the digraphs <gh>, <kh>, <sh> and <zh>.
I i	/i/	sea	Y represents /i/ at the end of words, whereas 'I' represents it elsewhere.
J j	/j/	yes
K k	/k/	car
KH Kh kh	/x/	Like the pronunciation of Scottish 'loch'.
L l	/l/	lamb
M m	/m/	mouse
N n	/n/	nice
NJ Nj nj	/ɲ/	Like the pronunciation of union.
O o	/ɒ/	bottle
Õ õ	/ɞ/	Rounded form of bird
P p	/p/	pot
Q q	/k/	cat	Q q is not found in native Ughonic words, and foreign words that contain this are usually quickly replaced with more Ughonic-friendly letters, for example aqueduct > akvëdukt, quasar > kvazar.
R r	/ɾ/	Like the intervocalic GA pronunciation of better	Because of the non-rhotic nature of Ughonic, 'r' is silent after vowels, instead it lengthens the preceding vowel.
S s	/s/	see
SH Sh sh	/ʃ/	shout
T t	/t/	tap
U u	/u/	coup
Û û	/ʉ/	Similar to good
V v	/v/	very
W w	/v/	very	W is not found in native Ughonic words, and is usually replaced with 'v' in natuaralised foreign words.
X x	/ks/	tax	X is not found in native Ughonic words, and is usually replaced with 'ks' in naturalised foreign words.
Y y	/i/	see	Y represents /i/ at the end of words, whereas 'I' represents it elsewhere.
Z z	/z/	zebra
ZH Zh zh	/ʒ/	vision

Grammar

Verbs

Verbs in Ughonic come in four tenses: Past, Present, Present Participle and Future. There is also a gerund form of most verbs.

In the following table there is an example of the verb tense system, using the verb venë meaning "to say".

Tense	Suffix	Result	Meaning
Past	-ëkh	venëkh	"said"
Present	[none]	venë	say(s)
Present Participle	-ashek	venashek	saying
Future	-abal	venabal	will say

The usual verb word order is SOV (Subject-Object-Verb).

Ughonic	English	Transliteration
Umek dukhon venëkh.	"I said to you"	(I+nom. you+dat. said).
Gõrek gõrim maçek.	"Dog eat dog"	(Dog+nom. dog+acc. to eat)

The Verb 'To Be'

The verb 'to be' in Ughonic is quite troublesome in that often it is used in a different way from how it is in English, and sometimes even different than other verbs in Ughonic. It is also, in many cases, left out altogether.

'To Be' as a Copula

When 'to be' is a copula, the root shkë is used. It is then treated as just another verb, so follows the regular pattern of SOV, with nominative and accusative nouns. So for example in the sentence "Dogs are canines", it would be written "Gõrakek kaninakim shkë" (Dog+pl+nom. canine+pl+acc. to be).

'To Be' before adjectives

In Ughonic, when the verb 'to be' comes before an adjective, the root seti is used. So the sentence "That cat is ugly" becomes "Ptë nicën golzhënëm seti " (that cat+nom. is ugly), which literally means "that cat is ugly". The root "seti" is written after the noun and adjective.

'To Be' describing a location

When 'to be' is used before a location, as in "I am here", the root a is used. So the sentence "I am here" is written Umek a malgamat.

'To Be' before other verbs

When 'to be' is needed before verbs, the root ndë is needed. It is put immediately after the noun and before the verbs. The nominative forms of verbs are used in these instances.

English	Ughonic	Gloss
I am going	Umek ndë sânelashek	I am going
The man was murdered	Omek ndënëkh krastanëkh	The man was murdered.

Cancelling A Verb

The word një can be used to cancel any verb. For example: Umek ndë sânelashek "I am going" can be altered to Umek një ndë sânelashek.

Nouns

Nouns in Ughonic are highly declined for number, possession and case. Rather than having separate case forms for plural and singular (as in Latin), the plural suffix (-k) is added to the noun, with the case suffix added after.

Declension

Case

There are -- cases in Ughonic, each of which is notified by a suffix. Unusually for a language, Ughonic marks both the nominative and accusative forms of nouns.

The following table shows noun declension using the noun õrçem meaning "house".

Case	Case Suffix	Result	Meaning
Nominative	-ek	õrçemek	house
Accusative	-im	õrçemim	house
Dative	-on	õrçemon	to (the) house
Genitive	-ûsh	õrçemûsh	of (the) house
Comitative	-ekh	õrçemekh	with (the) house
Adessive	-aly	õrçemaly	on (the) house
Inessive	-ân	õrçemân	in (the) house
Benefactive	-ep	õrçemep	for (the) house

Posession

The posessor of a noun is indicated in the form of a short suffix added to the end of the word.

Posessor	Suffix	Result	Meaning
1st P. Sing.	-ur	õrçemur	my house
2nd P. Sing.	-ud	õrçemud	your (sing.) house
3rd P. Sing.	-uk	õrçemuk	his/her/it's house
1st P. Plur.	-ërâk	õrçemërâk	our house
2nd P. Plur.	-ëdâk	õrçemëdâk	you (pl.) house
3rd P. Plur.	-ëkâk	õrçemëkâk	their house

For example

• Umek õrçemuron shâmbëkh. "I went to my house".

Number

The plural of a noun is formed by the suffix -k. In the case of nouns that end in a consonant, the -k suffix is preceded by an a.

Plural vs Genitive Suffix

The plural and genitive suffixes in Ughonic both revolve around the letter -k. However, the plural suffix is just a plain -k after vowels, and -ak after consonants, whereas the genitive suffix is -nek after vowels, and -ek after consonants.

Moveable N

Ughonic uses a moveable /n/, which is placed in between the word root ending in a vowel and a declining suffix that begins with a vowel. This is to prevent the collision of the two vowels, as vowels are never found adjacent to each other in Ughonic.

So for example, the word voleptu meaning "mother", becomes voleptunërâk, when the 1st person plural possessive suffix -ërâk is added.

Articles

There are no articles in Ughonic, so the word ptesh can mean "boy", "the boy" or "a boy".

Adjectives

Adjectives in Ughonic determine the quality of nouns and pronouns.

The first syntactical function of Ughonic adjectives is to define a noun. (For e.g. "The pretty woman is here": Mâram khntisa a malgamat).

Secondly, they describe a copula. (For e.g. "The woman is pretty": Mâram khntisa seti).

Interrogatives

Interrogative words in Ughonic come a) as the opener to a question, and b) as a pronoun.

English	Ughonic Question	Example	Ughonic Pronoun	Example
what	ke	ke lanzûlur? "what is your name?"	e ke	ndanek e ke lanzûlur shkë "this is what my name is"
who	gavan	gavan dukh? "who are you?"	e gavan	nda e gavan umek shkë "this is who I am"
why	gaghnë	gaghnë umek ndanon skhalâm? "why did you do this?"	e gaghnë	umek ndanon skhalâmëkh e gaghnë. "I did this because"
when	kte	kte dukhek devegënashek "when are you leaving?"	e kte	ndanek e ke umek devegënabal shkë "this is when I will leave"
how	kazt	kazt dukhek ndanon skhalâmëkh "how did you do this?"	e kazt	ndanek e kazt umek ndanon skhalâmëkh "this is how I did this!"

Example Texts

English

A swamp is a wetland featuring temporary or permanent inundation of large areas of land by shallow bodies of water. A swamp generally has a substantial number of dry-land protrusions, covered by aquatic vegetation, or vegetation that tolerates periodical inundation. The two main types of swamp are "true" or forest swamps and "transitional" or shrub swamps. The water of a swamp may be fresh water, brackish water or seawater.

Ughonic

Grezhganek stabakim stalan sju mezgoshkerekashek sjujanshkân dënzandër usk zandër reveghak mezgõ stalanûsh sjuttkõlveshakali istrimë. Grezhganek molkhovesakim ërzt e stanastrak, e zta ndë khnshitëkh veghetashkânekh akvatishçë, usk veghetashkânek sjujanshkânim perijodikal udolërdë e zta. Spekunak grezhganûsh drajër jõ grezhganak "emed" (ukh grezhganak sekoj) khno grezhganak "tranzishkânisk" (ukh grezhganak veldezlejë). Sjutt grezhganekûsh sjuttshinë, sjuttdõleg ukh sjuttvejeb telbo shkë.